Vanilla Beaned

by Jenn McKinlay

  Fancy was one of those people who never deleted an e-mail. As she scrolled through, Mel looked at the in-box and there were over ten thousand e-mails. She had to suppress the urge to bang her head on the desk.

  “I am never going to slog through this, never,” she muttered. She glanced at the time in the corner of the screen. Nerves made her jog her foot up and down. Suddenly, she was overly aware of her makeup and it felt greasy on her skin.

  She decided to stick to the days when there had been incidents. That narrowed it down by a few thousand. She read the subject lines, hoping the words crash, bomb, shooting, or the like would give her a clue. There was nothing.

  She glanced at the clock again. Time was running out. Fancy and the others would be down here for the intermission at any moment. Damn it.

  She pushed back from the desk, planning to slip out of the room when she saw the words contingency plan in a subject line. It was a reply in Fancy’s e-mail from a person with the handle stuntryder.

  Mel’s eyes bugged. This had to be the driver. This was her proof. She had to see the e-mail. She glanced at the clock again. She was out of time. She could hear the chatter and laughter of the girls as they passed by the office.

  What to do? What to do? Impulsively she forwarded the e-mail to her own e-mail account. Then she opened the sent mail folder and deleted what she had forwarded. That should do it.

  “What the hell are you doing in my office?”

  Twenty

  “Yikes!” Mel jumped. “You scared me.”

  “I’m going to do a lot more than that if you don’t tell me what you’re doing in my office, which was locked, right now.”

  Fancy crossed her arms over her chest. She looked pretty confident that she could kick Mel’s behind, which was disturbing because Mel was pretty sure she could, too.

  “You know, the door was open,” Mel said. “And when I was walking by, I saw this person come running out of here and I thought that was weird, so I just popped in here to make sure everything was okay.”

  She stood as she spoke. She glanced from side to side as if reassuring herself that all was well. Then she looked at Fancy and said, “You’re welcome.”

  “You’re new, aren’t you?” Fancy asked.

  “Very,” Mel said.

  “I don’t remember hir—”

  “Fancy, come quick! Tisha twisted her ankle,” one of the dancers cried as she stuck her head around the door frame.

  “What? How?” Fancy forgot all about Mel and moved toward the door.

  “Coming down the stairs. She’s at her dressing table, but it doesn’t look good,” the dancer said. “It’s already swelling.”

  Fancy turned around and glared at Mel. “Okay, new girl, get suited up for the opening number after intermission. You’re taking Tisha’s place.”

  “What?” Mel gaped. “No, I—”

  “Go see Denise in wardrobe,” Fancy said. When Mel didn’t move fast enough, she barked, “Now!”

  Mel hurried out of the office. This was not possible. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t even fake it. If she tried to high kick, she’d likely throw her back out.

  She passed Levi’s dressing room on her way to wardrobe. Angie was just slipping out.

  “Find anything?” Mel asked.

  “No.” Angie shook her head. “Unless you count the world’s largest collection of indigestion medication. Poor Levi must be the most nervous person in show business.”

  “Yeah, I sort of got that off of him,” Mel said. “Doesn’t matter because I found a name in Fancy’s e-mail and I think it might be who we’re looking for.”

  “What did the e-mail say?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t get a chance to read it because Fancy caught me in there,” Mel said. “But the handle was stuntryder.”

  “No way. We have to tell Manny,” Angie said.

  “Yeah, I would but I can’t,” Mel said. “One of the dancers twisted her ankle and I’m supposed to step in for her. I’m supposed to be in wardrobe right now.”

  “Well, what are you doing here?” Angie asked. “Go!”

  “What? No, I thought we’d sneak out the back,” Mel said.

  “In this?” Angie pointed to their sparkly outfits. “Really?”

  “Well, no, I figured we’d change first,” Mel said.

  “We have five pounds of makeup on,” Angie said. “We’ll be seen as showgirls or hookers, either way I don’t see us getting out of here unnoticed.”

