BOYS' NIGHT OUT

"What do you wear if you're playing security for alpha shape-shifters?"

I stood in front of my open closet in a robe, but glanced back at Lindsey, who sat cross-legged on my bed, a bag of strawberry licorice sticks in her lap.

"Nothing at all?" she said with a grin.

"I'm wearing clothes."

"Spoilsport. But if you're going to play prude, might as well play sexy prude. Didn't you say Gabriel mentioned leather?"

The snark aside, she had a point. After all, I did own a set of buttery black leather that had been a gift from Mallory and Catcher for my twenty-eighth birthday - snug pants, bandeau-type corset, and trim, motorcycle-style jacket. It was a fabulous outfit, but it was so urban-fantasy book cover.

"Vampires in leather are so cliche," I said.

"I'm not disagreeing with you, but the shifters would appreciate it. They're all over leather."

"Yeah, I got that sense." But that much leather - and that little torso coverage - wasn't my ideal fighting ensemble, so I flipped through some tank tops, looking for something that might replace the bandeau bra.

On the other hand, leather pants and a tank top seemed a little too Linda Hamilton.

"Maybe a compromise," I murmured, pulling the leather jacket from its wooden hanger. I laid it on the bed along with my Cadogan suit pants and a simple black tank, then stepped back to take a look.

The jacket added a definite element of kick-assery to the slim-fit pants and tank. The outfit was still all business, but the kind of business that promised repercussions if the deal didn't go through. With a bloodred katana at my waist, and a gold Cadogan medal around my neck, I might be able to pull it off.

"Well," Lindsey said, "that's a Merit I can get behind. Try it on." When I was dressed, I grabbed a black elastic from the top of my bureau and pulled my hair into a ponytail. Since I'd be with Ethan, I skipped clipping on my Cadogan pager, but I slid my cell phone into one pocket of my jacket and picked up my katana.

Outfit assembled, I spun around so Lindsey could get a look. She nodded and stood up. "Only one question - can you work that outfit? Can you own it?" I glanced back at the mirror, took in the leather and sword, and smiled. "Why, yes. I believe I can." I met Ethan in the basement beside the door that led to the underground parking garage. I had actually sashayed down the stairs, ready to stun Mr. Compliment into silence.

As luck would have it, I was the one surprised, because I hadn't been the only one to rethink my ensemble: Ethan apparently took Gabriel's "no Armani" instruction to heart. He came downstairs in jeans. Perfectly shaped jeans that fit his hips, then fell to cover dark boots. He'd paired them with a snug gray T-shirt that was practically molded to his chest. His golden hair was loose, framing cut cheekbones and killer green eyes. I'm strong enough to admit it - I stared.

Ethan gave me a slow, eyebrow-arched perusal, masculine appreciation in his eyes. When he finally nodded, I assumed I'd passed the test.

"You're wearing jeans."

He glanced over at me with amusement, then typed numbers into the keypad beside the garage door.

Ethan's sleek, black Mercedes convertible and a few other vehicles owned by higher-ranking vampires (i.e., not newbies like me) were parked inside.

"I am capable of dressing as the occasion requires."

"Apparently," I muttered, irritation in my voice. That was a childish emotion, sure, but the man wasn't supposed to look better than me. He was supposed to be awed by my new, sleek style.

Not that I cared what he thought, I lied to myself.

Ethan beeped his security system, then opened the passenger side door for me.

"So very gracious," I said as I climbed inside, arranging my katana inside the tiny coupe.

"I have my moments," he replied, his gaze on the garage around him, then shut the door behind me.

When he was equally ensconced, we drove up the ramp to the security door, which lifted upon our approach, then headed out into the dark, summer night, zooming past the handful of paparazzi who stood at one corner of the lot, cameras at the ready. Since we were a captive group - nearly one-third of the vampires in the House returning to the roost before each sunrise - they hadn't yet bothered tracking us around when we left Hyde Park.

"Where exactly are we going?"

"A bar called Little Red," Ethan said. "Somewhere in the midst of Ukrainian Village." He nodded toward the GPS panel in the dashboard. It was already plotting our way toward the neighborhood, which was in a chunk of Chicago known as West Town.

"Little Red," I repeated. "What does that mean?"

"It's a reference to Little Red Riding Hood, I assume."

"So the shifters are wolves? Jeff said their shape had something to do with their power."

"They aren't all wolves. Each shifter transforms into one animal, and the animal runs in the family."

"So if one of the Brecks was a badger, all the Brecks would be badgers?" Ethan snickered. "And given our experiences with Nick Breckenridge so far, I'd be happy to learn he was a badger."

