“Yeah,” Catcher said ruefully. “That’s beginning to feel more and more common.”
He and Mallory walked inside, closed the door, turned off the light above their small porch, a signal that they were locked safely inside.
“Let’s go home, Sentinel.”
I’d been excited to leave the House earlier in the evening, eager to get to Wrigley, enjoy a beer, and watch some baseball. And now, with the evening having taken such an ugly turn, I couldn’t wait to get home again.
CHAPTER FOUR
A DOCTOR IN THE HOUSE
Traffic on the Kennedy hadn’t been any better than Lake Shore Drive. We’d avoided the accident, but not the three-mile backup that kept traffic at a crawl, so it took an hour to get back to Hyde Park.
Cadogan House glowed in the darkness, a beacon of warm light and white stone. The House was three stories of imposing French architecture surrounded by rolling lawns and an enormous wrought-iron fence meant to keep out enemies, paparazzi, and curious passersby.
There was a gate in front, recently upgraded by Ethan and at present guarded by humans. Two at the door, and four more patrolling the House’s perimeter. Both were insurance against whatever mischief Adrien Reed might have planned.
We drove the SUV back into the House’s underground parking lot, entered the code on the door that led into the House’s basement floor.
“Ops Room to update Luc?” I asked. The House’s security operations room, along with the arsenal and training room, was located in the basement.
“You will. After you’ve been treated.”
“Treated?”
“Your arm,” he said.
Those two words were enough to remind me of the wound and send it throbbing again.
“Ah. Right.”
He crooked a finger at me, and I fell into step behind him as we took the stairs to the House’s first floor.
The first floor was as lush as the basement was utilitarian. The scent of peonies and roses filled the air from an arrangement on a gorgeous antique table, which complemented the gorgeous woodwork, expensive rugs, and priceless artwork.
There was a desk in the foyer now, where a Novitiate vampire dealt with the supplicants who now requested an audience with Ethan. As one of the twelve members of the Assembly of American Masters, they looked to him for help, advice, and arbitration of disputes.
Ethan acknowledged them before directing me to his office, which was as luxe as the rest of the House. There was thick carpet, an imposing desk, and a comfortable sitting area with leather club chairs. Bookshelves lined the left side of the room, and an enormous conference table spread across the back in front of a bank of windows. They were open now, and would be shuttered automatically when the sun began to rise.
At the moment, the room was full of vampires. Malik, Ethan’s second-in-command, leaned against Ethan’s desk. He was dressed in the Cadogan uniform—fitted black suit, white button-down shirt that contrasted against his dark skin and pale green eyes.
Luc, the House’s guard captain, had tousled blond hair and the face and body of a well-practiced cowboy. He’d been excused from the House’s black-suit dress code. He wore jeans, boots, and a T-shirt with CADOGAN HOUSE GUARD CORPS printed in a circle across the front, the image of a bacon rasher in the middle. SAVIN’ YOUR BACON SINCE 1883 was printed across it. He’d created the design because, to quote him, “nothing fuels a vampire like a good rasher.”
His girlfriend and fellow guard, Lindsey, stood beside him. She was pretty, blond, fashion-conscious, and a very good friend. Tonight, she’d paired neon yellow stilettos with her House uniform. Matched with the jaunty high ponytail and small neon earrings, she added a little flair to the otherwise unrelieved black.
Juliet, another House guard, stood nearby with a bottle of green juice in hand. She was petite and looked delicate, with cream and roses skin and red hair, but she was a ferocious and determined fighter.
She’d recently decided “juicing” would further enhance her butt-kicking abilities, and she’d tried to foist one of her liquid kale concoctions on me. I declined to drink anything that looked like lawn clippings. Besides, if I wasn’t pumping my body with trans fats, I wasn’t fully utilizing my immortality.
When we stepped into the doorway, the vampires took in my blood-spattered T-shirt and bandage and Ethan’s own ripped and bloodied T-shirt.