  “I can’t do this,” Mel said. “I’ve never been onstage in my life.”

  “Just do what the others do,” Angie said. “You’ll be fine.”

  “You had dance lessons as a kid, you go,” Mel said.

  “No can do, too short,” Angie said. This time she didn’t look bitter so much as relieved.

  “This is a nightmare,” Mel said.

  “Come on, let’s get you to wardrobe before Fancy has a cow and our real identities are discovered,” Angie said.

  Mel let Angie drag her out of Levi’s dressing room and down the hall toward the main room shared by the rest of the girls. It looked like a typhoon of shimmer and feathers as the dancers peeled off one outfit and slid into another.

  Angie maneuvered her way through the room without breaking her stride but Mel was feeling very self-conscious. She was going to have to change in front of these women. Suddenly every ounce of extra weight she was carrying seemed like a sack of flour. She turned to bolt out of the room but a hand clamped on her wrist, holding her in place.

  “Where are you going?” Fancy asked.

  “Bathroom?”

  “No time,” Fancy said. “Denise is waiting for you. Let’s go.”

  Mel felt the walls closing in. Now might be her only chance, so she asked, “Who’s stuntryder?”

  “What?” Fancy asked.

  “You heard me.” Mel tried to look fierce.

  “It’s a poodle that rides a tricycle,” Fancy said. “They’re auditioning for the show. Why? Do you know them?”

  Nuts! Mel bit her knuckle. She seriously doubted Fancy could have made that up on the spot.

  “Fancy! Fancy, wait!” A dancer came running up to them. She was holding her enormous purple headdress on with one hand while she ran. “Sunny just went to check on Holly and she can’t find her anywhere. She says she’s missing.”

  Fancy dropped Mel’s arm. “What?”

  “Missing! Holly is missing!”

  “She should be in her dressing room—why wouldn’t she be there?”

  “I don’t know.” The dancer shrugged.

  “But she’s never missed a curtain, not ever.” Fancy looked around her as if expecting Holly to appear out of thin air.

  Mel glanced at Angie. Judging by the round-eyed gaze Angie sent her, her panic was confirmed. Mel had tucked her phone into the padded front of her outfit. She pulled it out now, planning to call Manny and see if Holly was with him. Maybe she had already gone back upstage.

  They were three stories belowground in concrete. Mel couldn’t get a signal on her phone. She looked at Angie, who was doing the same thing.

  “Nothing,” Angie said. “I’m going upstairs to find Tate.”

  “Right behind you,” Mel said.

  “You can’t,” Fancy cried. “The show!”

  “Is screwed if we don’t find Holly,” Mel said. “If I were you, I’d get her understudy up to speed then worry about your backup dancers.”

  She didn’t wait for an answer but hurried from the dressing room, following Angie as she plowed through bodies to get to the door. They passed Holly’s dressing room. Sunny was in there, looking confused, while one of the costume people helped her into Holly’s headpiece.

  “This just doesn’t feel right,” Sunny was saying. “I need to go look for Holly.”


  “We’ll do it,” Mel said. “When was the last time you saw her?”

  “She was right behind me on the stairs when we came down,” Sunny said. “I went to the dressing area and then doubled back to go upstairs with her but she wasn’t in here and she should have already been dressed and ready to go.”

  “Anyone check the bathroom?” Angie asked.

  “Twice,” the costume person said.

  “Okay, let’s go,” Angie said.

  They dashed through the changing area to the stairs. Mel felt like cursing all the way up, but she couldn’t afford the breath. The stairs were well lit and there was no sign of anything amiss, no explosion of feathers or rhinestones to indicate a struggle. They got to the top of the steps and Mel was doubled over and wheezing.

  “You all right?” Angie panted.

  Mel nodded and waved her hand for Angie to continue. Angie pushed through the metal door and they stepped into the darkness. They could hear the crowd laughing as Levi paced the stage, shooting out his rapid-fire jokes like they were a barrage of bullets.

