“Tell me again, Miss Lowe, take it slowly.” The policeman, a detective inspector I think he said he was, kept tapping his pen against the table. It was driving me crazy. The policewoman sitting by the door smiled. That was driving me crazy too.
“What do you know about this Severn?”
I have to think about the answer. I know things about Severn that nobody knows but I hardly know him at all. And I desperately want to keep on learning.
So, really slowly like the cop wants, I start from the beginning again.
“I met Severn two weeks ago when we packed in.” It feels like forever.
“Packed in?” the cop inquires.
“Yeah, that’s what I said. Pack-in. It’s theatre-speak, Get used to it!” This guy was so dumb.
“All right, Miss Lowe,” the cop snapped. “There’s no need to get abusive. Let’s just get on with it so we can all go home.”
“Yeah, well don’t butt in then!” Okay, it was well after midnight and I was tired and cranky, but he really was a jerk. “I told you, I met him at pack-in. That’s when we set up the show in the theatre.” I added the last bit slowly, just in case he was as stupid as he looked in his prissy black jacket and his ugly blue tie,
Then, as he still looked blank, I explained.
“Until pack-in the show is all over the place. The actors will have been rehearsing in one place, the orchestra somewhere else and the dancers somewhere else again. The props and the wardrobe have been made at the main rehearsal rooms over the last few months and the sets have been made in a hired warehouse. At least that’s how our company usually works.”
The cop was rapidly taking notes.
“On pack-in day the set and all the technical stuff such as the lights and the sound gear arrives at the theatre and the crew take over; rigging, wiring, hauling things into place. It’s organised chaos. I love it.”
“Why were you there?”
“Mum’s been in the society for years. Even before she went to Australia and met Dad. When they split up she came home and joined up again. I go with her.”
“You act?”
“No, I’m the family disappointment. Backstage, that’s my job. I’m doing theatre arts at school but only because it’s easy, not because I ever want to act!”
He was actually writing this down, he really was a jerk!
“But you were at this show?” he asked, looking up from his paper.
“Yeah, I just told you, I work backstage. My theatre arts teacher also happened to be the choreographer for this year’s show and she talked to the stage manager who agreed I could work as floor crew, moving bits of set on and off stage when the scenes change.
This year’s production is the biggest show we’ve done. The director decided to have all the scene changes happening with the curtains up but in a black-out and there’re about twenty-one scene changes so they needed a lot of crew. That’s how come Severn and his lot were there at all. We didn’t have enough people to move all the sets by ourselves, or do the complicated lighting the show needs, so the stage manager rang somebody who rang somebody else who suggested Seth Borman.
“Seth Borman,” the cop repeated as he wrote the name on his piece of paper.
“That’s what I said.”
The cop glared at me.
“It was a good idea,” I continued. “Even if it is costing the society an arm and a leg. He runs a professional travelling stage crew. Technical wizards.”
“And Severn was one of these?” the cop asked.
“Yeah,” I snapped back. “I was just getting to that.” I carried on.
“Seth Borman’s the leader. The head flyman.” I could see the cop’s eyebrow start to rise with a question so I jumped in first. “Flymen are the guys who work on a little platform about fifteen metres above the stage, hauling the big backdrop cloths and bits of set in and out. They are immensely strong. Seth Borman has an upper body to die for,” I added wistfully.
The cop glared at me again. I continued.
“There are six more of them. The women, Olivia and Meredith, work floor crew like I do. So does Aiden, Meredith’s twin brother. The older guy, Finn, is the floor electrician. The guy in charge of lighting is a strange little dude they call the Reverend. He’s about five foot nothing tall and wears a huge black floor-length coat that makes him look like a miniature version of Darth Vader. I’ve never seen him without a can of coke in one hand and a chocolate bar in the other.
Severn operates the sound board.
I didn’t notice him for the first four days.
Chains of Blood
The Second of Severn.
Riley Lowe is backstage at another show, but this time she is out of her depth, running equipment she doesn’t understand and faced with all sorts of problems including a boy actor who is a spoilt little brat. When her personal vampires arrive to help, Riley thinks everything has suddenly got better, until the boy disappears. Will the vampire's special skills be enough to find the boy and how long will it be before Riley turns into a vampire herself?
Read an excerpt:
I fished a hanky out of my pocket, dried my eyes and blew my nose. Crying was not going to help. But I still had no idea what to do. Maybe Mum and Grant could help. The sound operator from our own theatre company was out of town touring with a fashion show but if Grant could get hold of him, he could at least tell me what to do.
Then my cell phone vibrated in my pocket. I hauled it out and stared at it blankly. A message from a withheld number. Curious, I opened it.
angels r us look up look left
I looked up, peered through the darkness of the encroaching night. Looked left – towards the carpark. And they were there. Three figures emerged out of the gloom, striding side by side like the baddies in a b-grade western or the chorus-line for a musical version of the Matrix, long black coats flowing behind them. Before I could get out of my chair the one in the middle had broken into a run. I have never climbed down the scaffold as quickly, but I was still not at ground level when he reached me, picked me off the scaffold and pulled me into his arms.
When I came up for breath I could see Mum and Grant standing up from where they had been sitting on the grass and walking towards David and Aiden, hands outstretched in welcome.
“What? How? When?” I stuttered, wrapping my arms around Severn’s waist under his coat as we walked to join the others.
“Sounded like you needed help,” Severn smiled, his arm around my shoulders.
