Stage Fright (Bit Parts) (16 page)

Isaiah clenched his massive fists.  “I said no!”

I looked from one to the other.  “No what?”

“We’ve been trying for
years
to find out more about vampire politics and grieves,” Perry said, his face lit with excitement.  “Here you come along, and in one day gather more intelligence than we could have in six months.”

“Forget it,” Isaiah said.  When Perry started to argue, Isaiah cut him off with a glare that could have stripped paint from the walls.  “If we act on information that Cassie overhears from the Bleak Street, it won’t take the vampires long to figure out where we got it.”

Perry’s smile died on his lips.  “You’re right.”  His shoulders slumped.  “Damn.”  Then he raised his eyes hopefully.  “Maybe one of us could audition for that play.  What’s it called? 
16 Voices
?”

“Victor wants to do it as a wire fu musical,” I said.  “All sixteen actors suspended above the stage and singing their parts.”

Perry grimaced.  “Never mind.”

I wished I could help them out, but there was no way in
hell
that I was going back to work on Victor’s play.  I didn’t care that I’d recommitted to being the stage manager, I was quitting again.  I refused to deal with vampires.  “I’d love to help, but…”

“No buts,” Isaiah said.  “It’s too dangerous.”

I smiled at him, grateful that he understood.

My head buzzed from exhaustion.  My giddy feeling had been replaced by a leaden one.  I swore I could sleep for a week.  I stood.  “I need to get home.”

“Let me see your phone,” Isaiah said.  When I handed it over, he programmed his number into it.  “There.  Now I we have each other’s numbers.  If you’re worried about vamps, you can call me.”

I struggled to remain calm, but inside I was doing back flips.  I had his number!  I hadn’t even needed to come up with a crazy plan in order to get it.  “Thanks.”

He walked me out to my car, and when I got in, I rolled down the window.  He braced his arms on the car and leaned inside.

“When I go home, should I sprinkle my door with holy water or anything?”  I was only half teasing.  The thought of those rogues – or any other vampires – getting into my home terrified me.  Then I had a worse thought.  “I was bitten!  Will
I
turn into a vampire?!”

“You couldn’t wear that silver necklace of yours if you were.”

Good point.  Seeing Isaiah’s silver earring still winking from high up in his ear made me feel even better.  My midnight rescuer wasn’t a vampire, either.

“Also, since rogues don’t have soul, they won’t come out during the day.  And vampires,
all
vampires, can’t get into your home without an invitation.  Holy ground is off limits, too.”

“Is that why your store is in the old church?”

 “That’s one of the reasons.”

“What’s the other?”

His lips quirked up.  “When the realtor showed Perry the sanctuary, he fell in love with the name Holy Comics.”

I laughed.

“Can I see you again?” he asked.

“Definitely.  I want to know more about those bastards.”  Now that I understood the danger, I wasn’t about to go around unprepared.  “Maybe you can also explain more about how a grieve works, and why Hedda always stages such bizarre plays.”  My mind was clicking away now, my thoughts jamming against each other like traffic during rush hour.

He looked at his hands.  “Well, we
could
discuss vampires if that’s what you want to do.”

I nodded.  “Yes, that’s what I want to do.”  It wasn’t until I was halfway home that I realized he’d meant we could meet together for some other reason than discussing vampires.

Chapter Eleven

The moment I pulled into my driveway, my phone rang.

“Hey Cassie.”

“Andrew!  Where have you been?  I’ve been calling you all day!”

His voice was peculiarly flat.  “When you asked me to move in with you, did you mean it?”

“Of course!”

“Then will you come pick me up?”

Although it was nearly midnight, and I was exhausted, I immediately put the car into reverse.  “What’s going on?”

“I’ll tell you when you get here,” he said and hung up.

Andrew must have been watching for me because the moment I pulled into his driveway, he came through the front door carrying a massive gym bag.  His broken expression spoke volumes.

I met him with a hug.  “What’s wrong?”

He pressed his lips together.  “I thought Caleb and I had moved past that argument over the audition, but this morning, he started in on me again.  He got so angry, that…”  Andrew fought for control.  “Never mind.  Anyway, I told him that we’re through.”

I uttered a silent prayer of thanks as I opened the trunk.  Andrew threw in his bag then returned to the condo for two more.  The last thing to go in were his free weights which were so heavy that they sagged the back end of my poor Focus.

As I slammed the trunk shut, Caleb’s SUV screeched up and jolted to a stop, half on the lawn and half in the street.  “Get in the car, Cassie,” Andrew said tightly and went to meet his boyfriend.

