by Kat Cotton
I shut the cubicle door, thinking about what Lilly had said. That’d been the first time she’d come outright and mentioned knowing about paranormal stuff. Until now, it’d been an issue we’d skirted around even after fighting more than one demon together.
Obviously, the three troupe members had more than a passing acquaintance with demons and other creatures. They might even be some of those creatures themselves but for her to just slip it into casual conversation meant that I’d taken a step closer to the heart of what Sequins & Daggers actually was.
If I got Lilly’s trust, I was sure she’d tell me even more.
“Yikes, we still have hours of travel left,” Lilly said. “I thought I’d been asleep for ages.”
Lilly was obviously the type who had no problem conversing while on the toilet which was always something that grossed me out. I didn’t want to reply until I came out of my cubicle because that would only encourage her but I didn’t want to be rude either. I ended up answering with an agreeing murmur.
When I came out, Lilly handed me more disinfectant swipes.
“You can’t be too careful.”
After that, we walked into the store. I grabbed a drink and Lilly got armfuls of sweets.
“Wow, are you going to eat all that?” I asked her.
“Sure am.”
“Aren’t you worried about putting on weight?” I liked to indulge in ice cream occasionally but if I spent two days sitting on my butt, driving and eating sugar, I’d pack on a heap of weight and fail my next physical.
“I have a fast metabolism,” she said.
I nodded and picked up a sandwich to go with my drink. When we got back to the van, Nuno had refueled.
“Want me to drive from here?” I asked him. It didn’t seem fair for him to do it all.
He shook his head.
“Sure? You must be getting tired.”
“Nuno always drives,” Lilly said. “He likes it and he hates anyone else touching the van. He even gets edgy when Duke drives it.”
From the truck stop, we drove along the coast. Lilly kept sleeping and it was no good trying to converse with Nuno but I was happy enough watching the sea. With the overcast weather, most of the beaches were empty except for a few determined surfers and some dog walkers.
When Lilly woke up, she got talking, telling me stories about their past performances. I listened carefully hoping she’d let something slip but she never once did. My boss, Larry, wouldn’t be happy unless I had some leads soon. He wanted evidence and hard facts, not stories of Lilly’s conquests.
After a while, Lilly put the radio on, some local station playing Country music.
At least Lilly and I were bonding. We’d done the whole break in and demon fighting together and now we were chatting like friends. I just needed to keep building that trust. If that meant listening to stories that made me a little uncomfortable, it was all part of the job.
The song on the radio finished and the announcer came on.
“Coming up next, we have Madame Esmeralda. Find out what your stars have in store for you, but first—”
“Turn off the radio,” I said.
“But I want to hear my stars.”
“Turn. Off. The. Radio.” I spoke through gritted teeth. No matter what, I would not listen to this.
Lilly spun around in her seat, her stare almost burning holes in me. Until now, I’d been pretty easy going when it came to Lilly. She took the lead and followed. Lilly liked that. I didn’t want to destroy the budding friendship between us but I wasn’t going to listen to that woman on the radio.
I leaned forward and locked eyes with Lilly. That radio would be turned off, if I had to jump in the front seat and do it myself. My stomach twisted, nausea rising up in my belly. She had until the end of this advertisement.
She kept staring at me, and I stared back.
She narrowed her eyes and I narrowed mine.
The jingle for tractor parts sang out on the radio.
She raised her chin as though in defiance but I could tell she forced that move.
“Really, Jayne, you’re being silly about this.”
I didn’t answer her, I just held up the eye contact. Normally, I’d have backed down by now and let Lilly do what she liked but not on this issue.
Finally, she turned away just as the jingle finished.
“All right, already. If it means that much to you.” She turned off the radio and gave a fake laugh. “Really, Jayne, it’s just a bit of fun. No need to turn into a feral cat. I swear I could see your hackles go up. You can be a bit scary.”
I picked up my book again and pretended to read until we got to our hotel. That was a lot of hours of silence but that was fine by me.
Lilly was supposed to share a room with me but she never appeared all night. I assumed she shared Nuno’s room instead which was just being overly dramatic. I wasn’t that scary.
Chapter 5
WE ARRIVED IN BRISBANE the next day and headed straight to the venue, a performance space by the river. We were scheduled to do three one-hour shows over the next three days as part of a festival. That put us on a tight schedule with other acts going on before and after us. There were ten different shows going on while we were here.
Nuno parked the van and we looked for the person in charge. An older man came out and gave us directions to where we had to unload our stuff. We’d been allocated a storage cage in the loading bay.
“It’s a bit of a squeeze,” he said. “But it should be big enough.”
The dubious glare he gave our trailer made me doubt that. He handed us a key and had Nuno sign off on it. Lilly and I walked over to the storage space while Nuno moved the van. We both eyed up the tiny space.
“This isn’t going to work,” she said.
I nodded. There was no way. It’d be impossible. We went back inside and found the man in charge.
“This isn’t working,” Lilly said. “We need a bigger space.”
He shrugged. “No can do. We agreed to all this prior to the booking and we have no other secure space.”