“And we needed sun,” Aiden added.
I gave him a quizzical look. “You? Needed sun? Umm...?” The “have you forgotten you’re a vampire?” question left unasked.
“Oh no, not in the want-to-hang-out-in-the-daylight way. We were just sick of snow. It is so cold in the mountains.”
“And we were bored,” the Reverend added. “Sounds like we got here just at the right time. We were in the carpark. We heard the director’s little request.”
Of course they did. A normal person sitting beside me wouldn’t have heard it unless they were wearing headphones but of course the vampires heard it. I wonder how long it takes for things like that to change – my hearing hadn’t changed at all yet and it had been three months since I had drunk Severn’s blood and started the change-over. I must ask them how long it takes and what the symptoms are.
“How did you get here so quickly? I only emailed you yesterday?”
“We flew,” Severn replied with one of his pedantically correct and obvious answers, complete with raised eyebrow over his fine, tortoiseshell-rimmed glasses.
I gave him a similar look back. “Flew? Um, flew... as in...?”
“As in the Lear Jet,” Severn laughed. “You weren’t thinking...?” and he flexed his shoulders so I could feel his wings move under his t-shirt. “We are not that fast – or that fit.”
“Weren’t you worried about coming back so soon after ... what if they stopped you at the airport? Don’t the police still want to talk to you about the bo
dy at New Brighton?”
Power Ride
An Avi Livingstone Murder Mystery
Kester (Kit) Simmons, drummer with the rock band ‘Charlotte Jane’, was out of beat. He was stressed out, starving and he thought he was going crazy. Then, with less than two weeks to go before a national tour, Kit's precious drums and one of the band members are found slashed to pieces. The keyboard player, Avi Livingstone, is missing, Kit has no alibi and, to make matters worse, the police suspect him of dealing drugs.
Read an excerpt:
“Cousin, tell me something. Kit's a bit out of it, isn't he? Do tours always have this effect on him?”
“Tours? No, they don't affect him at all, strangely enough,” Avi replied thoughtfully. “Something is obviously bugging him, though. Mind you, that doesn't mean to say that it'll be anything horrendous. Kit doesn't have the most stable personality and he is apt to make monstrous mountains out of the most minute of molehills. Whatever it is, he doesn't want to talk about it. This, with Kit, means that it is probably something reasonably serious, but I can't force him to talk to me. I'll have another go later. I can usually convince him to talk, it's just a matter of easing him along gently. I can be very persuasive.” He ignored Jo's expression of sarcasm. “I wouldn't worry about it too much, though. In the meantime, I would think the best thing we can do is keep Danny from ripping Kit's face off this afternoon.”
“Danny doesn't like Kit much, does he?”
“Huh!” Avi's laugh was more a scoff of derision. “Rest assured, cousin dearest, it's nothing personal. This close to a tour, Danny hates everyone, including and especially himself. Tours might not affect Kit, but they blow Danny away. He'll get worse yet.”
“Super.” Jo did not sound as if she actually meant the superlative. “You mean we're likely to see some fireworks?”
“Better than Old Man Carson's bonfires. I guarantee it.”
Joanna laughed and rubbed her hands gleefully. Then she stopped and looked serious.
“But Danny's such a little guy. He wouldn't be stupid enough to upset the whole band would he? Surely?”
“He would, he has and he will, no doubt, do so again. In case you hadn't noticed, Daniel Gordon is somewhat akin to your neighbour's crazed Jack Russell terrier. Wind him up enough and he'll tackle anything, even if it is three times his size. Mind you, we could have some real problems this tour. I don't think it's going to be a very smooth ride. Danny is still very angry about losing our last bass player and, even though we've got Kelly, Danny is determined to hold Kit responsible and to rub it in as much as possible.”
“Why?”
Avi shrugged his shoulders and spread his hands wide in a gesture of genuine incomprehension.
“I don't know. Danny's just a creep, I guess.”
“So why keep him in the band, if he's such a creep?”
“Two reasons, I guess. He's a damn good guitarist and vocalist and he sells records.”
“Garbage! The band sells records, not Danny Gordon. 'Charlotte Jane' was selling records before Danny joined you guys, and who the hell was he? Some two-bit wanna-be from Geraldine! Come on, Avi, he might be a good guitarist but they're ten a penny. If the man is a jerk you've got to have a better reason than that for keeping him on.”
Avi ran his hand thoughtfully over his unshaven chin. He shrugged again.
“You know something, Jo? I don't have a decent answer. I guess we've got so used to Danny being a prize prick we just take his temper tantrums for granted. I mean, nobody's perfect, and if we started throwing out band members who had personality problems there'd be bugger all of us left. Poor old Kit would be at the top of the list, he's completely scrambled, and I don't think I'm always the easiest musician to work with. Anyway, whatever Danny is, he's a good businessman. He's got a pretty watertight contract, so we're stuck with him for the duration, at least.”
“The duration of what?”
“The cd, the tour and the next single. It could be an exhausting few months.”
About the Author
J. L. O’Rourke has worked as a journalist, sub-editor, free-lance writer and office administrator. When not writing, she enjoys being in a theatre, either onstage as a singer or backstage where she has been everything from floor crew to stage-manager. She lives on an olive grove in North Canterbury, New Zealand.
You can follow her on Facebook at
https://www.facebook.com/MillwheelPress
or on Smashwords, https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/millwheel
Out for Blood Page 15
