Chapter 18 Arabella
Arabella
Maisie: O Magnificent One, I’ve put up audition notices around the village – we’re expecting a great crowd. Thank you again for doing this! See you tonight at book club!
“SOMETHING SMELLS AMAZING.” Winnie breathes deeply as she pushes open the door of Nevermore Bookshop. “That can only mean one thing.”
“Celeste is back,” I answer for her. Celeste has been running away to help her mum at least once a month now.
As a vampire, I have no need of her sweet treats, but I miss Celeste when she’s gone.
She’s a calming influence on my friends, even if only for the fact that it’s difficult for Isis and Komal to infuriate me when they have their mouths filled with cheese scones.
“I smell butterscotch!” Maisie huffs as she runs up the steps behind us, her duck, James Pond, trotting alongside her, dressed in a Sherlock Holmes hat and matching capelet, and tugging imperiously on his lead. “Celeste is here!”
“Why is the duck at book club?” I ask.
“Yeah, I thought Heathcliff has a rule about no other feathered animals in the shop,” adds Winnie.
“He’ll have to deal this week. James Pond can’t be left alone. He’s stressed.” Maisie hugs him to her chest. “He’s worried that if we don’t save the paper, I’ll no longer be able to keep him in the manner to which he’s become accustomed.”
“You mean, he’ll have to give up the duck Versailles you’ve built for him in your back garden and all those duck costumes he wears on his duck Instagram page and the fancy duck food you order in from Germany and he’ll have to live in a communal pond with other pleb ducks? ” I smirk. “However will he cope?”
“Quack,” James Pond says mournfully, hanging his head.
“Don’t remind him of the stakes.” Maisie kisses his head. “But I’m sure, with you at the helm of the Zen and Tonic Variety Show, everything will be fine.”
My stomach clenches. I should never have agreed to direct the show.
I only did it because it seemed like a good opportunity to torture Gideon, but Maisie is putting a lot of hope into raising enough money to keep her job.
Now, if the variety show is an abysmal failure, it’ll be my fault and I won’t be able to fix things with an anonymous donation if the council doesn’t think the community is behind the paper being saved.
This is why I don’t like doing things for other people.
“Let’s go inside.” I clench my jaw and turn the handle.
Laughter booms from the events room. We pass through the shop, Maisie holding James Pond’s beak shut so he doesn’t alert Heathcliff to his presence. When we step into the events room, Celeste bounces over and thrusts a tray into our faces.
“I made butterscotch tarts and cheese scones,” she announces. The cupcake charms on her silver hoop earrings dance jauntily as she bobs her head. “You have to try them while they’re still warm.”
“Yes, carbs. Just the thing to distract me from my miserable existence.” Maisie takes two scones. “How’s your mum, Celeste?”
“She’s going a little feral being stuck at home, but that’s why she needs me so much.
” Celeste sets down a platter of mini quiches next to the scones.
“I’ll be back to help her again in a few weeks, but in the meantime, fill me in on everything I missed.
How was the grand opening of Beth’s pole studio? ”
“Great!” Isis blurts out. “It turns out that Arabella used to be a dancer.”
“She invented pole dancing at a Paris cabaret,” Winnie explains. “Toulouse-Lautrec painted her portrait and everything.”
He isn’t the only one. I think of the painting that now has pride of place in my living room.
Celeste turns to me, her eyes wide, a silent question passing between us. “I’m not surprised. We all know Arabella is someone special.”
“She is! She wowed the whole village and convinced a bunch of people to sign up to the studio. A group of her friends from Sanctus are now showing up for my vamp-friendly pole class and cashing in their ten per cent off vampire facials.” Beth grins at me from her usual beanbag.
“Although they keep asking if you’re going to teach a class. ”
“I’d rather pull out my fangs with rusty tweezers.”
“You’d be amazing.”
“I’m already swamped with work and moving and plotting to disembowel Gideon, and now directing this bloody variety show someone signed me up for.” I glare at Maisie. “No way do I have time to help a bunch of giggling vampires locate their divine feminine.”
“Speaking of, who here is going to do an act? Arabella can’t be our Simon Cowell without a few innocent souls to crush.” Maisie beams at everyone.
Mina shakes her head. “Quoth and I have already agreed to help with costumes.”
“I’m the MC,” Komal says. “And I’m doing the promotion.”
“Sorry, Arabella. I’m flat out behind the scenes at the studio,” Beth says. “But I am helping with choreography for some of my students who want to perform.”
