Night of the Living Dandelion (23 page)

I glanced at her hand as she pushed a strand of hair away from her face. No ring, pretty, polite, smart, and single. Possibly the perfect girl to mend Rafe’s broken heart.

“How is your ankle, honey?” Mom asked.

Not much different from when she’d questioned me that morning. Luckily, I was spared having to answer when she turned to Chelsea and said, “Abigail fell off a spike heel and suffered a nasty sprain.” She added in a whisper, “I think she learned her lesson.”

Yes, I did. If I ever sprained my ankle again, I wouldn’t tell Mom how it happened. “Did Lottie give you the news about your bat mobile?”

“No, Lottie is helping a customer.”

“It sold!”

Mom’s face flushed with joy. “So soon? You only had it, what, six hours? That has to be a new record. Oh, Chelsea, I’m so sorry you didn’t get to see it. It was something, wasn’t it, Abigail?”

“Yes, it was.” Something.

“The way you described it, Mrs. Knight, I can imagine it would sell quickly,” Chelsea gushed, clearly knowing how to get on Mom’s good side. No one could hear a true description of that mobile and think it would sell in a million years.

“It’s probably already hanging over some lucky child’s bed,” Mom said, pressing a hand to her heart.

I could hear the screams now.

“I’ll just have to get the next one finished tonight,” Mom said.

Wait. What? The
next
one?

“Nothing succeeds like success, as Grace always says.” Mom gave me a hug. “We’re off, honey. I promised I’d show Chelsea around town. This is her first year in New Chapel and she never gets off campus except to come to my school.”

“I adore your flower shop,” Chelsea called, following Mom through the curtain.

“Wait, Chelsea,” I said. “How old are you?”

She stuck her head through the curtain. “Twenty-one, why?”

“Seeing anyone?”

She shook her head.

“Then there’s someone I’d like you to meet. Are you free for dinner tonight?”

 

Twenty minutes later, Claymore returned with a white cardboard carryout carton. We removed one of the rare beef slices from the box, cut it into strips, placed antibiotic capsules inside two of them, then rolled them up and fastened them with floral picks. We rolled up a few more strips to make it look authentic, put them back in the box, and then I called downstairs, “Jillian! I’ve got raw steak for you. It’s from your favorite restaurant, Adagio.”

I heard scraping sounds, as though clay pots were being moved, but there was no answer. “Jillian?” I called.

Still no answer. “You’d better go check on her, Clay.”

He crept down the steps. “Jillian? Sweetheart?”

Moments later Claymore came pounding up the steps. “Her accoutrements are there, but she’s not.”

“She has to be there. She didn’t turn into a bat and fly away, did she?”

Claymore stared at me in horror, as if such a thing were possible.

“Stop it, Clay! Did that spider bite you, too? There are plenty of places to hide in that old basement. She probably found one of them.” I glanced at my watch. It was nearly closing time. “Why don’t you go home and let me work on her? And leave the bottle of pills. I’ll call you as soon as I have news, okay?”

“Are you sure she’ll be safe down there?”

“What’s the worst that can happen? She’s already been bitten by a spider. Now go!”

After he left, I called downstairs, “Jillian, Clay is gone now. You can come up.”

From far away I heard, “No.”

Fine. If she was going to be difficult, then she could just cool her heels in that dank old basement all evening. “Jill, I have to leave in a little while to meet Marco at the bar. I’m going to put your food in the fridge. I’ll be back after dinner to see how you’re doing.”

“Do we dare close up the shop with your ailing cousin down there?” Grace asked, startling me.

“When Claymore tried to get her to come up, she went deeper into hiding. I can’t get down there unless I scoot down on my rear, so if you’d care to try to convince her, be my guest.”

“In that case, I’m sure she’ll be perfectly fine until you return.” With a nod of affirmation, Grace said good night.

 

At five fifteen, as Chelsea and I headed up the sidewalk toward Down the Hatch, I gave her the important details on the Salvare brothers—
important
meaning nothing that might scare her away from Rafe, such as his ill-fated engagement to a nineteen-year-old Hooters waitress whose father owned a striptease club and whose mother had been a dancer there. Instead I focused on the Salvare men’s positive qualities, of which there were many.

There was still a heavy police presence around the square, along with more people carrying antivampire signs and walking in a continuous loop. They weren’t bothering anyone, simply exercising their constitutional rights, which I’d done a number of times myself for animal rights causes. Plus, they were on public property, so the police couldn’t chase them off. Still, their presence worried me.

The protesters didn’t seem to faze Chelsea. “I can’t wait to meet Rafe,” she said, holding the door open. “Thank you so much for inviting me.”

The first thing I did upon entering was to make sure Rafe was there. He was. My next task was to make sure Vlad had arrived without harassment from the protesters. He had. I spotted Marco already seated at our booth in the far back and paused to point him out to Chelsea. “That’s Marco.”

Marco lifted his hand in greeting. I’d already filled him in on my plan and surprisingly he’d agreed to it right away. We would order drinks and have Rafe deliver them to the table, at which point I’d introduce Chelsea. Then Marco would invite Rafe to take a short break to join us. Hopefully, sparks would ignite and the rest would fall into place.

“And there’s Rafe,” I told her. But Rafe chose that moment to duck behind the counter to get something from a lower shelf. “Correction, there
was
Rafe.”

“Here’s my girl,” Marco said, standing up to give me a kiss. He offered his hand to my guest. “Chelsea, right? Marco Salvare.”

