Wild Things by Chloe Neill, now you can read online.
Chapter One
MIDNIGHT RIDER
Mid-February
Chicago, Illinois
Within the last ten months, I'd become a vampire, joined Chicago's Cadogan House, and become its Sentinel. I'd learned how to wield a sword, how to bluff a monster, how to fall, and how to get back up.
Perhaps most of all, I'd learned about loyalty. And based on the magic that was pouring through the House's first-floor hallway, I hadn't been the only one who'd taken that particular quality to heart.
Dozens of Cadogan's vampires stood in the hallway outside the office of our Master, Ethan Sullivan, waiting for a call, for a word, for a plan. We stood in our requisite Cadogan black with our katanas at our sides because Ethan—our Liege and my lover—was preparing to run.
"Out of one fire and right into another," said the attractive blond vampire beside me. Lindsey was a member of Cadogan's guard corps and a skilled and capable fighter, but tonight she looked, as usual, more like a fashionista than a century-old vampire guard. She'd left her suit jacket downstairs and had matched her satin-striped black tuxedo pants with a white button-down and four-inch stiletto heels.
"Do they actually think we'd just let them take him?" she asked. "That we'd let them arrest him—our Master—right there in front of the House?"
An hour ago, a Chicago Police Department detective—fortunately, one of our allies—had come calling, advising us that the city's prosecutor had obtained a warrant for Ethan's arrest.
Ethan had killed Harold Monmonth, a powerful vampire from Europe who'd murdered two human guards before turning his sword on us. Ethan had acted in obvious self-defense, but violence had recently rocked the Windy City. Its citizens were afraid, and its mayor, Diane Kowalcyzk, was looking for someone to blame. She'd apparently managed to bring the prosecutor to her side.
That's why Ethan was sequestered in his office with Luc, the captain of Cadogan's guards, and Malik, the House's second in command, making a plan.
Detective Jacobs suggested Ethan seek refuge with the Breckenridges, a family of shape-shifters who lived in Loring Park, a suburb outside Chicago. That meant he'd also be outside the mayor's jurisdiction. The Brecks were über-wealthy, well connected, and politically influential. That was a powerful combination and enough, we hoped, to keep the mayor from using him as a sacrificial lamb.
Papa Breck, the family patriarch, was a friend of my father, Chicago real estate mogul Joshua Merit. I'd gone to school with some of the Breckenridge boys and had even dated one of them. But the Brecks had no love for vampires, which was part of the reason for the closed-door negotiations.
Ethan was the other reason. He was nearly four centuries old, and he had the stubbornness to match his age. Going gently into that good night wasn't his style, but Luc and Malik wanted him safely away. It had been a long winter for the House—including Ethan's premature demise and resurrection—and we didn't need any more drama. We certainly didn't trust Kowalcyzk and feared turning Ethan over to a justice system that seemed to be rigged against us.