He shuffled through the papers on his clipboard and held out a form to show us. Like he said, it’d been all signed off. We didn’t have a leg to stand on.
“Damn Duke,” Lilly said, then turned to the man. “It’s okay. We’ll just have to work with what we’ve got.”
We walked back along the dusty concrete walkway to the loading bay.
“Be nice if he’d told us about this,” she said. “Be even nicer if he hadn’t disappeared to start with. He obviously thought the space would be big enough for our stuff. It’s most definitely not.”
When we got back to the space, Nuno had unloaded the trailer. When he saw us, he shrugged. I looked at all our gear and shrugged back.
“That can go back in the trailer to start with,” Lilly said, pointing at the Wheel of Death. “It’s not like we’ll use it.”
I didn’t like the way she said that but I gave Nuno a hand loading it back in the trailer. Then I looked over what we had left.
“These cases, do they need to be stored here or can we keep them at the hotel?”
Lilly looked through the cases.
“These ones need to stay,” she said. Then she pointed to two others. “Those ones are sound and lighting. Even when we have specs, we never know if a venue will have what we need so we bring everything with us. We shouldn’t need them here so pack them back in the trailer. If anything is amiss, we can bring them back.”
Oops, I’d assumed all Lilly’s cases were her clothes and makeup. I silently apologized for judging her.
She then indicated another two cases. “These are costumes I don’t need for this show. If there’s somewhere secure for us to leave the trailer at the hotel, we could keep them with us.”
Nuno and I loaded the trunks back into the van. Then we started getting the necessary stuff packed in to the cage.
Lilly leaned against one of the other cages, doing something with her phone.
>
“Isn’t she going to help?” I asked Nuno.
Nuno shook his head emphatically. I took that to mean that not only wouldn’t Lilly help but, if she did, it’d be more trouble than it was worth.
We finally got the stuff loaded in. It’d been like playing Tetris and I figured it’d take us an extra half hour of set up time to get it all out again.
“How would Duke have organized this?” I asked.
“Dunno,” Lilly replied. “But if we’d known we’d only had that tiny cage for storage, we’d have only bought the bare essentials with us. We could’ve shipped the rest.”
I sucked on my teeth, thinking about that.
“Did you check the paperwork before we came?”
Lilly did one of her tiny shrugs, as though the effort of lifting her shoulder was almost too much for her.
“Nope. Duke usually does that. I never thought of it.”
Nuno put his hands together in apology but he didn’t need to apologize to me. He’d been the one stuck with most of the heavy lifting.
“Maybe we need to start checking these things ourselves,” I said. “To prevent nasty surprises.”
“That’s what Earnest is for,” she said. “If we did it ourselves, it might step on his toes.”
Personally, I’d rather step on his toes than deal with a situation like this.
Lilly scowled for a minute then put down her phone.
“Okay, let’s look around the place,” she said. “See what last minute modifications we’ll have to make.”
I followed along behind her, with a sinking feeling that we were horribly under-prepared for this performance. I had to remind myself I wasn’t here to run the business. I just had to shut up and keep my eyes open.
We found the room we’d be playing.
“Well this is cozy,” Lilly said. “You’d think Duke could’ve gotten us higher billing.”
The room was indeed cozy. It’d be a good space for Earnest’s dog act but not so much for me.
Another troupe set up for their performance, loading a cannon on the small stage. I wasn’t sure what they intended doing with that cannon but it made me curious.
“Hey, Simmo,” Lilly called to one of the performers.
He grinned and waved back at her.
I walked onto the stage. The clearance for my act concerned me. I didn’t have as much space as I’d thought so I called Nuno over and pointed it out to him.
“Do you think we can have the hoop lower during that part of the act?” I asked him.
He nodded.
I did a quick check that everything I needed was available. We’d come back for a dress rehearsal tomorrow so I’d do a more thorough check then.
Lilly sat on the side of the stage, legs crossed, fixing her lipstick.
“Are you guys done?” she called out. “I’m starving.”
“Almost,” I replied.
It was okay for her. Dancing and singing didn’t have the same kind of risks as my act. Other than tripping over and falling off stage, there was little chance of physical injury.
I did a final walk around then sat down beside Lilly.
“Done.”
Since the altercation in the van yesterday, there’d been a distance between us.
“Sorry about yesterday,” I said.
I wasn’t one bit sorry and I’d do it again but I figured the best way to close this distance would be to apologize.
“Yesterday?” she asked. “What happened yesterday? I never remember insignificant details.”
If that was the way she wanted to play it, fine by me. She smiled and things had smoothed over a bit and that was the main thing.
Some of the crew came in to rearrange the seating in the room. While we waited for Nuno, I spotted a familiar face. Akira. I gave a little gasp. Sure, I knew he’d be working on this case too but no one had told me he’d be on the crew. Of course. It’d be stupid to acknowledge him. We technically didn’t know each other.
I did take a second look at him, though. He barely looked like the same guy I saw in the office. Clean cut, suit wearing Akira now had casually tousled hair and a tight t-shirt that showed off his hard body.
