"Elrod, P N - Vampire Files 09 - Lady Crymsyn E-Txt" - читать интересную книгу автора (Elrod P N)

something was going wrong with the most important new thing in my life, and I
didn't want to sit around waiting for him to finish his feed bag.
And damned if he didn't seem to read my mind. "I'll have ingested sufficient
nourishment by the time you've finished changing, unless you plan to establish a
truly informal atmosphere to the site by appearing in such attire."
I gave him a brief sour smile, then vanished between one eyeblink and the next
to go upstairs for clothes. He must have expected the move, for I didn't get his
usual comment of "damn" in reaction. Show-off antics like that nearly always got
some kind of rise from him. I only did it now to divert myself from the
gut-sinking idea that he was probably right.
This was post-Prohibition Chicago and still reeling from the aftermath of Big
Al's near-uncontested reign. The old building I'd picked to house what would
become Lady Crymsyn had a violent history; it'd be strange if there wasn't a
nasty surprise in the cellar.

The creation of my own swank nightclub represented a lot more to me than just an
interesting way to provide steady earnings for decades to come. It meant that
for once I'd deliberately chosen a path for myself, not simply stumbled along on
those created for me by the needs of others.
You see, unaware of committing my worst crime against myself, I'd wasted my
first life.
I'd drifted, one year to the next, assuming I was in charge of my destiny until
a murderous beating and a gangster's bullet put an abrupt stop to such foolish
thinking. There it should have ended, my disappearance an open mystery to my
distant family, but of no concern to anyone else, least of all to the men who'd
killed me.
But much to their appalled surprise my weighted carcass didn't stay where they'd
dropped it in the cold depths of Lake Michigan. The one good thing that had
happened to me during that wasted life wouldn't leave me in such grim peace. I
returned to the world of the living, confused and fired by rage, a dark rebirth
attended by blood, madness, and, finally, no small amount of revenge. My killers
were dead or the next thing to it; I was aliveЧor the next thing to itЧand it
was time for me to cease drifting and move forward.
And for once it would be on my own terms.
Not that God or Fate or whatever you believe in is stingy with second chances.
Those are all around us, only we're too distracted to notice them. Most of the
time they're a lot more mundane than the special one I'd been handed.
Mine had to do with being a card-carrying, dusk-to-dawn, stake-in-the-heart,
you're-damn-right-I-drink-blood vampire.
It was a hell of a resurrection, but not so bad once I got used to things.
And since then I'd done rather well for myself.
A few months back, while flattening out a few wrinkles with a local mob, I
discovered a hoard of their cash that they didn't know about. Though someone
else walked off with the lion's share, the sixty-eight grand I'd stuffed into my
coat pockets like a greedy kid in a candy store seemed more than enough to get
me set up for good if I went about it the right way. I'd wasted one life; I
wasn't going to repeat the mistake.
First I had to clean the money. Flashing around undeclared fistfuls of dough is
a fast way to get the attention of the tax man. Capone himself got tossed in the
clink on that little detail, but I could avoid landing in the next cell over by