She shook his hand and then we sat down. The Evil Ones were stowed; drinks were ordered; and the curtain on my little drama began to rise. As the orchestra struck up the overture, Chelsea exclaimed,
“O-M-G!”
and lifted herself up off the bench to watch as Gert carried our order up to the bar. “Is that
him
?”

Marco and I both followed the direction of her gaze. Rafe had popped up again and was mixing drinks, looking young and dashing. I saw Gert give him our orders, point at us, and pass along the message that he was to serve our drinks. He glanced our way, so I waved.

“Yes, that’s him,” I said. Let the play begin.

“I can’t believe it,” she squealed. “I’m actually seeing the vampire in person!”

What? I glanced at Marco and he shrugged, as though to say,
Nice try.

“Everyone in my dorm is talking about Vlad.” She pulled her cell phone out of her purse and slid out of the booth, her eyes wide with excitement. “The girls will
not
believe this. I have to get his picture. Thank you
so
much for inviting me!”

I watched in dismay as Chelsea surged into the crowd just as Rafe pushed through from the other side to deliver our beers. He set three bottles on the table, then gave Marco a vexed look. “I was busy. Why did I have to bring them over?”

Marco propped his chin on his hand and gazed at me. “Yes, Abby, why did Rafe have to bring them over?”

I pasted on a smile. “Because . . . I haven’t had a chance to congratulate you, Rafe. Marco says you’re doing a terrific job.”

“Yeah, well, it kind of goes unnoticed when I’m working next to the superstar.” He indicated Vlad with a nod of his head. “That reminds me, bro, while you were out this afternoon, Vlad’s attorney stopped by. Dave Hammond, right? He said he couldn’t reach Vlad by phone so he was hoping to find him here. I passed the message to Vlad, just so you know.”

“Is it me,” I asked, “or does it seem like no one can reach Vlad during the day?”

Marco ignored my question to ask Rafe, “Did Dave say why he needed Vlad?”

“Nope. Just when I saw Vlad, to make sure he called ASAP because he had news.”

“I hope it was good news,” I said. “We could use some of that.”

“By the look on Dave’s face,” Rafe said, “I wouldn’t count on it.”

A hush fell over the room. I glanced around to find out what had caused it and saw all eyes on the television screens, where a photo of Lori Willis was being displayed.

“Turn up the volume,” one of the men called.

“In area news,” the anchor said, “New Chapel police are close to making an arrest in the murder of director of nursing Lori Willis.”

At that, every head in the place turned toward Vlad, who was busily mixing a drink.

“Willis was last seen early Wednesday morning leaving the Calumet Casino,” the anchor continued. “Her body was discovered in a garbage bin behind Down the Hatch Bar and Grill. Police are asking for anyone with information to call their tip line.”

I heard low murmurs coming from several groups of men near the front and felt a new tension in the air. I glanced at Marco and saw his sudden alertness. He sensed it, too.

“Sit tight,” Marco said quietly, as he got up and made his way toward the bar.

T
he rumblings ceased when Marco took the remote and clicked over to a sports channel. There was a watchful silence as he and Vlad headed toward Marco’s office, but as soon as they were out of earshot, a buzz of conversation began.

I caught snatches of whispers from people around me:
“Is Vlad going to be arrested?” “Could he be guilty?” “Why is Marco letting him work here?
”
“Is Marco being duped?”

When Marco returned to our booth ten minutes later, Rafe and Evan were busy mixing drinks and taking payments, Gert and another waitress were delivering food and beverages, and customers were drinking, eating, and talking as though nothing had happened. Only the women at the bar seemed to have been affected. With Vlad gone, their numbers had decreased sharply. Chelsea, however, was still there, and seemed to be flirting with Rafe.

“Where’s Vlad?” I asked Marco quietly.

“I told him to take a break. I gave him the opportunity to go home, but he didn’t want to.”

“Do you think that news report was about him?”

Marco sighed heavily. “I don’t know, but I don’t have a good feeling about it. According to what Dave told Vlad, the casino’s surveillance videos are now a part of the prosecution’s evidence against him. Vlad is going to meet with Dave at seven this evening to discuss strategy.”

“Dave never meets clients in the evenings.”

“Apparently he makes exceptions.”

For vampires?

Gert stopped by our booth, tablet in hand. “You kids gonna eat tonight?”

“I’d like a big green salad and a bowl of French onion soup, please.” After handling that raw steak, I was craving something as far away from red meat as I could get.

“Salad and a burger,” Marco said. “Thanks, Gert.”

“I thought we were gonna have trouble there for a while, boss,” Gert said in a low voice. “Things seem pretty calm now, but the Garlic Party idiots are back across the street.”

“Thanks for letting me know,” Marco said. After Gert was gone, he said to me, “I think I’d better stick around here again this evening, Sunshine. Want to keep me company?”

So much for our dwindling number of evenings together. “Of course I do. I just need to check on Jillian. She’s hiding in Bloomers’ basement because she thinks Claymore and her doctor are conspiring to poison her. She even wants to sleep down there.”

“Is this the same woman who won’t put her head on anything but a silk pillowcase?”

“The very same. I told you she’s sick. And we can’t get her to take her medicine.”

“Maybe spending a night in the basement will convince her she needs help. I’ve got blankets and a cot here. If you’d like, I’ll carry them down after we eat.”

Not a bad idea. If I made Jillian comfy down there, and she got hungry in the night, she’d eat her medicine-laced steak roll-ups. “I think I’ll take you up on that.”