As we neared the street number Noah had given us, Ethan pulled the Bentley into a parking slot in front of a sushi restaurant that now stood vacant. A dry cleaner was next door, and in the next building was the insult to our existence, the vampire registration office. Tonight was a weekend, and the building was dark. But come Monday at dusk, a line of vampires would appear outside the door awaiting the opportunity to give away their blessed anonymity to the bureaucracy of the city of Chicago.
Ethan and I got out of the car and strapped on our katanas. Chicago cops would probably lose it if they realized we were carrying dozens of inches of honed and tempered steel, but I wasn't going to let that stop me. There was no telling what kind of drama we might find, and I wanted to be prepared.
I jumped as a nearby car door slammed shut. Noah, who'd parked on the street a few cars back, walked toward us.
"You all right?" Ethan asked, glancing back at me.
"Fine," I said with a nod. "The sound startled me."
Ethan squeezed my hand supportively. "So Oliver and Eve came here to register," he said, glancing around. "Why this particular center?"
"They lived not far from here," Noah said. "So probably proximity."
"Sentinel? Thoughts?"
"They probably wouldn't have been alone," I suggested. "There would have been other vampires here, or the employees operating the registration center. Maybe they saw something, or could tell us if Oliver and Eve actually made it through the registration process? That might help us nail down the time line."
"That's something to check," Noah agreed.
"There's also no blood," I said. My vampiric instincts would have been triggered if there'd been a quantity of blood around. I hoped that meant Oliver and Eve hadn't succumbed to any harm.
"I'm not suggesting anything untoward has occurred," Ethan said, "but if it did, could they have been targeted because they were registering?"
"Maybe," Noah said. "But registration is supposed to soothe humans. Why punish vampires for doing what you've asked them to do?"
"Perhaps it wasn't humans who did the punishing," Ethan said. "Other Rogues might have been less than thrilled they'd decided to register. They might have seen it as a betrayal."
I thought Ethan had a point, but Noah wasn't thrilled at Ethan's implication. His look was arch. "You're suggesting we've created our own problems?"
But Ethan wasn't intimidated. "I'm asking. Is it possible?"
"I'd like to think not. But I don't control them."
So two vampires were missing, vamps we knew had visited a registration center. There weren't any obvious signs of violence or anything else that linked them to the site, or that suggested where they might have gone - or been taken - afterward.
Hands on my hips, teeth worrying my bottom lip, I glanced around the neighborhood. It was either very late or very, very early, depending on your perspective - and the area was quiet. Across the street from the registration center was another set of buildings: a pizzeria, closed for the night, and a boarded former apartment building surrounded by chain-link fence. But in between them, something interesting - a tidy, narrow, three-story condominium . . . with a suited doorman.
I glanced back at Noah. "Do you have the picture of Oliver and Eve?"
"On my phone, yeah."
I gestured toward the doorman. "He's on the night shift. Maybe we'll get lucky and he was on the night shift two nights ago, too."
A corner of Ethan's mouth curled. "Well done, Sentinel," he said, then gestured across the street. "Ladies first."
I waited until a very odiferous garbage truck rumbled past, then jogged across the street, Ethan and Noah behind me.
The doorman, the brass buttons of his burgundy coat gleaming, looked up nervously as we moved toward him, his eyes widening, his heartbeat speeding. If he'd had magic, I'd no doubt have felt the bitter pulse of his fear yards away.
As if protecting his castle from marauders, he stepped in front of the door. "Can I help you?"
"Noah," I said, extending my hand until he placed his phone in my palm. I checked the screen, saw the gentle smiling faces of two blond vampires - one male, one female.
I held it toward the doorman. "Our friends have disappeared, and we're trying to find them. We think they might have been across the street two nights ago. Do they look familiar to you?"
Without bothering to check the screen, the doorman crossed his arms over his barrel chest and narrowed his gaze at me.
"Not even a little peek?"