Page 28 of The Claiming of the Shrew
Halstadt laid down the broom he had been using in lieu of a rapier. “You’re getting tired. That’s the third cue in a row you’ve missed. Let’s call it a night.”
Leah bid him good night and went back to the hotel past the campsites and trailers, answering cheerful greetings and good-nights called to her. She didn’twantit to be any of these people, she thought sadly. She liked these people. But she also liked Fawkes. Maybe more than liked Fawkes. Definitely more than liked Fawkes. He was her mate, for goodness sake.
She really needed to talk to him.
Inside the hotel, Leah went upstairs and knocked on Fawkes’s door. There was no answer. She sighed and leaned against the door.
“Fawkes? Are you in there? Are you avoiding me? I just want to talk.”
There was no answer.
Leah was about to lie down and peer under the door to see if she could get any hint of whether he was in there or not when a sudden, shrill scream tore through the upstairs hallway.
LEAH
The screams broughtevery guest out of their rooms, converging on the source of the shrieking: Gloria’s room.
As Leah pushed forward with the rest, she caught a glimpse of Fawkes in the crowd. He definitely had not come out of his room; he was out of breath and hastily buttoning his shirt. He’d been shifted somewhere around the hotel. Leah frowned at him, but before she could say anything, she got a look at Gloria.
And stared.
Gloria was a beautiful blonde with a luxurious head of salon-perfect waves. At least she used to be.
Now her hair was a brilliant, frizzy, Ronald McDonald orange.
So was her face, in blotches of varying intensity.
Maggie arrived on the scene, wrapping a bathrobe around herself; her hair was up in a towel and it looked as if she had come directly from a shower. “Oh, honey, what happened?”
Gloria shrieked again, burst into tears, and clung to Maggie. “I can’t go onstage like this! I look like a clown!”
She did, but Leah was too distracted to point this out. She edged through the assembled Menagerie and other puzzled guests, trying to get close to Fawkes.
“Are you sick?” someone else was asking Gloria.
“No!” Gloria moaned into Maggie’s shoulder. “Someone tampered with my cosmetics. Someone did this to meon purpose!”
“I’m sure we can fix it,” Maggie offered.
“Only by shaving my head!”
Leah got Fawkes’s attention by bumping into him. “I need to talk to you,” she whispered.
He turned a look on her that was filled with hope. “You changed your mind about me having?—”
“I haven’t decided yet.” She looked him up and down, taking in his sneaking-around clothes. “Where haveyoubeen?”
Fawkes touched a finger to his lips.
“Leah!” Maggie said loudly over the hubbub of the crowd. “There you are!”
Leah looked around in surprise. The director had put off Gloria onto another of the crew and was making her way through the crowd toward her, and she was scowling.
Fawkes, to Leah’s surprised pleasure, moved to interpose himself protectively between them. Leah shoved him out of the way. “She’s the director of the play,” she whispered. “She’s not going to hurt me.”
She wasmostlyconvinced of that. But she didn’t know what to think about the way Maggie was bearing down on her, glaring thunderously.She’s found out I’ve been sneaking into people’s rooms, Leah thought. It was the only?—
“What were you thinking?” Maggie snapped. “How dare you do this to the star of our show!”