Nick had been an unwilling participant in Peter's blackmail scheme. And in the process, he'd transformed from a former boyfriend of yours truly to a growly pain in the ass. "Badger" seemed entirely apropos. "Agreed."

"Unfortunately," Ethan said, "the families don't generally publicize their particular animals. So other than being on very, very good terms with a shifter, the only way for an outsider to know the animal is to see the shift. That said, one would presume the more powerful members of the Pack - Apex and the like - are predators. Bigger, badder, fiercer than the rest."

"So, wolves or grizzlies or something, rather than least weasels."

"Least weasels?"

"They're real," I confirmed. "I saw one in a nature center once. Tiny little guys. So Gabriel - what do we know about him?"

"The Keene family - Gabriel's father, great-uncle, grandfather, and so forth - have led the North American Central Pack for centuries. We've had independent confirmation they're wolves."

"Independent? Did that come from your secret vampire source?" My grandfather had representatives of three supernatural groups in his employ - Catcher for the sorcerers, Jeff for the shifters, and a third, secret vampire source who kept his profile low in order to keep from pissing off his Master. That anonymity notwithstanding, my grandfather sometimes shared the info he received with Ethan.

It had occurred to me that Malik, Ethan's second in command, might be the anonymous vampire. Malik knew everything that went on in the House, but usually kept to himself. He was intense, but seemed to be on the side of truth and justice. Providing secret, but crucial, information to the Ombud's office, information ultimately used to keep supernatural peace in Chicago, seemed right up his alley.

"Independent," Ethan said, "as in it didn't come from a vampire. I suppose we are throwing you to the wolves," he added after a moment, "although you're not exactly the type to go traipsing through the woods, basket in hand, to grandmother's house."

"No," I agreed, "I'm not. But I am the type to take the Volvo to my grandfather's office, bucket of chicken in hand."

"Sounds like a good trip."

"It was. You know I love food. And my grandfather. But not necessarily in that order." Traffic wasn't bad as we moved north, but it still took twenty minutes to reach West Town. Ethan made himself comfy for the ride - one arm perched on the door, one on the steering wheel at three o'clock.

Eventually, we pulled off I-95 and into a neighborhood, then made a few more turns onto a commercial street of brick buildings that probably had its heyday in the 1960s. Now they sat largely empty but for a few industrial dry cleaners and international bakeries. At this time of night the street was empty of pedestrians . .

. but plenty full of bikes.

The bikes, I guessed, were a marker for the Packs. In this case, it was a row of retro-looking cruisers - low, curvy motorcycles with lots of chrome and red leather - parked one beside the other, a dozen or so in all. They were lined up in front of a brick building that sat at the corner. A round, glowing white sign - like a full moon in the midst of Wicker Park - bore the words LITTLE RED across it in simple red letters.

"That must be it," I said as Ethan maneuvered the Mercedes into a parallel parking spot up the block.

We emerged from the car and into the thump of rock 'n'

roll music, which spilled onto the street when the door opened. A leather-clad man with a short beard and dark blond ponytail mounted one of the bikes, started the engine, and rode away.

"One fewer shifter we'll be able to get to know," I whispered to Ethan, who humphed in response.

We belted on our katanas, then walked down the block toward the door into the bar.

The bikes weren't the only indication that something different was going on in Ukrainian Village. When we reached the corner where the front door sat kittycorner to the street, I spied a trio of gouges in the brick wall. I stopped and peered more closely, then lifted my fingertips to the brick. They were clean marks, long, evenly spaced, and deep into brick and mortar.

These weren't gouges, I realized. They were clawmarks.

"Ethan," I said, then gestured toward the scratches.

"It's a sign," he explained. "That this is a Pack place." And here we were, vampires walking into their den.

But since we were here, and there was nothing to do but do it, I took the lead and pushed open the door. The bar was one narrow room - a handful of tables in front of a large picture window, a long wooden bar along the other side. The hard-driving music was loud enough to bruise my eardrums, and I winced at the throb of it. The sound burst from a jukebox in a corner, that machine the only decoration that didn't involve advertisements for beer, whiskey, or Malort, Chicago's wickedly strong version of absinthe.

Men in leather jackets with NAC in giant, embroidered letters across the back sipped at the tables, somehow managing to chat over the roar of the jukebox. I assumed NAC stood for the North American Central Pack.

The hair on the back of my neck lifted. There was something unnerving about the place, about the tingle of magic that filled the room, as though the air itself was electrified.