  Mel blinked, trying to get her eyes to adjust. She knew Manny had planned to stay backstage to keep an eye on everything so she assumed he would be near the door to downstairs.

  “Manny!” she whispered. “Are you here?”

  There was no answer.

  “I’m going to slip out into the audience to find Tate,” Angie said. “Come with me.”

  “No, I need to find Manny,” Mel said. She glanced at her phone. Now she had a signal. “I’ll call you if I get in a jam.”

  Angie’s face was barely visible in the dark but Mel knew her best friend well enough to see the crinkle of unhappiness in her forehead. She didn’t like this plan. Mel didn’t, either, but Manny really was their best shot for finding Holly since he was probably the last one to see her before she went downstairs.

  “All right, but if I don’t hear from you in ten minutes, I’m coming back here with all of the boys.”

  Mel nodded. She squeezed Angie’s arm before turning and walking into the deep darkness of backstage. Like any backstage, there was a shabbiness that came with overuse. The props that looked so glittery from the audience were distressed when seen up close.

  Mel stepped over a coil of rope, walked around a stand of lights, and moved even deeper into the backstage. She couldn’t hear what Levi was saying but she could hear the laughs from the crowd. She knew she still had some time. She just hoped that Holly did, too.

  “Manny!” she hissed.

  A man wearing a headset hushed her and Mel jumped. She looked closely at him. Did he look like a stalker in disguise or the real deal? He spoke into the mouthpiece attached to the headset and she assumed he was real or a very good actor.

  Where was Manny? He was supposed to be here, guarding the backstage from anyone suspicious like, say, a cupcake baker who couldn’t dance for beans but was decked out in showgirl attire. If Mel had made it this far, then who else might have and where the hell was Manny?

  Her stomach began to churn. She inched forward in the darkness hidden behind the backdrop from the crowd. The noise from up front, even the laughter, was muffled. Surely, Manny wouldn’t have stayed this far back. How could he see anything from back here?

  Mel turned to go back toward the front of the stage. She held her hands out in front of her to help guide her in the darkness. It was strange to walk around when she could barely see the dim outlines of sets and equipment around her. It was like walking through nothingness and she felt as if she might step off an unseen ledge into a vast emptiness.

  Instead she kicked something soft. She thought it might be a costume or a prop. She reached down to see if she could move it. Her fingertips brushed something warm. She held her hand still and it took her a moment to register that it was skin. She bit off a scream before it could escape her lips. Her heart hammered hard and she knew without even looking more closely that the arm she was touching was Manny’s. On the upside, his skin was warm and not cold so that had to be good.

  “Manny,” she called as she crouched and ran her hands down his chest. It was then that she felt the ropes looped around his middle, binding him to a stone pillar. Oh, no. Someone had done this to him. Someone bad.

  He didn’t respond and she noticed his head was hanging forward. He was unconscious. Mel tried to rouse him to no avail. She patted his cheeks and then ran her hand over his head. There was a knot the size of a golf ball on the back of his head that she was sure was going to give him a powerful headache when he woke up.

  Mel began to fumble with the ropes, but she couldn’t get them loose. Whoever tied him had been efficient. She needed help. She took out her phone and sent a text to Angie letting her know where she was and that she needed help ASAP.

  Mel continued to work the knots with little success, but in less than a minute, two Elvis wannabes, Tate, and Angie arrived.

  “What happened?” Tate demanded.

  “I don’t know,” Mel said. “I found him like this. He got clocked on the head and tied up but I haven’t been able to rouse him to find out if he saw Holly or not.”

  What Mel didn’t add was that she had no doubt that wherever Holly was, she was in grave danger.

  Twenty-one

  Angie’s nimble fingers untied the last of the rope and Manny sagged forward. Mel caught him, staggered under his weight, and then Oz and Tate were lifting him off her. Together they draped his arms over their shoulders and they began to drag-carry him across the dark stage.

