Biting Cold (Chicagoland Vampires 6)

"You remember Paulie, Seth Tate's former protege? He's dead."

Paulie Cermak, a cigar stub of a man with an accent bigger than he was, had run Seth Tate's drug operation. They distributed V, a drug that enhanced the sensation of being a vampire and made users uber-aggressive.

"Is that so surprising?" Ethan asked. "Mr. Cermak ran with a tough crowd."

Malik puled out his cel phone and thumbed across the screen, then showed it to me. The image was in black and white, but its subject was clear enough: Paulie on his back on the ground, lying in a puddle of blood. It looked like his throat had been cut.

I grimaced. "I'm not saying I liked the guy, but I wouldn't wish that on him."

"No," Malik agreed. "It's not a pretty way to go."

"Time of death?" Ethan asked.

"About eight hours ago."

"Plenty of time for the Tates to make it back from Nebraska and do it."

"But why would they?" Ethan asked. "Paulie was old news.

Why would he, or it, or they, or whatever, have any interest in taking him out?"

"Revenge?" Malik offered.

"But he worked for Tate," I said. "And Tate handed Paulie over to the cops. There's no revenge to be had."

Of course, there was also no theoretical revenge to be had against Paige, but that didn't stop the Tates from burning down her house.

Helen popped her tidy gray head into the doorway. "He's here."

Ethan stood up and nodded. "We have to assume this is the first of many pleasantries the Tates intend to visit on Chicago."

He looked at me. "Talk to Luc and Keley. Figure out what we don't know and what their agendas might be."

His words and tone were wholy professional; there wasn't even a hint in his manner that we had any connection to each other beyond our relationship as Sentinel and Master. Granted, we were discussing serious business and he had a meeting with Darius in the offing, but that didn't stop the gnawing in my stomach.

I nodded and walked into the halway, closing the door behind me, then stood there for a moment, my head against the wal.

Our relationship moved like an awkward and il-timed dance - forever one step forward, two steps back. But for now, Paulie had to be my first and only concern. So I put Ethan out of my mind and headed for the stairs again.

Each of Chicago's three vampire Houses had a team of guards whose job was to keep the House - and its vampires - safe. As Sentinel, I wasn't technicaly a guard, but since our guards were shorthanded, I was helping out. Each set of guards had a captain and an HQ.

Our HQ was tucked into the basement of Cadogan House, appropriately near the training room and arsenal, and was outfitted with top-of-the-line electronic whoosits and goodies.

Touch-screen panels, wal-mounted screens. Only the best technology for the keepers of Cadogan's safety.

Unfortunately, al the 'lectrics in the world wouldn't rid Luc, the former guard captain, or Keley, the current guard captain, of their love of paper. They stil stuffed our file folders with handouts every day - reports on House activities caled the "Dailies," and any other bits of ephemera they thought we needed to know.

And Luc wasn't even our captain anymore. He was House Second and would presumably stay in that position until Ethan held the reins of the House again. Assuming Ethan would...

I walked into the Ops Room and found Luc and Keley staring up at the image of poor deceased Paulie. Juliet sat at one of the computer monitors, her gaze on the closed-circuit cameras around the House and grounds. Lindsey must have been out on patrol.

"Pretty sight, isn't it?" I asked, taking a seat across from them at the conference table.

Luc made a snort and crossed his hands over his button-up chambray shirt. "So, you made it back from Nebraska in one piece."

There was a bowl of chocolates on the middle of the table. I leaned over and grabbed a piece. I'd earned it.

"I did," I agreed. "You would have liked it. There were farms and cows galore."

Luc stil had the look of a cowboy just off the range, but at least he was dressed again. My retinas were stil burning from my earlier interruption.

"My ranch days are over," Luc said.

"I thought your guard days were over, too."

Keley snickered. "His excuse is that there are more than enough suits upstairs."

Luc grabbed his own piece of chocolate after carefuly rummaging through the bowl for some select piece. "Ethan and Malik are both quite capable of serving as second of this House.

They have plenty of years under their belts."

It was hard to imagine Ethan as anything other than head of the House, which made the current arrangement awkward at best.

"What was Ethan like as Peter Cadogan's second?" I wondered.

"Particular," Keley said. "An avid learner, but usualy convinced he was right. He respected Peter, but he chafed at the bit. He was eager for his own command."

"That was before my time," Luc said, "but it matches what I've heard." He sat up straight and puled his chair closer to the table. "And now that we've reminisced, why don't we get down to business?"

"I presume Ethan filed you in about Tate?" I asked.

"He did. We have one more Tate and one fewer Tate accomplice." Luc tapped the screen and zeroed in on Paulie's injuries.

"Paulie was forty-two years old," he said. "He was kiled while he was being transported from lockup to a med facility."

"How are the guards?" I wondered.

"Also dead, as were two med techs, although we haven't seen pictures yet. Information doesn't flow in like it did when your grandfather was official."

I nodded. "So it looks like a hit on Paulie by someone with a grudge."

"That could be Tate," Keley said. "There could be facts we don't know."

"There could be," I said. "But let's play devil's advocate.

What if this has nothing to do with Tate? Maybe somebody had a grudge against Paulie wholy unconnected to the mayor's office. That's not hard to imagine, since Paulie was running drugs."

"True," Luc said. "But I'm a fan of Occam's razor - the simplest explanation is usualy the correct one. Two Tates explode onto the scene, and one of their comrades goes rather dead. It's not hard to imagine those two things are related."

"So for now, we work from the assumption that Tate kiled Paulie," Keley said. "And brutaly. Why?"

"Cleaning up loose ends?" Luc suggested.

"I don't know," I said. "Ethan and I talked about this earlier.