I caught his arm.  “Forget him.  Let’s just leave.”

Caleb tumbled out of his vehicle and nearly fell to his knees.  “Where the hell do you think you’re going?”  His words were fuzzy at the edges.

“I’m leaving.”  Andrew’s voice trembled.  “For good this time.”

“You’re not going anywhere!”  Caleb jabbed his finger in Andrew’s chest.  He stank of booze.  “Get in the house!”

Andrew shoved his house keys at Caleb who let them drop to the ground.  Caleb’s face tightened with grief.  “You’re not really leaving, are you?  I’m sorry, okay?  I swear I didn’t mean it.  I love you!”

Andrew hesitated, but I put my hand on his arm, guiding him towards my car.  “Let’s go.”

“I said I love you, you little bitch!”  Caleb snatched at Andrew’s arm, but Andrew jerked away.  When Caleb made another grab, I slapped his hand.

Caleb erupted.  “Stay out of this!”  He grabbed a fistful of my coat and yanked me forwards, nearly pulling me off my feet.  Furious, I grabbed hold of the first thing I could reach – his ear – and gave it a mighty twist.  He yelped and let go, but then lunged at me again.

Andrew slipped behind Caleb and put him in a headlock.  “Leave her alone!”

Caleb swore loudly and tried to wrestle free.

“Andrew, come on,” I shouted.  “Andrew!”

Andrew let Caleb drop to the ground.  “Don’t you
ever
touch her again!”  He got into my car and slammed the door.

I gunned the engine, peeling out of the driveway so fast I nearly clipped their mailbox.  As I sped off, Caleb threw something at my car.  A paper cup full of Coke and probably rum exploded across the back window.

A few blocks later, I pulled off the side of the road.  My hands were shaking too hard to drive.

“You okay?” Andrew asked.

“Yeah.  You?”

He nodded.  “Thanks for coming for me.”

“Of course I’d come for you!”  I reached across the gear shifter for an awkward hug, and ended up poking my hand into his side.  He winced.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

He shrugged.

My heart sped up.  “Caleb hurt you, didn’t he?”  When Andrew remained silent, I said, “What did he do?  Show me!”

Reluctantly, Andrew turned sideways and lifted his jacket and t-shirt.  I switched on the dome light.  Just above the waistline of his jeans was a nasty bruise and a long gouge with some missing skin.  “Caleb pushed me into a corner of the kitchen counter.”

From the look of it, Caleb had thrown him against the counter, not just pushed him.  I choked back a sob.  Rage painted my vision red.

A trace of worry broke through Andrew’s woodenness.  “Calm down, Cassie.  It’s not that bad.”

“Not that bad?!  You need to file a police report!”

“What?!  No way.”

I ground my teeth.  “Andrew, he physically
attacked
you.  That’s abuse!”

“I know you have faith in the system because of your dad being a deputy sheriff and all, but I don’t.”  He looked out the window at the passing cars.  “If the police get called out because a man is beating on a woman, they do the right thing.  But two
men
fighting?  All they see is a couple of guys who let things get out of control.  I mean, I look like someone who can take care of himself, right?”

I had to agree.  With his height and musculature, Andrew definitely looked capable of fighting back.

Andrew drew a sad face on the fogged-up window.  “A while back, a neighbor called the cops after they saw Caleb take a swing at me.  When the police got there, they told us to break it up and not play so rough.”

My stomach dropped.  “This has happened before?”

“Once or twice.”

I took his hand.  “I’m proud of you for leaving him.”

He squeezed my fingers.

We drove to my house in silence.  After we’d hauled all of Andrew’s things inside, I showed him to my parents’ old bedroom.  “You get the Geranium Room,” I said.  My mother, a thematic decorator, had painted the walls an odd shade of green, hung geranium-print curtains in the windows, and spread a geranium-print comforter on the bed.  “Feel free to nerd up the place however you want.”

The corners of Andrew’s lips quirked, but his eyes remained miserable.  “Do you mind if I have a little alone time?  I need to play some Portal.”

Portal was Andrew’s go-to video game for when life got overwhelming.  Even though he’d already won it eight times, he said there was something Zen-like about wandering through the empty hallways of the game’s weird scientific lab.

“Sure,” I said.

“And take my cell phone.”  He pressed it into my hands.  “Even if I ask for it back, don’t give it to me, okay?”

