Hard Bitten - Chloe Neill [18]
The one closest to Ethan ran a napkin across his dripping mustache, his gaze shifting from me to Ethan. “You two look familiar. I know you?”
Since my photo had been smeared across the front page of the paper a couple of months ago, and Ethan had made the local news more than once since the attack on Cadogan, we probably did look familiar.
“I’m a vampire from Cadogan House,” Ethan said.
Our area of the restaurant, not full but still dotted with late-night munchers, went silent.
This time, the man looked suspiciously at the sandwich. “You like that?”
“It’s great,” Ethan said, then gestured toward me. “This is Merit. She’s from Chicago. She decided I had to try one.”
The man and his companion leaned forward to look at me. “That so?”
“It is.”
He was quiet for a moment. “You had deep dish yet? Or a red hot?”
My heart warmed. We might have been vampires, but at least these guys recognized that we were first and foremost Chicagoans. We knew Wrigley Field and Navy Pier, Daley and rush hour traffic, Soldier Field in December and Oak Street Beach in July. We knew freak snowstorms and freakier heat waves.
But most of all, we knew food: taquerias, red hots, deep dish, great beer. We baked it, fried it, sautéed it, and grilled it, and in our quest to enjoy the sunshine and warmth while we could, we shared that food together.
“Both,” I said. “I got him pizza from Saul’s.”
The man’s bushy eyebrows popped up. “You know about Saul’s?”
I smiled slyly. “Cream cheese and double bacon.”
“Oooh,” the man said, grinning ear to ear. He dropped his napkin and threw his hands into the air. “Cream cheese and double bacon. Our fanged friend here knows about Saul’s Best!” He raised his giant paper cup of soda in a toast. “To you, my friend. Good eats and whatnot.”
“And to you,” Ethan said, raising his sandwich and taking a bite.
Hot beef in the name of peace. I liked it.
“I’m surprised you told him we were vampires,” I told Ethan on the way back to the car. “That you admitted to it, I mean, given what we saw earlier tonight.”
“Sometimes the only way to counter prejudice is to remind them how similar we are. To challenge their perceptions of what it means to be vampire . . . or human. Besides, he wouldn’t have asked who we were if he hadn’t at least suspected, and lying probably would have irritated him further.”
“Quite possibly.”
He smiled magnanimously. “Besides, you clearly wooed them with your cream cheese and double-bacon talk.”
“Who wouldn’t be wooed by cream cheese and double-bacon talk? I mean, other than vegetarians, I guess. But as we have thoroughly established, vegetarianism is not my gig.”
Ethan opened my car door. “No, Sentinel, it is not.”
I’d climbed inside and he did the same, but he didn’t start the car right away.
“Problems?” I asked.
He frowned. “I’m not sure I’m ready to return to the House. Not that I’d prefer to be at Creeley Creek, of course, but until I go back to Hyde Park, the drama hasn’t quite solidified.” He glanced at me. “Does that make sense?”
Only a four-hundred-year-old Master vampire would wonder if a grad student could understand procrastination. “Of course it does. Procrastination is a very human emotion.”
“I’m not sure humans have a monopoly on procrastination. And, more important, I’m not sure this counts as procrastination.” He turned back again and started the ignition. “Unlike what you’re doing.”
“What I’m doing?”
He smiled just a little—a tease of a smile. “Procrastinating,” he said. “Avoiding the inevitability of you and me.”
“How long does ‘inevitability’ take when you’re immortal?”
He grinned and pulled the Mercedes away from the curb. “I suppose we’ll find out.”
One summer night in Chicago. Three sets of battle lines drawn.
The protesters were still outside when we returned, their apparent hatred of us undiminished. On the other hand, their energy did seem to be a little diminished; this time, they were sitting on the narrow strip of grass between the sidewalk and street. Some