Chicagoland by Gail Martin (important books to read TXT) 📕

“I’ll keep my eyes and ears open,” Sarah promised him. “And if we find out something helpful, I’ll let you know.”

I loved how she gave him an honest answer without actually admitting to anything. And I knew for a certainty that as soon as we changed out of our fancy dress clothing, we were going to have a look at those tunnels.

2

This is impressive.” West swiveled his head to take a gander at the freight tunnel as we headed inside. Bare bulbs overhead lit up the depths, and we walked carefully, mindful of the track for the electric trains that carried coal, ash, garbage, and freight to and from all of the buildings on the street above us. Telephone and telegraph cables ran along the ceiling, and handcarts dotted the loading docks where the sub-basements of buildings opened into the underground network.

“Sixty-two miles of tunnels,” I said, having spent some time chatting with the janitor at our hotel while I waited for West and Sarah. He was happy to share what he had learned from talking to the garbage collectors who gathered the hotel’s trash.

“That’s a lot of places to hide,” Sarah murmured.

We were dressed in black, each with a miner’s hat left over from our adventure in Reading. The gear bag I carried had flashlights and lanterns, an extra shotgun with shells filled with rock salt, and plenty of knives. West and I both had machetes. I had a shotgun; he carried a pistol. Sarah had a gun and a smaller—but equally wicked—knife. I hoped we didn’t run into the cops because we’d be hard-pressed to explain ourselves.

Then again, this was Chicago. Maybe they’d buy “monster hunters” after all.

We did our best to melt into the shadows when a train went by. The man in the control booth never noticed. People tend to see what they expect to see, and that worked in our favor.

“Look.” Sarah pointed to the wall at the nearest juncture. The names of the streets above us were painted onto the concrete walls, giving us a way to navigate. That saved us from having to mark our path with chalk, although I had some in the bag. Never know when things will come in handy.

“He said the secret room was under the Lexington Hotel,” West said. “This way.” We followed him through the maze of tunnels, marveling at the underground complex. My janitor acquaintance had confided that rumor held the tunnels weren’t profitable. I also knew that there could be a big difference between the money reported to the IRS and the money actually changing hands.

I didn’t doubt that bootleggers moved cargo through here, disguised as other types of freight. The complex had multiple openings to the surface as well as into the buildings they served, which were probably put to good use by shady players who needed to make a fast, discreet getaway. Trains ran day and night, so vagrants picked somewhere else for sleeping off a bender, but there were enough darkened nooks—especially near the tunnel mouths—that were probably utilized for quick trysts by Chicago’s streetwalkers and their customers. Just in case this trip went sideways, I said a prayer to Krukis and hoped he heard me. If there was a rogue werewolf—or some other heart-eating monster—down here, I didn’t want to wait until the last minute and find out my patron deity wasn’t answering the phone.

Kirkpatrick said that the Chicago Mob families had their own vampires and werewolves, like in Cleveland. So whatever monster was running amok down here was either acting on a plan by one of the families or had gone completely rogue. I didn’t like either option, but at least a monster following orders might have rules about what could and couldn’t be done. A rogue monster was a complete wild card and thus even more dangerous than usual.

“We’re here.” West’s voice cut through my musings, and I looked up to see a blank concrete wall ahead of us, unremarkable except for the newly patched area that stood out by its lack of grime.

“Kinda hate to bash it in since they just got it patched,” Sarah said, but I could see the eagerness in her eyes to look inside the mystery room.

“I’ll try to bash gently,” I told her with a smirk. Sarah and West stood back when I grabbed the sledgehammer out of my bag and took a big swing. The patched concrete crumbled, opening a dark hole and sending up a cloud of dust.

We froze, listening to hear if anyone was coming, but after a few moments of silence, we decided to go on. The hole wasn’t large enough for my big shoulders to fit through, but Sarah and West wouldn’t have any trouble. I insisted on sticking my flashlight and my head in first, to make sure there wasn’t a creature waiting for them.

To my relief, no monster stirred inside. What I could make out of the interior validated Kirkpatrick’s report, except that I recognized the “nonsense” words and symbols as having occult meanings.

“Go on in,” I said. “I’ll keep watch.” West went in first, gun drawn, followed by Sarah. I handed her my flashlight. A moment later, the electric lights flicked on. I knew West had his Nikon, a fancy toy provided for the Supernatural Secret Service, and one he’d been eager to try out.

If anyone happened by, I’d tell them that someone had obviously broken through the patch, and I had reported it, then agreed to stand guard until the police arrived. In this clothing, I looked enough like a dock loader that people were unlikely to question my presence. I just hoped that I didn’t need to use my phony cover story and that West and Sarah wouldn’t take all night collecting evidence.

To my relief, they emerged after about half an hour. “I got the pictures,” West reported, tucking his camera back into his bag. “Let’s hope they