No worries there.  I stuffed his phone into my pocket while Andrew went into the bedroom and shut the door.  I should have been thrilled – after all, I’d wanted him as my roommate all along – but the pain in his eyes kept me from celebrating.

An hour later, I knocked on the bedroom door and poked my head inside.  Andrew stared at the screen of his laptop with eyes that were red and puffy.

“Care to join me in a little Chunky Monkey?”  I held out the ice cream carton.  Ben and Jerry’s was my personal cure-all for broken heartedness.

He set his laptop aside and patted the bed next to him.  I sat down and handed him a spoon.  “I have a present for you, too.”  I set the bag from Holy Comics in his lap.

When he saw the Detective comic, he pressed his lips tightly together.  “Cassie, this is amazing.”  His voice was rough.  “Thanks.”  He hugged me, hanging on for a long time.

“I’m getting Chunky Monkey down my shirt,” I finally told him.  The ice cream had been squashed between us and was oozing down my front as it melted.

He laughed a little and let go.  Together, we spooned up the ice cream.  I was dying to tell him about everything that had happened to me over the past twenty-four hours, but he was already so overwhelmed, I couldn’t burden him with more heavy stuff.  And given the state of his love life, gushing about an uber-hot baseball player turned vampire hunter would be cruel.

Instead, I went for a rhetorical debate.  “What if vampires didn’t just need blood to survive?” I asked.  “What if they need human souls as well?”

“That’s a random question.”  He thoughtfully licked his spoon.  “Why would they need souls?”

“Because they don’t have any of their own.  If they don’t have any soul, then they would turn into animals.”

“So they need soul in order to remain civilized.”  When I nodded, he continued, “So the more passionate the soul, the more they’d like it.”

“That makes sense,” I said.

“Which would mean that the souls of musicians and actors would be the most delectable since artists tend to be very passionate people.”

I shivered at his observation.  No wonder Hedda owned a theater, a music hall, and an art gallery.  Those places would be smorgasbords.

I went for another spoonful of ice cream, but the carton was empty.  “Are you still hungry?  I have peanut butter and jelly.  I may even have un-moldy bread.”

A heavy thud from outside made us jump.  Andrew looked at me wide-eyed.  “What was that?”

For a moment, I wasn’t sure, but then I smiled.  “It’s my neighbor.  Every week he forgets about garbage pickup until after midnight, then he has to get out of bed and drag his cans to the curb so he won’t miss the morning garbage truck.”

Andrew still looked worried.  “Are you positive?”

I started to say yes, then stopped.  What if it was Caleb messing around outside?  I’d taken Andrew in without thinking how his possessive boyfriend might react.  Then a worse thought struck me.  What if the lurker was a vampire?  Suddenly, the ice cream was lying too heavy on my stomach.

I scrambled across the bed and peeked through the blinds.  To my relief, I saw Earl wheeling his garbage to the curb.  “The coast is clear.”

Andrew’s face relaxed.  “Good.”

Still, I was uneasy.  “Does Caleb know where I live?”

Andrew shook his head.  “If I thought you were in danger, I’d leave right this minute.”

“Don’t leave.”

He smiled.  “I’ll stay as long as you let me.  Maybe even longer.”

I resumed my seat next to him, and he put his arm around me.  I rested my head on his shoulder and turned on the small TV sitting on the dresser.  Within minutes, Andrew had fallen asleep, but I remained tense, listening for strange sounds outside the window.  What if Caleb
did
find out where I lived?  He’d probably do something much worse than throw a cup of Coke at my window.  And what about the vampires?  Isaiah said they couldn’t get inside my house, but then again, he and Perry didn’t know much about what really went on in Hedda’s grieve.

That thought worried me so much that I slipped out of bed and checked the window and door locks.  There was a withered bulb of garlic in the refrigerator.  Should I hang it somewhere?

Since it was after two o’clock, I didn’t want to wake Isaiah.  Still, my nervous imagination wouldn’t let me sleep.  Every gust of wind made my heart flutter.  I decided to put on my pajamas, hoping that would relax me.  As I took off my jeans, something heavy slipped from my pocket.  The crystal prism from the Bleak’s chandelier.  Shaped like a teardrop, it was about the size of a fig.  Since I wouldn’t be returning to the theater for a while, I hung the prism in the window over the kitchen sink, thinking it would make a terrific sun catcher.   Then I settled back on the bed next to Andrew.  I flipped through channels on the TV, finally stopping at a re-broadcast of the local news.  If anything would bore me to sleep, it was this.