Biting Oz: Biting Love, Book 5 (19 page)

We were plenty early, but I hid in the prop room until I made myself late and had to haul ass to the pit. I threw my butt in my chair barely in time for the initial tuning.

At seven, the doors opened. Seats filled rapidly and I was hit by the familiar opening-night buzz.

A little preshow cramming usually took the edge off. I’d marked my difficult passages with a star in the margins and now rehearsed them to remind myself how they went. No playing once the house opened, so I just fingered them, which was good enough. When I’d run through them all, it was only seven fifteen.

I leaned over. “Hey, Nixie.”

“Not more viola jokes.”

“But—”

“No. Tell something else. Tell piano jokes or banjo jokes or something.”

“Okay. Why was the piano invented?”

She stared at me. “I didn’t think you’d actually
know
any.”

“Come on. Why were pianos invented?”

Rocky leaned up. “So the pianist would have a place to put his beer.”

We fist-bumped. Rocky said, “What’s the least-used sentence in the English language?”

“Is that the banjo player’s new Ferrari?” we said together and fist-bumped again.

“Enough!” Nixie glared. “These
baka
jokes can’t be good for the baby. I’m supposed to play Brahms and shit, not bludgeon it with stupid.”

I smirked. My work here was done.

But it was only seven twenty. “Hey Rocky, how did the sausage bribe go?”

She frowned and was about to answer when Takashi said, “What?”

I looked front. He was talking into his headset, low, intense whispers.

Next to Nixie, Julian arched a black brow. Nixie leaned toward him. “What?”

“Dumas,” Julian murmured.

“Something’s wrong with Dumbass?”

“Dumas is talking. Telling them something’s wrong. Shh.”

Vampire ears must be damned good. I could barely hear the electronic chirp from Takashi’s headset and was itching to know what was going on.

Fortunately, so was Nixie. She wasn’t silent more than five seconds before poking her husband. “What?”

He sighed. “Something about Lana.”

Our Glinda, the part-time hooker with the tiny voice. Not Mishela and not one of the Broadway leads, so probably nothing too awful. Maybe Dumas had found Lana on the job, so to speak. I went back to fingering.

Takashi cued the final tuning and we started. I stopped thinking about anything but the music.

Playing a show is like driving. Your mind can wander, but if there’s a hiccup, you’d better be ready to compensate. I try to keep my head in the music. Sure, it’s not often some asshole swerves into your lane and jams on the brakes, but it does happen and it’s worse with amateurs. Aside from the leads, these were unpredictable newbies. And half were kids.

So when Glinda’s swing came out empty during a tremolo, I was surprised enough to stop waggling fingers, but only for a second.

Takashi didn’t miss a beat; another sign he’d make it. The show must go on may be a truism, but it’s also an imperative. The show is your product and you can’t sell excuses. Good news is audiences will forgive a lot if you give them a great product eventually. As long as Lana made it onstage soon (even pulling up her little stardust panties from a good rubbing on someone’s wand), the audience wouldn’t care. They might not even know. I snuck back into my tremolo.

But onstage nothing was happening, which was a bad thing. We hit a vamp, the musical equivalent of fat pants, and Takashi signaled repeat with a whirl of one finger. Still nothing. I kept flicking eyes between Takashi and the stage. The Munchkins couldn’t come out without Glinda to call them, so poor Dorothy and Toto were alone in front of a full audience.

Mishela was desperately improvising when suddenly, a whole number ahead of time, the Wicked Witch shot onstage.

Even Takashi hiccupped a beat.

Wicked was thin and bony and wore the usual fluttery black skirt, granny boots and tall, pointy sorting hat.

And a new green Halloween mask. We
all
lost a bar when we saw that. Well, except Lob, the drummer in Nixie’s bar band, who could play though drunken bar fights and Granny Butt stripping. He covered us with a totally bonkers improv.

Takashi hissed, “Number ten.” We hit the Wicked Witch theme for two bars and trilled ominously before cutting off. Eighteen faces turned up from the pit to see what would happen next.

