“But that still doesn’t give these guys the right to ask girls to...you know...in exchange for a role.”
Almost gagging, Sonya took a sip of her drink and stared at the bar a second. Oh. So that’s what he meant. Okay. Maybe she had been a little more innocent than she’d thought herself to be. Never would she have thought a man in such a position could be so disgusting. Then again, she’d seen centuries of men behaving badly. Why should Hollywood be any different?”
“From what I heard that blonde bombshell was a favorite of your show’s producer.”
She looked up at Bart. “Karl? Karl Zwick?”
“That’s the one.”
She thought of her audition, how sweet and kind everyone had been.
“Are you okay?”Bart said.
Sonya shook off the creepy crawly skin that had suddenly enveloped her. “Sure.” She pressed a tight smile. “I guess I should be thankful that I’m not a buxom blonde.”
Bart pressed his lips tightly and looked at her, his gaze kind, much as a big brother would look at the little sister he wished to protect. “If anything, I’d say you clearly have class. No man in his right mind would ask you to be so...well, so crudely submissive.”
“I’m glad I didn’t know about this at all. I think I would have been too afraid to come audition had I known.”
“I have no doubt the production would have suffered greatly had they not found you. I’ve heard they’ve been auditioning singers for weeks. Either they had the chops but not the look, or the looks but no singing ability whatsoever. I’m guessing you have quite the pair of lungs on you. Girls have come in here crying at how hard the songs are for this production.”
“They are, indeed, challenging.” She took the final gulp of her drink and set a few bills on the bar then patted his hand. “Thanks for keeping me company. It’s been a pleasure talking to you.”
“Same here,” he said with a nod. “See you tomorrow?”
“Sure thing.”
Chapter 4
During rehearsals,Sonya felt his presence. She knew he was there even though she couldn’t see him. That’s the way he liked to play. That’s the way he controlled people without them even realizing it. The question of whether he there in the darkness watching them or not; it left people on edge.
Three days went by and Sonya had learned nothing about Rhonda and her connection to Zwick. And though she’d continued to go to the bar every evening, she didn’t see the bat creature again nor the man Rhonda had been talking with that night she was killed.
It would be too easy to assume it’d been a random attack. She could just shrug it off and say that it was exactly that. But she knew better. The vampire bat that had taken Detective Rhonda had shifter powers, something she had yet to master, being only a vampire for about a decade.She knew only very ancient vampires had the power to shift from human form into animal form like a bat.Because there were very few ancient vampires known, almost rare, it made them more elusive.
Such a powerful vampire wouldn’t bother with such a random attack. With such powers, he would have to be from the ancient world, a world where vampires tended to be more selective, more cautious. They weren’t opportunity feeders. They chose their prey well; someone who wouldn’t necessarily be missed.
