Friday Night Bites (Chicagoland Vampires 2)

I sighed and turned back toward the window. Those questions, I guessed, weren't going to be answered tonight. I was hardly two months into my life as a vampire - and I still had an eternity of Ethan to go.

When we reached the House, Ethan parked the car, and we walked up from the basement together.

"What can I do?" I asked when we reached the first floor, not that I hadn't done enough already on behalf of Cadogan and its Master.

He frowned, then shook his head. "Keep me up to date about Jeff's progress with the e-mail. The Masters are investigating on their ends; I'm going to make some calls on my own until they arrive. In the meantime - " He paused, as if he was debating my skills, then finished, "Try the library. See what you can find."

I arched my eyebrows. "The library? What am I looking for?"

"You're the researcher, Sentinel. Figure that out."

Experienced enough to know that a ball gown wasn't appropriate research attire, I returned to my room to change, trading the silk for jeans and a short-sleeved black top.

(A fusty suit wasn't, to my mind, research attire, either.) I was relieved, physically relieved, to hang the dress back in the closet, don jeans and pick up my katana. It felt right in my hand - comforting, as if I'd stepped out of a costume and back into my own skin. I stood in my room for a moment, left hand on the scabbard, right hand on the handle, just breathing.

When I was calmer and ready to face the world again, I grabbed a pen and a couple of notebooks, ready to begin my own brand of investigation.

The more I thought about it, the more I agreed with Ethan that Celina had a role in this.

We didn't have much in the way of evidence, but this was totally her style - to sow discord, put the players in motion, and let the battle proceed on its own. I wasn't sure where Kelley fit in, or if she fit in at all, and I didn't exactly have the skills of a private investigator.

But I could research, study, peruse the library for information that might give us a clue - about Celina's plans, her connections, her history. Whether it would help us in the long run remained to be seen, but it was something proactive, something I had the skills to do.

And more importantly, it was something I could sink into, something that would keep my mind off other things. Off Morgan, and what seemed the inevitable end of that relationship. Off Ethan, and the attraction that, however ill-advised, lingered between us.

Off Mallory.

I found the library quiet and empty - and this time, I double-checked - dropped my pens and notebooks on the table, and headed for the shelves.

Chapter Eighteen

IN THE STACKS

"ate, isn't it?" I blinked away black text and looked up, found Ethan walking toward my table. My immersion solution had worked - I hadn't even heard the library door open.

"Is it?" I flipped my wrist to check the time on my watch, but before I read the dial, he announced, "It's nearly three o'clock. You look to be engrossed."

Over an hour had passed, then, since we'd gone our separate ways. I'd been sitting in the chair with my sword poised beside me, Pumas discarded beneath the table, legs crossed, for most of that time.

I scratched my temple and glanced down at the book before me. "French Revolution," I told him.

Ethan looked confused and crossed his arms over his chest. "French Revolution? To what end are you researching the French Revolution?"

"Because we, I, will better understand who she is, what she's after, if we know where she came from."

"You mean Celina."

"Come here," I told him, flipping through a book to locate the passage I'd found earlier.

When he reached the opposite side of the table, I turned the book toward him and tapped a finger against the relevant paragraph.

Frowning, he braced his hands on the table, leaned forward, and read aloud. "The Navarre family owned substantial holdings in the Burgundy region of France, including a chateaux near Auxerre. On December 31, 1785, the oldest daughter, Marie Co lette, was born." He glanced up. "That would be Celina."

I nodded. Celina Desaulniers, nee Marie Collette Navarre. Vampires changed identities with some frequency, one burden of immortality being the fact that you outlived your name, your family. That tended to make humans a little suspicious; thus, the name changes.

Of course, Ethan had been a vampire for nearly two centuries before Celina had been a twinkle in her parents' aristocratic eyes, and she was a GP member. He'd probably long since memorized her name, date of birth, and hometown. But I thought the next few sentences, hidden away in this petite biography of a long-dead vampire, might be more interesting.

"Marie," he continued, "although born in France, was smuggled to England in 1789 to avoid the harshest persecutions of the Revolution. She became fluent in English and was considered highly intelligent and a rare beauty. She was raised as a foreign-born cousin of the Grenville family, which held the Dukedom of Buckingham. It was assumed that Miss Navarre would marry George Herbert, Viscount Penbridge, but the couple was never formally betrothed. George's family later announced his engagement to Miss Anne Dupree, of London, but George disappeared hours before the marriage was to have taken place."

Ethan made a sound of interest, looked up at me. "Shall we place any bets as to the disposition of poor George?"

"Unfortunately, that's unnecessary on all accounts. And we know what happened to Celina - she was made a vampire. But what's important is what happened to Anne." I waved a hand at him. "Skip to the footnote."

He frowned, but without taking his gaze away from the book, pulled out the chair in front of him. He settled himself into it, crossing one leg over the other, then arranged the book in his right hand, his left across his lap.

"George's body was found four days later," he continued. "The next day, Anne Dupree eloped with George's cousin, Edward." Ethan closed the book, placed it on the table, and frowned at me. "I assume you've taken me on a stroll through English social history for a reason?"

"Now you're ready for the punch line," I told him, and pulled from my stack a slim, leather-bound volume, this one providing biographical information about the current members of the Greenwich Presidium. I turned to the page I'd flagged and read aloud:

"Harold Monmonth, holding the Presidium's fourth position and serving as Council Prelect, was born Edward Fitzwilliam Dupree in London, England, 1774." I lifted my gaze from the book, watched the connections form in his expression.

"So she and Edward, or Harold - what - plotted together? To have George killed?"