Wicked stalked toward Dorothy, claw-like hands menacing. Little Munchkins cowered behind scenery. Toto went apeshit, barking and running in circles.

Mishela’s nostrils flared and she took a step back, Dorothy pigtails bobbing.

“I’ll get you now,” Wicked snarled and followed.

The snarl was male. Fuck, this must be the kidnapper. A
he
, almost certainly a vampire, and definitely after Mishela. I flicked eyes for Glynn, but no dark mountains hovered in the wings.

Julian, though, had set his cello on its ribs to leap to the rescue.

Which would
ruin
the show. Julian’s one sexy dude and a fine string player, but not primarily a performer. First rule is if the actors on stage can get themselves out of trouble, you let them. Best case, the audience thinks it’s part of the show.

Granted, this bit of trouble was more than your usual dropped line or missed cue. But Mishela was a pro. She’d think of something. Both Nixie and I grabbed Julian before he could bollix things up.

He growled low and feral and not human at all.

Fortunately, Toto’s barking covered it up. The dog ran at Wicked and lifted his doggy hind leg, no doubt to tell the impostor exactly what he thought.

Wicked jabbed a broom in Toto’s belly. The dog gave a pained yip and skittered back.

Mishela scooped up poor Toto. She stepped forward, hit her light and challenged Wicked with, “Are you a good witch or a bad witch?”

Yay, an actual line from the scene. Damn, she was good.

Wicked grabbed for her again, nearly connected. Mishela swayed back, not quite superspeed. Wicked’s claws swished air.

A sucked inhale from the audience said they were caught up in the drama, not knowing it was real.

But Wicked took a menacing step forward, and another, and Mishela backed away, which was bad because the proscenium was only so wide. Once she hit the wing, the audience would know it wasn’t an act and the show would be ruined.

Of course that was when Julian shook my hand loose. I tried to grab him and his arm blurred avoiding me. He peeled off Nixie more gently, but his tensed muscles screamed his readiness to leap onto stage the instant he was free. I snatched at him. His arm shimmered again and I missed.

Nixie just jumped into his lap. He couldn’t shift her quickly without hurting her. He growled again, more human and disgruntled, and slid her gently aside. She clutched and hissed Latin curses the whole way.

Once again, he tensed for the leap.

Steam boiled from the wings, shot between Mishela and Wicked.

Snapped into a very big, very pissed Glynn, glaring at Wicked. I stopped grabbing for Julian. The scene was lost.

There was a collective gasp, from audience, pit and Munchkins. A tiny gap in the action as even pro Dorothy tried to think up a plausible save. Finally she stuttered, “Who are you? And…and are you a good witch or a bad witch?”

Glynn grinned down at Wicked, his teeth very white, his canines just a little long. “I’m Glynn,” he said in his musical baritone. “And I’m very, very good.” The canines lengthened a little more.

Wicked turned tail and ran.

The audience cheered.

Without a pause, Glynn turned to Mishela. Pulling a wand out of his jacket, he delivered Glinda’s lines word for word. Well, except for calling himself Glynn-deh instead, but I don’t think the audience picked up on it.

A quick double-blink and Mishela responded, in character, naturally.

They say the Welsh are a musical people. To our utter shock, Glynn completed the scene as Glinda (Glynn-deh), including singing the come out song to the Munchkins. Down an octave, since he was a baritone, but it was note-for-note perfect. And for once, we could play full volume. That boy had
lungs
.

Although the leather jacket clashed a bit with the wand.

But the audience applauded Glynn-deh, and the scene, miraculously, was saved.

At intermission Julian disappeared, literally. One minute he was setting down his cello, the next he was a river of smoke, running onto stage and into the wings.

Nobody noticed. They were all busy scoring their intermission chocolate from Rob, greeting friends or hitting the bathroom.

Nixie caught me watching Julian’s mist. She stopped midswab. “I can explain that.”

“No need. I figured it out.” I loosened my clarinet ligature and slid the reed out. “The fangs are a dead giveaway.”

