“Okay,” Lizzie agreed, “no burning to the ground. Let me think.” She ripped open another package of Twinkies.
Wilhelmina watched her, trying to think of something that would cause the club to be closed down for longer than an evening. Fire was out. Water damage was out—too much fire needed. Tampering with the liquor, ineffectual. Food poisoning—too dangerous. What did that leave?
“I’ve got it,” Wilhelmina said, suddenly. “Health inspectors.”
Lizzie nodded, looking impressed. “Yes, that could work. If you did it right.”
Wilhelmina grinned. Oh, she’d do it right. This time her plan would definitely work.
Sebastian strode through the nightclub, nodding to several of the club’s employees as he passed. They were busy with their sidework, getting ready for another hectic night. He scanned the large room for dark hair and black-rimmed glasses, but didn’t see either. The new waitress wasn’t in yet, or maybe it was her night off. Or better yet, maybe she’d quit.
“Where’s the new girl?” he asked Nadine, keeping his voice casual as he slid onto a bar stool.
Nadine glanced at him, then picked up a bundle of napkins. “She’ll be in any minute.”
“So what’s the deal with her?”
Nadine didn’t look up from where she crouched behind the bar, restocking the shelves. “What do you mean?”
“She’s—odd.”
Nadine rose, crumpled up the empty wrapper from the napkins and tossed it down the bar into a gray plastic trash can.
“She is,” Nadine agreed. “But she’s harmless.”
“When she’s not starting fires in the backroom, that is.”
“That was an accident.”
Sebastian nodded, but knew he didn’t look convinced. There had been something about the new waitress’s behavior that still didn’t seem right to him. It was almost as if she’d been disappointed when he’d assured her the rest of the nightclub was fine. And then in his apartment, she’d been downright afraid of him.
He supposed he could chalk up her fear to the fact that she’d fully expected to be fired, which many other business owners would have done. He wondered why he hadn’t.
“You said that she needs this position,” Sebastian said. “Why? What’s her story?”
Nadine ladled maraschino cherries from a large jar into a metal serving tray. “I don’t know much about her. She’s pretty quiet.”
“Then how do you know—” Sebastian started, but his head bartender silenced him with a sharp flash of her dark eyes.
“I just get the vibe that she needs this job,” she stated. “There’s something... desperate about her.”
Sebastian couldn’t disagree with that. At the very least, there was something desperately strange about her. He started to say so when Nadine’s next comment stopped him.
“She seems lost.”
Sebastian paused. Hadn’t that been what he’d sensed about her, too? He just hadn’t been able to label it as Nadine had. But there was something anxious and almost lost about her. She was unlike any vampire he’d encountered, and running this club, he’d met many. He had to admit that she made him curious.
And other than being a little accident-prone, she was obviously not dangerous. In fact, aside from her strangeness, she was rather unexceptionable. Another peculiar trait for a vampiress. Vampires were nothing if not noticeable. She wasn’t.
Except when wet, he amended. She’d definitely been noticeable then. The image of her sitting in that puddle, dress hiked up to the tops of her pale thighs, appeared in his mind again.
He gritted his teeth, annoyed with himself. He wasn’t irritated with himself for noticing. After all, that’s what he did. He always noticed women. It was the fact that the image was still so clear in his mind, and kept replaying. He’d seen far more provocative displays of skin from far more beautiful women, yet something about—what was her name?
Wilhelmina.
He grimaced. But something about Wilhelmina had captured his attention. Again and again over the course of last evening, and again tonight.
He’d obviously been depriving himself. Time with his holier-than-thou brothers really did cramp his style. And last night, the sprinkler incident had put a damper (no pun intended) on his plans. By the time he was finished cleaning up the backroom, he’d decided just to head up to his apartment to relax. Alone. He’d been too preoccupied: with who could have called the cops about serving minors, and then as much as he hated to admit it, Wilhelmina. He’d thought about her more than the damned cops.