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I saw her pause to do the math on that. “You broke up with a girl on Valentine’s Day?”
“She broke up with me. Don’t ask me why; I’m pretty fucking amazing, if I do say so myself.”
She laughed, and I spread my arms in a what can you do? gesture. I caught her glancing down at my muscles for a second. Nice. It was working.
“Alright, finish me off,” she said with that same sly smile. She was definitely flirting with me.
“Never have I ever…” I said. “Never have I ever… lived in a townhouse with Braden.”
I lowered my own finger. She blinked and then lowered hers. “You’re getting yourself out!”
I shrugged and picked up my drink. “I told you I want to get drunk. Cheers.”
We both clinked glasses and then downed the rest of our drinks. Nadia returned to the kitchen to make new drinks with old fashioned mix. “Hey, I really am sorry about what happened at the theater today.”
“Yeah…” I let out a long sigh. “It sucks, but I guess it’s the culmination of everything that’s been happening over the past few weeks.”
“Oh?”
“We’ve had lots of little issues like that.” I held up a hand. “Okay, sure, a light crashing to the stage and almost killing an actress isn’t a little issue. But we’ve had other weird problems leading up to it. Screws mysteriously becoming loose. Wires coming free. Stuff like that. Andy and I have been double- and triple-checking our work, but things still happen. Do you ever feel like you’re just spinning your wheels and it doesn’t matter in the end?”
She returned with two new drinks and barked a laugh. “You’re talking to the understudy to the actress who can’t lose her job because her grandfather is the producer.”
I smiled, but only for a moment. “It’s probably for the best that I get fired tomorrow. It’s better than these issues driving me mad. I feel sorry for the poor bastard they hire to replace me.”
Nadia’s face suddenly went slack, and she stared off at a point over my shoulder. “I heard a noise!”
I looked around. “This building is old. The heat pipes sometimes—”
“No,” Nadia said, reaching across the table to touch my hand. “I heard a noise yesterday. Dorian and I were at the theater early. We heard a noise in the catwalks, like metal slamming against metal.”
I perked up. “Did you see anyone?”
She shook her head. “I climbed up the ladder to take a peek, but there wasn’t anyone there. So the obvious conclusion is that it was a ghost.”
I pursed my lips when I realized she was teasing me. “Don’t even kid about that!”
“I think it’s cute that you’re superstitious. But no, we didn’t see anyone.”
“I couldn’t find my socket wrench before rehearsal,” I said. Pieces were coalescing in my mind. “I assumed someone had stolen it, since the theater has almost no security, but maybe it was someone fucking with the lights.” I nodded. “If someone loosened it enough, it would come out of the housing as soon as Andy activated the servos for the lighting routine.”
“The noise we heard could have been a wrench being dropped!” Nadia said excitedly. “But who would want to sabotage our little show?”
“It’s not like we’re competing with anyone,” I mumbled. “Hey. Do you think it was targeted? To hit someone specific?”
“It almost hit Tatiana. I wonder if she has any enemies.”
I narrowed my eyes at Nadia. “Like a jealous understudy who wants a shot at the lead role?”
Her face got deathly serious. “Okay, now that’s not funny. Don’t even say that out loud!”
It was my turn to reach across the table and take her hand. “Totally a joke. I know you wouldn’t do that.”
“Confident words for someone who just met me.”
I tried not to smile. “Yeah, well, someone with an American public school education wouldn’t be smart enough to plan such elaborate sabotage.”
I laughed as she began play-hitting me in the arm.
