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I STOOD IN THE ALLEY BETWEEN DAMEN AND WOLCOTT in the recently trendy neighborhood of Wicker Park There was a parking lot filled with cars directly across the alley from my position It was bordered on the other three sides by four-story aparts Behind the wall that I leaned on, the clubs, bars and restaurants of Division Street did a brisk trade in liquor and lust for the upscale singles who had purchased all the new condos in the area The cold Noveht was no deterrent to business After all, if you lived in Chicago, then you understood that there are only two seasons--winter and construction If you let a little cold slow you down, then you should probablymy toes inside my boots in a vain effort to keep theo, el’s heartstone As a result, I was usually a little warels’ hearts are el’s body is still no oyle, Beezle, poked his head out of the lapel of my wool peacoat He’s the color of stone, about the size of an overweight guinea pig, and he’s got little wings, the better to flap around my head and annoy me with

Before we had left the house he had trimmed a childsized scarf for his own use He had a small strip of rainbowcolored rapped around each horn and a longer piece wound several tih the lared at him

"I can’t understand you when your mouth is buried like that," I said

Beezle narrowed his cat eyes athis"I said, have you got anything to eat?"

"How can you possibly be hungry? You ate a whole bowl of popcorn before we left the house"

"But I ahnut," he whined

"Stop wriggling We’re supposed to be undercover here In point of fact, you’re not supposed to be here at all You’re supposed to be at hooyles"

"Do you think I would trust your life to hioyle," Gabriel said dryly

My tenant and bodyguard, Gabriel, had been so quiet I’d alotten he was there Almost He’s a little difficult to overlook--six foot plus, dark hair, dark eyes, the face of an angel I el

Have I mentioned that I am in love with him and he with me, and that our love is doomed, in a really melodras sort of way?

I’el and a chief of the Grigori, a right-hand man of Lucifer hi spentmy father to be an ordinary deadbeat (or possibly dead) human dad