“What’s your degree in?” Catcher asked.
“Biochemistry,” he said, gesturing toward the building. “You could say I grew up in the field. I’ve been heading our R and D division.”
“New products in the works?” Catcher asked.
“Always,” Charla said with a smile. “But not just new products. We’ve developed additives to keep blood from spoiling, products to keep the blood in suspension, nutritional enhancements.”
“Stronger teeth and shinier coat?” Catcher asked, earning an elbow from me.
But Charla laughed good-naturedly. “That’s not far from the truth. Fangs are important to vampires. No reason not to give them a calcium boost.”
Catcher smiled. “I’m sure they appreciate it. We should let you get back to work, unless there’s anything else you think we should know?”
Charla put her hands on her hips and frowned sadly at the remains of the building. “Only that I wish you could wave a wand, fix this damage, and turn idiots into humanitarians.”
“If I had a wand that could do that,” Catcher said, “I’d do nothing but wave it.”
Chapter Eight
LIKE A GOOD NEIGHBOR, VAMPIRES ARE THERE
Charla disappeared into the building, and without our escort, the cops shooed us back behind the police tape. We regrouped beside Moneypenny, and looked very sharp doing it.
“Thoughts?” he asked.
“I think we have to wait for the CPD to question Robin Pope. I’m curious to know exactly how pissed she was about losing ‘most popular hot dish’ at the company potluck.”
“Hot dish? What’s a hot dish?”
“You know,” I said, moving my index fingers in the shape of a square. “A casserole. A hot dish.”
“Nobody says hot dish.”
I rolled my eyes. “People say hot dish. My roommate at NYU was from Minneapolis. She said it all the time.”
Catcher looked far from convinced, but he let it go. For the moment. “Idioms aside, I think you’re right, especially since we don’t actually have any other leads.”
The wind was picking up. I spied a coffee shop across the street; a man with a laptop sat at a table in front, sipping at his mug while he stared out the window. Aspiring novelist looking for inspiration in violence . . . or sociology student with a window on a natural experiment?
“It’s cold out here,” I said, gesturing toward the café. “Why don’t we grab something warm? We can talk shop.”
“Sure,” Catcher said.
We walked across the hills and valleys of snow to the shop’s front door, and then inside. The shop, which was new to me, was just the kind of place I’d have frequented in grad school. Dark and a little cozy, with shabby couches and mismatched chairs and the scents of coffee, cinnamon, and smoke from the roaster. A checkers set was on one small table; saltshakers and other random tchotchkes replaced missing pieces.
We walked to the counter, where Catcher immediately pulled out his wallet.
“Latte, half caf, extra hot, double foam, two shots, soy milk,” he rattled off, then looked at me.
“I’m not really sure how I can follow that,” I said, before looking over the chalkboard menu and picking something simple. “Hot chocolate?”
The barista looked suddenly tired. “Caramel, salted caramel, mocha, Aztec, dark chocolate, double chocolate, white chocolate, black and white, low cal, fat free, or regular?”
“Regular?”
The clerk seemed utterly unimpressed by my decision, but she rang us up. Ever the gentleman—or at least in coffee bars in February—Catcher paid for both drinks. We waited in silence for them to arrive, then picked them up and tucked into a sitting area along the back wall. Window views were nice, but not in Chicago in the winter. The cold inevitably seeped through, which left you only slightly less chilled than if you’d been outside in the first place.
I took a seat on the couch and curled my feet under me, then sipped my hot chocolate. It was tasty, although the residual warmth from the mug was more valuable than the drink.
“They’re going to strike again,” Catcher predicted. “The rioters, I mean. There was no event here. No trigger. They weren’t reacting to a Super Bowl win or the beating of a civilian. And if there’s no trigger, there’s a groundswell of rage. That’s not the kind of thing that just disappears.”
Unfortunately, I couldn’t disagree with him. “So how do we stop it? Get a handle on it?”
He shrugged. “By doing the stuff we’ve discussed. We’ll follow up with the CPD, check the security videos. The key here may not be the riot itself, but why this particular place was targeted. This isn’t exactly a public hot spot for vampire activity. It’s not flashy. Not like Cadogan House, which would have been the obvious, big-name target. There’s something to that—to picking this place. I just don’t know what it is yet.”