Shana Galen - [A Lord & Lady Spy Novella] Read Online Free PDF Page B

baritone—Damian?—said.
    “Fallen or was pushed?” one of the young women said. Blue had not seen her before—she was petite and pretty with curly brown hair.
    “Oh, Giuliana!” Carolina cried. “Do not start your talk of phantoms again.”
    “It is not talk!” Giuliana argued. “Bianca is dead! And I know what happened to me.”
    “What happened?” Blue asked.
    “Oh, Herr Hoch, it was horrible!” Giuliana put her hand to her forehead in a dramatic gesture. “Last week I was here late after the show and as I was leaving, walking down the stairs, someone pushed me from behind. I took a nasty tumble and almost broke my ankle.”
    “You fell,” Damian—no, Damiano—said. “You’d had too much wine.”
    Giuliana’s hands flew to her shapely hips. “I did not fall. I was pushed. I know when someone pushes me!”
    “Did you see the person who pushed you?” Blue asked.
    “That’s just it, Herr Hoch! When I looked back, there was no one there.” She waved her hand artfully in front of her face as a magician might do.
    “Stop it!” Andre, the tenor, broke in. “Bianca and now Luca are dead. Must you start rumors? Do you want people saying the theater is haunted? Then no one will come, and we’ll all be out on the streets.”
    “She might do very well on the streets,” Carolina murmured.
    “So might you,” another voice said, and Blue turned to see Helena. He frowned. Hadn’t he told her to wait in her dressing room? She glanced at him, and then said, to no one in particular, “I wanted to see what all the commotion was about. What—Luca? No!” She rushed to the body, kneeling before it. “Is he…?”
    At Carolina’s nod, Helena’s eyes filled with tears. She didn’t speak, none of them spoke, but Blue knew what they were thinking: this was bad luck. Stage performers were notoriously superstitious. It was bad luck, but not the kind they thought.
    “Someone has to tell Pacca,” Damiano said. “He should be the one to notify… I do not even know who one notifies in such a case.”
    “They will probably want to speak to all of us,” Blue said. “Did anyone see anything unusual?” He looked at each person in the circle in turn, and each shook his or her head. “Did anyone see Luca go up to the fly loft?”
    “The last I saw him,” Giuliana said, “he was bringing a rose to Helena.”
    “He delivered it,” Helena said. “I have it on my dressing table. I must have been the last person to see him alive.” She took a shaky breath. In that moment, Blue was truly sorry she had to be part of this. He had not brought it upon her. It was simply horrible coincidence that both she and Reaper were here. Horrible coincidence that Signor Pacca had crossed the Maîtriser group. The group’s leader, Foncé, was known to kill his victims by carving them up. But when Foncé was not available, Reaper did the group’s dirty work. And Blue happened to know Foncé was unavailable at present. He was running from the agents of the Barbican group. One could only hope Reaper would lead him to Foncé.
    “I will find Signor Pacca and bring him back,” Andre told them, making a grand turn and striding away.
    “I’m not going to wait here, with a dead body, for Andre to track Pacca down,” Giuliana said. “I’m going home!”
    “Giuliana, the authorities will need to question all of us,” Helena pointed out.
    “I don’t see why you cannot all go home and come back,” Blue said. He preferred to empty the theater so he could have a look around. “Why not all reconvene in two hours’ time?”
    “What about rehearsal?” Damiano asked.
    “Oh, hush!” Carolina said. “Who can sing at a time like this?”
    Blue had to suppress a smile. Yes, who indeed could sing at a time like this? Certainly not an opera singer who was famed for singing to her last dying stage breath. He glanced at Helena, wondering if she found her comrade as amusing as he, but she was watching him carefully.
    “It is