  “He needs to have his head examined,” Mel said.

  “Not the first time someone has said that, I’ll wager,” Marty said.

  “Focus, people,” Tate said. He was breathing heavily as he and Oz maneuvered Manny through the dark. “We have a man down and Holly is missing.”

  “Take Manny out front,” Mel said. “Carlos can call an ambulance. The rest of us should look for Holly.”

  “No!” Tate argued. “Whoever did this will not hesitate to hurt any of you. We stay together.”

  “We can’t cover the same amount of ground if we stay together,” Mel argued. “If we don’t find Holly quickly, it could be dire.”

  They were near the side door to the stage and Mel could see Tate’s face illuminated in the glow of the stage lights. He was straining under Manny’s weight but he also looked like he was wrestling with himself over the situation.

  “We’ll be careful,” Angie said. “We’ll leave our phones open with a live call so we can hear whatever is happening if anyone finds anything.”

  “Mel.” The voice was slurred but Mel recognized Manny’s low growl immediately.

  “Manny, are you all right? What happened? Where’s Holly?”

  His head was weaving and he looked like he was trying to raise his face up but his muscles were having none of it.

  “Saw her leave the stage and went to follow, but I . . .” His voice trailed off as he fuzzed out.

  “Manny, speak, what happened?” Mel demanded. She moved so she was standing right in front of him. She cupped his face so that he could see her eyes.

  “Got jumped,” he said. He gave her a wan smile and his eyes rolled back into his head right before he went limp.

  “Get him out front for ambulance pickup right away,” Mel said. “If he saw Holly go down the stairs, then she must have gotten snatched on the stairs or below. Let’s go check it out.”

  “Use your phones,” Tate ordered. His gaze pierced Angie and he added, “Be careful. Marty, go with the girls. I’ll be down as soon as I can.”

  Neither Mel nor Angie felt the need to let him know that their phones didn’t work downstairs. They bolted for the door to the stairs just as Tate and Oz disappeared into the theater, hauling Manny as they went.

  They wound down one set of stairs before Marty started puffing. “How many levels are down here?”


  “Three,” Mel said. She paused on the landing to catch her breath but also to be sure that they hadn’t missed anything. She did a quick scan of the wall to make sure there were no secret openings or hidden passages.

  “What knucklehead thought having the dressing room three floors below was a good idea?” Marty said.

  “Try doing it with a thirty-pound headdress,” Mel said. “I can’t believe Holly has lasted as long as she has with this show.”

  “She must be very fit,” Angie said. “Which may be the only thing that saves her now.”

  With that grim pronouncement, the three of them picked up the pace and wound their way down the remaining stairs.

  “Where do we start?” Angie asked. “Her dressing room and the bathroom have been checked.”

  “Let’s look for a back exit,” Mel said. “Maybe there is another way out of here and whoever snatched her took that route. We have to ask Fancy.”

  “She isn’t going to tell us jack,” Angie said.

  “No, but I’m betting she sings like a bird for Elvis,” Mel said.

  They both turned to look at Marty. His Elvis wig was askew, he had sweat stains in the armpits of his white jumpsuit, and his aviator glasses with the gold rims hung off the end of his nose as if the earpieces couldn’t latch on to his head quite right.

  “What? Fancy who? What are you two cooking up?”

  “You know that suave magic you use on the ladies at the bakery?” Mel asked. “Yeah, we’re going to need a little bit of that right now.”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa, that’s like my superpower,” he said. “You can’t just expect me to flip it on for any old gal that comes along. It could have catastrophic consequences.”

  “Fancy has worked here since she was a showgirl fifty-plus years ago. If anyone knows the layout, it’s her,” Mel said. “Now get in there and find out what she knows.”

  Angie opened the door to Fancy’s office, saw Fancy pacing back and forth with her desk phone at her ear, and Mel gave Marty a solid shove into the room. Angie shut the door and they pressed their ears up against the gaps in the door frame hoping to hear what was said.