The shifters looked up as we entered, their expressions not exactly welcoming. Apparently none too thrilled about the vampires in their midst, they stood and pushed back chairs. My heart raced, my hand moving to the handle of my katana, but the shifters headed for the front door. Within a matter of seconds, they were gone, leaving us in the middle of the bar, rock 'n' roll still pouring out around us.

Ethan and I exchanged a glance.

"Maybe the food's bad?" I wondered loudly, but that couldn't be the case. The bad vibe notwithstanding, the smells in the bar were fabulous. Under the top note of cigar smoke was something delicious - cabbage and braising meat, as if cabbage rolls were steaming in the back room. My stomach growled.

"Help you?"

We turned to face the bar. Behind it stood a heavyset woman, wearing a T-shirt with LITTLE RED and a cartoon girl in a red petticoat and hood emblazoned across the front. The woman's short, bottle-blond hair was teased above her head, and there was suspicion in her eyes. This must have been Berna.

"Gabriel," Ethan, stepping beside me, said over the music, "asked us to meet him here." One hand on the bar, one on her hip, the woman indicated a red leather door near the end of the bar.

"Back," she half yelled, then arched an eyebrow as she looked me over. "Too thin. You need eats." I'd only had a chance to open my mouth to respond - which, given the meat-and-veg smell of the place, would have involved a resounding "yes" - when Ethan smiled politely back at her.

"No, thank you," he called out.

She sniffed at Ethan's answer, but turned back to her well-shellacked bar and began to wipe it down with a wet rag. Ethan headed for the red door.

So much for the cabbage rolls, I thought, but followed him.

Before he opened it, his hand on the tufted leather, he initiated the telepathic connection between us.

Sentinel? he silently asked, checking in before we made the final plunge. I shook off the sudden, but refreshingly brief, vertigo. Maybe I was getting used to the sensation. I'm ready, I told him, and in we went.

I was thankful the room was quieter than the rest of the bar, but the air was thick with old magic. I'm not sure I would have normally been able to separate new from old, but this felt different from the magic I'd felt around vampires or sorcerers. It was the difference between sun and moon. This was ancient magic; earthy magic; the magic of damp soil and sharp lightning, of grassy, windswept plains on cloudy days; the magic of dust and fur and musky dens and damp leaves. It wasn't unpleasant, but the sheer difference between this prickle and the magic I was used to unnerved me. It was also exponentially more powerful than the tingle I'd felt around the few shifters I knew.

Four men - four shifters - sat around an old-fashioned, vinyl-topped, aluminum-legged table. Four heads lifted when we walked in the door, including Gabriel Keene's. He gave me a once-over, then offered up a slow grin that lifted the corners of his mouth. I guessed he liked the leather.

After looking me over, Gabe shifted his gaze to Ethan; his expression became businesslike.

I tried to keep my eyes on Gabriel in order to give the rest of the alphas time to check out the vampires who'd stepped onto their turf. But my occasional glimpses gave me basic details - all three had dark hair and the stiff shoulders of folks not thrilled to be in the back room of a bar in Ukrainian Village, vampires in their midst.

Finally, Gabriel nodded and gestured toward a wall that was empty but for a couple of small, cheaply framed movie posters. I followed Ethan over there and stood beside him. I wasn't expecting immediate trouble, but I gripped the handle of my katana with my left hand, rubbing my fingers across the leather cording, the friction somehow comforting.

I didn't have to wait long for action.

"The name of the game," Gabriel said, pulling a deck of cards from the middle of the table, "is five-card draw." He shuffled through the cards twice, then put the deck back on the table. The alpha to his right, who had short dark hair and a square jaw, the rest of his face hidden by aviator shades, leaned forward and knocked his knuckles against the deck.

With movements so smooth you'd have thought he was a professional, Gabriel began flicking cards to the others.

"We're here," he said, "because, barring objections, we're convening in two days. We're here to discuss ConPack."

The alpha at Gabriel's left, who slouched in his seat, had a few days of stubble on his face, narrowed brown eyes, and shoulder-length dark hair that was tucked behind his ears. He cast a suspicious gaze our way.

"In front of these two?" he asked. He gave Ethan a couple of seconds of derisive staring, then gave me a leering, up-and-down appraisal. A couple of months ago, I would have blushed a little, maybe looked away uncomfortably. Given that he was a shifter and, by the looks of him, a bully, I probably should have. But even if my skills at fighting needed work, I was still a vampire, and bluffing was one of the first lessons Catcher had taught me. I knew how to give back the arrogance other sups threw at me.