She smiled slowly. “I thought Glynn was looking a little slugged-stupid around you. Congratulations.”

“Thanks. It’s not like he made it easy. Say, am I going to minionize or…?” I made fangs out of my index and middle fingers, wiggled them from my upper lip.

“Nope. I’ll tell you why later.”

“A secret?” Sticking my reed in my mouth, I threaded my swab’s weight through the bell.

“Big-time. It’d cost their lives. But the need to bite—” Nixie clacked her jaw “—gives them away every time. When the right mate comes along.”

“
Mate
?” I sucked in a breath. Along with my reed, which gouged my soft palate. I spat reed into my stand, coughed and gagged. Nixie pounded my back until I’d replaced the spit in my lungs with enough air to choke out, “What do you mean, mate?”

“Oh, not any sort of destiny mate or shit like that. Just, if you’re immune to their Illuminati mind-control, you’re a potential. Then the smell/taste thing draws them to couple up.”

“I’m not…I mean Glynn isn’t…I mean…” Actually, I didn’t know what I meant beyond
duh-huh?

“I was going to give you the 4-1-1, but figured with you so duty
über alles
, it’d never go anywhere. Should have known nature’d win over nurture. Hey, since you’re linked in, want to come to the party tonight?”

“You mean the reception?”

“I said party, not puke-fest. LLAMA’s doing the reception, you know. They don’t throw parties, unless vomiting and mass hysteria count as good times.”

The VIP reception was being catered by LLAMA? Not good. The Lutheran Ladies Auxiliary Mothers Association was famous for their liver sausage and cheese balls, second only in popularity—well, maybe notoriety was a better word—to their pistachio fluff with stuff floating in it.

I saw a fluff recipe once. It called for gelatin, whipped topping and cottage cheese, but I think LLAMA substituted cellulite from botched liposuctions.
 

The fluff was why nobody ever said no to a LLAMA reception. Not twice at any rate. Rumor said they found bits of themselves floating in it. LLAMA pistachio fluff broke down people into desserts, a church-lady Soylent Green. Which I didn’t believe until I was sixteen and came eyeball to eyeball
with
an eyeball, staring at me out of my dessert. It turned out to be a pickled egg, but the scarring was permanent.

A rustle caught both our attentions. Rob was opening a new bag of chocolate bars, super dark, the kind that are 70% cacao and 30% orgasm.

Nixie’s eyes tracked the bag on its way to Katie Reverend, playing reed three. “Julian and I are doing a do at our place. Glynn’ll be there. Get him to tell you about his tchotchkes.”

“His what?” I reached for the bag. Nixie snagged it midair. I was practically sucked into the vacuum left behind.

“His knickknacks.” Nixie dumped the entire bag onto her lap. Carefully put two back. “He won’t tell us anything about them and it’s driving me crazy.”

“Glynn has knickknacks?” I reached again for the bag.

“Nuh-uh. Pads, girlfriend.” She started to pass the sadly deflated bag back a row, stopped. Extracted one of the two bars, and finally passed the bag to the harpist, who simply stared at the lone chocolate.

“Knickknacks.” My stomach growled. “Glynn travels. They’re probably just souvenirs.”

“I don’t think so.” Nixie popped a bar into her mouth, swallowed without chewing. “He arrived with the clothes on his back and exactly one piece of luggage the size of my clarinet case. And first thing he does is ask for a small table. Well, of course I had to look. He’d covered the table and set up these pieces like some weird shrine.” She popped another bar. “You’re gonna needle him and find out what they mean.”

“I am? Why should I do that?”

“I told you. It’s driving me cray-Z.” She made short work of two more chocolate bars. I think she unwrapped them first, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

My stomach growled again. “Yeah, except these knickknacks are apparently special to him. I’m not going to intrude.”

“Aren’t you curious?”

“Yes, but…” Glynn was the ultimate mystery man. Vampire. Whatever. He’d lectured me about home, and when he made camp, first thing he did was set out some knickknacks? Huge Freudian thing and much more serious than me slipping up about underwear when he was around.