I tore my gaze away.
“He looks familiar,” Lilly said.
Damn. I wouldn’t help his cover to have Lilly remember him from our last performance.
“You’ve probably worked with him before. It’s not unusual to have the same crew at different shows,” I said.
Lilly pursed her lips. “Not crew that cute. If I’d worked with him before, I’d most definitely have noticed. I might have to get to know him much better while we’re here.”
That shouldn’t have made my heart clench the way it did. There was no denying Akira’s attractiveness but I’d always brushed him off because work place relationships complicated things. If Lilly wanted to go after him, she was welcome.
Actually, if Lilly wanted to after him, there was no way in hell I’d be able to stop her. Lilly had all the assets I was missing, not that I thought a perky set of boobs would sway Akira, but she also had extreme confidence and that whole femme fatale thing going on. Everything about her, from her posture to her walk to the way she held her head left no doubt that any man would want her. And not just want her, but be damned grateful for any crumbs she threw their way.
I smiled at her. In a situation like this, the only course of action was to disengage your emotions.
Once Nuno finished his checks, we headed to our hotel. At least Nuno had thought to get the hotel details from Duke’s paperwork. Except, when we tried to check in, the receptionist said our booking had been canceled.
“No way,” Lilly said. “The arts people made the booking for us. Maybe it’s in a different name.”
“I’ve found the booking. In your name. It was canceled today. The man said he was in charge of your group. I wasn’t here but the details are all on file.”
I bit my lip, a shudder going through me. Did she mean Duke? But surely if he turned up out of the blue, it wouldn’t be to cancel our hotel booking but who knew with that guy?
“Is it actually hotel policy to allow someone else to cancel our booking?”
The receptionist shrugged. “As I said, I wasn’t working. I don’t know what happened.”
I really needed a shower and a change of clothes not a protracted argument about hotel policy, even if she was wrong.
“Can we rebook?” I asked. I didn’t care if I had to pay for it out of my own pocket, so long as I had a room to go to.
“We’re pretty full at the moment,” she said. “But I’ll see what I can do.”
I leaned against the desk while she checked the computer.
Lilly lounged on one of the lobby sofas. I was going to join her when Earnest walked into the hotel.
“They wouldn’t let my dogs stay here,” he said, with that annoying chuckle. “I’ve organized town house for us. Who’d book us into a hotel that doesn’t allow dogs?”
I didn’t want to mention that there were no dogs in the act when we’d been booked because he looked so sad about it. But really, he could’ve gotten in touch with us. A text or phone call wouldn’t have killed him and would’ve saved us a lot of bother.
“You found somewhere nice for them?” Lilly asked.
He nodded. “They have a yard to play in and everything. Much nicer than this scumbag hotel.”
I held my breath, not wanting to argue but the thoughtlessness of it annoyed the hell out of me. We took our bags and headed back to the van. This town house had better have a shower and a comfortable bed.
“Is there anywhere to eat near this place?” Lilly asked. “I’m starving.
“We can get some pizza or something and the dogs won’t be alone.”
I trailed along behind them, thinking of the bright side. Pizza, and a much better chance to investigate Earnest. But I’d definitely be writing a bad review for this place.
Chapter 6
THE TOWN HOUSE WAS as blan
d and generic as you’d expect. But it had a huge garage, big enough to hold the trailer as well as the van and Earnest’s car.
A door at the back of the garage took us through the courtyard garden into the kitchen. Earnest must’ve bought groceries with him because a few things sat on the kitchen table. Tea, bread, sugar — all the necessities.
From there, he led us through to the living area. The dogs had made themselves comfortable on the sofa. They fit into the neutral color scheme.
“I’ll order the pizza,” Earnest said.
“No mushrooms for me,” I said. “I can’t eat them.”
At least this place had four bedrooms so at least that meant my own room. I’d had a horrible feeling on the way over that Earnest might’ve expected Lilly and I to share a room. That would not have worked on so many levels.
Earnest had grabbed the master bedroom with en-suite on the ground floor. We went upstairs to the other three rooms. Of course, Lilly called dibs on the biggest room but I didn’t mind. She needed far more wardrobe space than I did so the small room was fine by me. Poor Nuno got the kids’ room at the back. Two single beds with a pirate theme. He gave us the thumbs up and a smile. Maybe he loved pirates.
I dumped my stuff then jumped in the shower before Lilly commandeered the bathroom. She struck me as someone who’d spend a lot of time in the bathroom while I just wanted to get in and out.
When I got back to my room, the major drawback of this place struck me. I wanted to call my boss and report in but that would be impossible. We might have more space but it lacked the privacy of a hotel. Lilly and Nuno would be able to hear every word when I was on the phone. Being sloppy about who heard you talking on the phone was a rookie mistake. Like Earnest, for example.
At least I could send Larry a text. Reporting your whereabouts to base was an essential part of being undercover.
Then I searched for somewhere in my room to hide the burner phone. Living in a town house with the troupe might make it easier for me to snoop on them but it made it easier for them to do the same — and Lilly had proved herself in that area.
