Chicago Stories: West of Western Read Online Free PDF

crotch. Above her, three life-sized black-robed assassins loomed against a blood-red sky, clutching bloody knives that dripped red onto the white body below. Seraphy's stomach clenched and she tasted bile in her throat. Crude as the figures were, she had no doubt whom the naked woman was meant to depict.
    Maybe the bastards were still around. Fight or flight? Hell with flight, she wanted to rub their noses in the paint before she strangled them. Seeing no one, she rolled her window down to listen. Small sounds—clothes rustling? a foot scratching on pavement? seemed to hint at a lurker nearby, yet when she slid out of the car and held her breath, she heard nothing more than the usual distant traffic. Maybe there was a trace of cigarette smoke, someone nearby, maybe across the alley?
    When the odor had dissipated and still nothing moved in the shadows, she pulled the Jeep into the garage, brought the door down, and sat with her forehead on the steering wheel, secure in her building, but shaken by the venom that oozed from the image. So the windows hadn't been a one-off bit of teenage vandalism. This image wasn't some adolescent prank, she could feel real hatred ooze from every inch. Somehow she'd made an enemy, an enemy who threatened to kill her. Or at least scare her away?
    Right. Give up her home? Not in her lifetime. Seraphy got out of the car, opened the bottom drawer in her workbench, considered the Glock, but strapped on the stiletto she found there. The bastards thought they could scare her off? Like that was going to happen.

Chapter 3
     
    First light, Saturday, her first full day in her new home. A beautiful late November day, sunny and crisp, and Seraphy was back at the garage door, the cappuccino in her right hand sending feelers of fragrant steam into the chill dawn air, her mind steaming along with it. Dreams of hooded assassins had kept her company through the night, now she drew on the city's early morning calm to concentrate her mind and analyze the obscene image. Around her the city lay quiet, gathering strength to cope with Monday's stampede to the Loop. She checked the alley. Empty. None of her neighbors seemed to be up yet, good.
    However crudely rendered, the woman was obviously intended to depict her—spiky black hair, white skin—while the three hooded figures were generic assassins and the painting signed only with gang signs. Whatever, she thought, absentmindedly sucking up froth and caffeine and ignoring the anger smoldering under her analytic brain. The vandals were in for a big surprise if they thought she could be scared off by a few broken windows and a painting. Narrowed to silver slivers, her normally blue eyes lingered over details of the painting, the hair on her arms rose and she tasted blood when she bit the inside of her cheek. A last swallow of coffee washed the blood down.
    Love was a bitch and now she was vulnerable. Love at first sight had deepened with each tuck-pointed brick, scrubbed bathroom tile and varnished floor board, and now she and her home were one. Architects work on many buildings, but this one was different; this one spoke to her, as much a part of her as her arm or leg, and she couldn't abandon herself. Ten years in a war zone hadn't seen her as jumpy as this. Hell, she had had no dog in that race, just the need and desire to follow orders and stay alive. This was different.
    She gazed down the alley, pushing her emotions to the side and concentrating on details. Black city garbage toters, filthy mattresses, a broken Big Wheel. An adventurous squirrel. Watch the squirrel. Cool it, Pelligrini. So what if the bastards splashed a little paint around, that's no reason to over-react. Anger is good fuel for a fight, maybe later.
    Okay. Right. She shook her head, took a deep breath, and turned back to the door with a plan. No painting yet. Leave the door as-is. They'd be back, and she'd have video cameras aimed and ready, set to record every stroke. She grinned at the