Slowly, serenely, I arched a dark eyebrow back at him and raised the corners of my mouth into a not-quite smile. The look, I hoped, was equal parts vampire moxie and feminine wile. Whether he was intimidated, I didn't know, but he finally looked away. That was good enough for me. Gabriel, his expression all nonchalance, picked up his pile of cards and fanned them in his hand. "You agreed to these arrangements, Tony, if you'll recall."

So the bully was Tony, head of the Great Northwestern Pack and the man who ruled the shifter retreat in Aurora.

"Bullshit," Tony coughed out in reply. He would have been handsome, but the chip on his shoulder tightened his features unflatteringly.

"My lieutenant," Tony continued, "agreed to the arrangements because that was the only way we could get a word in edgewise. You called the convocation, Keene. Not me, not Robin, not Jason. You.

Speaking for myself, we don't want it." He shrugged. "The Bering Sea was pretty and blue when I left it.

Things are fine in Aurora, and we're happy to keep them that way."

"It's your job to keep them that way," said the third man.

This is Jason, Ethan silently told me.

Jason was brutally handsome - green eyes, dark hair with just a little wave to it, killer cheekbones, curvy lips, the tiniest bit of a southern drawl in that honeyed voice. Altogether, it was a dangerous combination.

"You're the protector of the keep."

"And that's exactly my point," Tony muttered, tossing a couple of cards on the table with a flick of his wrist. "I am the protector of the keep. And when the time has come to retire to that keep, we do it. We don't convene to 'talk it over.' That is political, strategic bullshit." He glanced over at Ethan. "Vampire bullshit. All due respect, vampire."

"Ditto," Ethan said, a surprising amount of venom in his voice. I bit back a proud smile; he seemed to be adopting a little of my snark.

"Things in Chicago - ," Gabriel began, but he was interrupted by Tony, who put out a hand.

"Things in Chicago don't concern us," Tony said. "There aren't any Packs in Chicago, and there's a damned good reason for that. Chicago isn't a shifter city." Tony's animosity charged the air in the room, that prickle of magic now strong enough to lift the hair on my arms. I shifted uncomfortably, my lungs tight as the pressure in the room shifted, a magical side effect of the buildup of shifter tension.

"Chicago is a city of power," Gabriel said quietly, throwing a card onto the table, plucking a new card from the remainder pile, and adding that one to the fan of cards in his hand.

At least, that was all I saw him do, but those simple motions cut through the magic in the air. I sucked in a breath, the weight lifting from my chest. Apex, indeed.

"And that we don't have an official presence here," Gabe continued, "doesn't mean we won't be affected. Vamps are out. They're in the public eye, for better or worse, and we can't expect that humans will be satisfied with the notion that bleeders are the only supernaturals in the world."

"So that's your position?" asked Jason. "You're bringing us here to, what, get us to agree to announce ourselves?" He shook his head. "I won't do that. The vamps came out of the closet, and they got riots and Congressional hearings. We come out, and what do we get?"

"We get experimented on," said the fourth and final shifter, who must have been Robin, head of the Western Pack. He was the one with the dark sunglasses.

"We get incarcerated in military facilities, shipped to God knows where so stratcom officers can figure out how to use us as weapons." He lifted a hand and flipped up his shades; I nearly flinched at the sight of his eyes - milky blue, staring blankly in our direction. Was he sightless?

"No, thank you," he quietly said, then lowered his sunglasses again. "Count me out, and count out the rest of the Western Pack. We aren't interested."

"I appreciate the fact that you've guessed my agenda and you're ready to vote," Gabriel said dryly. "But this isn't the convocation, and I haven't offered a resolution, so let's keep our fortune-telling to ourselves, shall we?"

There were humphs from the table, but no outright objections.

"What I want," Gabriel continued, "is to state the question and ask the Packs. That's my agenda. Do we stay and face the coming tide?" He glanced up and raised his gaze to Ethan. The two of them stared at each other, fear and power and anger combined in Gabriel's expression, the "coming tide" apparently vampire related. "Or do we leave now?"

"Which of those decisions is safer?" Tony asked.

"And which," Jason put in, "is more irresponsible?"

"Instability," said Robin. "Death. Warfare. And not among shifters. Not among the Packs. Vampire business is not our business. It never has been."

And there's the rub, Ethan silently told me. Their unwillingness to step forward.

