Chapter 39 - Ryan

Watching Nadia perform had me completely transfixed.
She glided around the stage like she owned it, confidence growing rapidly. She whispered the song at the beginning but rose in volume until she was projecting perfectly in the theater, allowing the acoustics of the room to take over. My eyes were glued to her, unable to look away. She was stunning. Everything that the lead to a show should be.
Compared to Tatiana, it was like watching an NFL quarterback instead of a pee-wee player.
She met my gaze for a brief moment during the song, while singing the words, “…if only he loved me…” It was like a punch to the gut. The haunting song was hitting me in the soul, making me feel new emotions for this girl.
No, that’s not true. The emotions weren’t new, they had merely been dormant beneath the surface of our physical-only relationship. I’d been keeping them down because we were just fuck-buddies, but watching Nadia perform moved me. It rewired part of my brain.
She was more than just a friend with benefits.
I wanted to ravage her. To rip her clothes off there and pound her into the wooden stage. I wanted to come deep inside of her while feeling her pussy muscles clench around my cock, squeezing every drip from me.
But more than that? I wanted to hold her in my arms. To break our rule again and kiss her on the lips, before and during and after.
The realization struck me like a hammer.
Nadia reached the climax of the song, striding out toward the audience… and was blocked by the sandbags. They had landed exactly where she was supposed to stand for the final note and applause.
The music cut off, and Andy came walking out of the booth.
There was a lump in my throat. I felt butterflies in my goddamn stomach while staring at Nadia. To cover it all up, I walked forward and loudly said, “That’s pretty fucking definitive. Tatiana is the target.”
“We need to call Director Atkins,” Andy said.
“What if he set this up?” I asked. “Because right now, he’s still suspect number one in my head.”
“Even though he was the one who told you to double-check all the lights before the show?” Nadia asked.
“Especially because of that,” I said. “Those sandbags were arranged to blend in. The set was constructed by the other stage crew. Atkins probably hoped that I would chalk it up as part of their equipment.”
Andy pursed his lips in thought. “I do not disagree, but we have to call him nonetheless.”
“We can watch his reaction,” Nadia suggested. “Maybe he’ll look guilty, or annoyed that we discovered the trap before it could go off.”
Andy made the call, telling Director Atkins that there was something he needed to see at the theater. When the grey-haired man appeared at the back of the theater half an hour later, he froze.
“You have got to be kidding me,” his voice drifted across the audience toward us.
I focused on his expression as he walked down the aisle and up the steps to the stage. The lights reflecting off his glasses made it tough to see his eyes, but my first impression was that he didn’t look guilty. He looked exhausted. Tired of this happening in his theater.
Or maybe he’s just a good actor.
He kept his tired expression as Andy and I explained what had happened. “I might have overlooked it if I wasn’t already searching for abnormalities,” I admitted.
“Glad you’re good at your job,” Atkins muttered, eyes still glued to the sandbags. He crouched down and reached forward.
“Stop!” Andy said. “It’s technically a crime scene. They might be able to get a fingerprint off those cloth bags.”
Atkins yanked his hand back. “Good point. Let me call the detective. It’s probably pointless since he doesn’t give a fuck about this theater, but we might as well get it all on record.” He nodded at Nadia. “You should go home.”
“Why?” Nadia asked.
“Because you’re the understudy to the potential target, and if you’re here when the detective arrives he’s going to focus on you. So unless you want that…”
She bobbed her head in a fearful nod, then left the theater. As soon as the door closed backstage, Atkins turned back to Andy and me.
“Does she have an alibi?”
Andy gave a start. “You think Nadia did it?”
“That’s not what I said,” he replied carefully. “I asked if she has an alibi.”
I nodded at the ceiling. “I didn’t see the sandbags yesterday, which meant they were installed since then. Nadia has been with us the entire time after rehearsal last night.”
Atkins raised an eyebrow. “Has she, now?”
“She’s our roommate,” Andy quickly said. “She came straight home after rehearsal last night, then did temp work with Dorian this morning. Then she and I went on a picnic in Central Park, and came straight here once Ryan told us what he’d found.”
Atkins listened quietly. I steeled myself to defend our arrangement if he said anything about it, but he pulled out his phone to call the police.
The detective who arrived was the same one who had investigated the spotlight last time. He looked even more bored today. “What is it this time? Another actor spat?”
We gave him the run-down on what had happened.
“So you were here alone?” the detective asked me. “Nobody was with you when you discovered this so-called trap?”
“That’s right.”
“So there’s no one who can verify your claim.”
I felt my pulse quicken. “Excuse me?”
“Why would Ryan set it up just to tell everyone about it?” Andy asked.
The detective shrugged casually. “To clear his own name. Make us sniff around someone else.”
“I don’t like your insinuations,” Atkins spat, rounding on the detective. He pointed behind him at me. “Ryan’s been working around the goddamn clock to make sure this theater is safe, and what’s his reward for being vigilant? Getting the third degree from a detective who couldn’t give a fuck about any of this. How about you take all of this more seriously before someone gets killed?”
The detective stared back placidly. When Atkins stopped his rant, the detective gestured around us. “This is a cheap theater. It’s got cheap equipment, cheap locks on the doors, cheap overall security. What improvements have you made since the first string of incidents?” He twisted in a circle, looking around. “Did you install those security cameras I recommended? What about the lock changes and redundant deadbolts on all the entries? No? That’s what I thought. I’ll take this more seriously when you do. Until then…”
Atkins’ face turned red like he was about to explode. He fumed as the detective took some cursory evidence, wrote down half a page of notes about the sandbag trap, and then left.
“He is not wrong,” Andy said quietly when it was just the three of us. “Security cameras would go a long way toward making this place safer.”
Atkins let out a long sigh. He sounded defeated. “I don’t even have the money to put together a proper show, let alone something that would be nice to have like a brand new security camera system. And detective chucklefuck sure as hell isn’t going to do any real police work.”
“Then why call him at all?” Andy asked.
“Because when someone does get injured, I want a papertrail showing that we tried.” He fixed me with a mournful gaze. “I’m sorry I ever blamed you for this. You’ve done the best you can with what you have. Rehearsal is canceled tonight. Clean those sandbags up and take the night off.”
He slumped his shoulders as he left the theater.
I stared at the sandbags on the floor. They were heavy enough to snap someone’s neck if they hit on the head just right. Might even break a shoulder or foot. I had a sinking feeling that it was going to eventually happen, no matter what we did to try and stop it.
But Andy strode toward me with purpose. “We’re going to catch this guy.”
“How do you think we’ll do that?”
His eyes sparkled behind his glasses. “I have a plan.”