“I’d love to, but I opened what I thought was a cupboard the other day and discovered a whole other wing of Black Crag that needs organising,” Winnie moans.
“Alaric has an entire room filled with Ancient Egyptian artefacts. I know everyone goes through an Ancient Egypt phase, but they usually grow out of it by age twelve and don’t spend a small fortune collecting dusty old grave goods and then move on to their taxidermy era and forget about them.
Who forgets about a room filled with mummies? ”
“If Alaric needs help turning those mummies into cash, I know a guy,” I say.
“If I can convince him to part with anything, I’ll let you know,” Winnie rolls her eyes.
“Dora and I are doing a routine,” Isis pipes up. “I think we have a shot at first place.”
“When did I agree to this?” Dora splutters.
“Last night. We were curled up on my sofa watching Practical Magic.”
“I was asleep!”
“I didn’t say you were awake when you agreed.”
Dora glares at her sister. Her lip wobbles, and I know she’s thinking about how her husband will react.
Add that to my list of director duties – make sure Mike is aware of the consequences should he make a fuss.
Celeste frowns at her phone. I assume she’s looking at her calendar, but she has an astronomy app open. “I’m going to be at Mum’s the week of the variety show. I’m so sorry, team. I’ve been letting everyone down lately.”
“You haven’t,” Mina assures her. “Your mum needs you. Besides, we’ve got everything sorted.”
“But the killer is still at large, and Maisie’s on the brink of losing her job.
” Celeste’s gaze falls to the floor. There’s no reason for her to feel guilty.
None of this is her fault. But Celeste always takes responsibility for others’ pain.
I’ve always said it’s her greatest weakness.
“And who knows what the vampire world is going to do with Winnie and Alaric—”
I sigh, attempting to change the subject before she spirals. “Can we actually talk about the book this week?”
“Yes, let’s talk books! The first item of business – I have copies for all of us of next week’s book.” Mina holds up a paperback. She doesn’t realise she’s holding it backwards, but I recognise the design on the back cover as the choice I threw into the hat. Freestyle by Bea Paige.
“I finished the whole series,” I tell her. “For those who haven’t read it yet, i.e. every other member of this supposed book club, it’s about a dancer who ends up with not one but four beautiful dancing men. It has the most amazing descriptions of movement—”
“Now I know why you chose that series.” Mina’s eyes sparkle. “All the hot dancers.”
“And it’s a second chance romance.” I fold my arms. “My favourite kind.”
“I’ll bet.” Winnie winks at me.
“Second chance is sooooo angsty.” Isis makes a face. “And there are always too many flashbacks. I want a fun fake-dating story.”
“No thanks.” Winnie makes a face. “I don’t want to read about my life. I’m still not over the trauma of trying to convince Alaric’s mother not to eat me.”
“I love the flashbacks, and I could use a little angst.” Maisie grabs one of the paperback copies from the stack at Mina’s feet. “It’ll take my mind off the fact that I might not have a job in a month.”
“I can’t believe the council won’t fund the paper,” Celeste says.
Maisie slams her fist into a cushion. “Exactly. It’s ridiculous, but they say subscriber numbers are too low for the resources we’re allotted.
People need local news! We inform the village about important things, except not a certain killer who’s still at large, since only vampires know about that. ”
“Do we still think it’s Gideon?” Celeste asks.
“No,” Winnie and Dora say at the same time.
I keep my lips firmly pursed because I’m not going to give Gideon a free pass on anything, even though I have to admit it’s unlikely that he’s the killer.
For all his (considerable) faults, Gideon cares about Sanctus too much to risk putting it in the limelight by killing and husking ex-employees.
Winnie raises an eyebrow at me but doesn’t say anything.
“But Gideon is letting us lead the investigation, and we do think the killer lives on Sanctus Estate,” Mina adds, then explains what we know about the Thralled staff and Danny O’Hare.
Maisie writes all the information we have up on a whiteboard for everyone to see, and dictates it into Mina’s phone.
“So, what’s our next step in the investigation?” Celeste crunches down on a butterscotch tart.
“We need to talk to the staff.” Maisie is already back in investigative journalist mode now that she’s sweet-talked me into being her director. “Maybe one of them will know if anything untoward is happening behind the scenes.”
“Maybe we’re going about this the wrong way.” Isis glances over at the purple cloth covering the table in the corner. “We’re thinking like amateur detectives when we could use magic—”
The other original members of the Nevermore Murder Club and Smutty Book Coven exchange weary glances.
“You’ve never told me what’s underneath that purple cloth,” Winnie says.