No, their unwillingness to sacrifice themselves, their families, on our behalf, I corrected, but kept the thought to myself. It was a decision they'd made before, during the Second Clearing. And while I sympathized with the vampires who'd been lost, I understood the shifters' urge to protect themselves from the chaos. I'd leave it to the philosophers to decide whether what they'd done had been morally repugnant.

"The viability of this world is our business," Gabriel said. "The Packs are large. Social networks.

Businesses. Financial interests weren't an issue two hundred years ago. But they are now." Tony put a card on the table with a decisive snap, then plucked a new one from the stack. "And how much of your friendly new attitude has to do with our sword-wearing buddies over there?" He looked at me, lip curled, hatred and a creepy kind of lust in his eyes. "Particularly the chick?" Gabriel offered a low growl that made the hair at my neck stand on end. I gripped my katana tighter and glared back with menace I didn't have to feign.

"Because you are a guest in this city," Gabriel said, "I'm going to offer you an opportunity to apologize to Merit, to me, and to Tonya."

"Apologies," Tony threw out.

Gabriel rolled his eyes but, maybe in deference to Tony's status, let it pass. He glanced over at Robin.

"Childishness aside, I hear your point, brother. I only bring the issue to the Packs. They'll decide as they will."

The room went silent. After a time, Robin nodded. Jason followed suit.

It was a long, quiet time before Tony spoke again. "When we convened in Tucson," he said, "we pledged to adhere to the rule of the Packs. To let the majority decide the fate of the others." He looked down at the table, shaking his head ruefully. "Damned if we thought the possibility of sending our sons and daughters into war was going to be the result of that decision." When he looked up again, his eyes swirled with something deep and unfathomable. It was the same mystical revelation I'd seen in Gabriel's eyes when we'd first met, right before he made a cryptic remark about our intertwined futures. It was a visual expression, somehow, of a connection to the things he'd seen, the places he'd been, the lives he'd known . . . and lost.

I didn't know what he'd seen, or why his reaction was so strong. I knew what we were asking of shifters - Gabriel had explained it well enough the night before. And Gabriel had mentioned the rumblings of humans unhappy about the fanged among them. But there was a pretty big gap between complaints and violence, and we weren't there yet.

Regardless of the depth of his emotion, or how unwarranted his fear seemed today, he also seemed to understand the numbers were against him. Finally, he relented with a nod.

"We convene two nights hence," Gabriel concluded. "We'll offer a resolution to stay or return, and we'll let the cards fall where they may."

ConPack was a go, and so the game began again.

They played cards for nearly two hours, two nearly silent hours, in which their decisions to call or fold or raise were the only words spoken. Ethan and I stood behind them, one Master vampire and one newbie guard, watching four shape-shifters gamble in the seedy back room of a cabbagey bar.

"As we have agreed to the convocation," Gabriel said, his gaze on his cards as he interrupted the silence, "if the decision is made to stay in Chicago, it may be time to consider allying with one of the Houses."

I felt the sharp spike of magic around the room, and not all of it shifter. When I looked over at Ethan, his eyes were wide, lips parted. There was hope in his expression.

"There's never been an alliance between Pack and House," Jason said.

"Not formally," Gabriel agreed. "But as a colleague recently pointed out, the Houses didn't have the kinds of political and economic power they do now." I stood a little straighter, realizing I'd been the colleague he was referring to.

Jason tilted his head to the side. "You're suggesting an alliance would actually benefit us, as opposed to just benefiting vamps?"

"I'm suggesting that if we stay, friends will be invaluable. I imagine the Houses would be willing to entertain that kind of notion." Gabriel glanced over at Ethan, who was trying very hard, I could tell, not to look overeager.

"No, you're suggesting we make some kind of permanent arrangement with vampires." Tony all but spit out the words, the magic around him turning peppery, vinegary, as if his fury changed its flavor.

"The world is changing," Gabriel countered. "If we don't keep up, we risk ending up like the pixies - creatures of dreams and fantasy and fairy tales. No one thought they'd come to that kind of end, did they? And in the end, running back to the forest didn't save them."

"We are not fucking pixies," Tony muttered. Apparently fed up with poker and vampire politics, he threw his cards down on the table, then stood up. I tightened my grip on my katana, but Ethan nodded me back.

"Convocation is one thing," he said, punching a finger into the tabletop for emphasis. Anger swirled in his eyes like a freshly stoked fire. "But I'm not playing nice with vampires - I won't lose family - because you feel guilty about something that happened two hundred years ago, something none of us was involved in. Fuck that."

Tony clapped his hands together and threw them up like a dealer leaving his table. Then he disappeared out the red leather door, leaving it swinging angrily behind him.