On the Prowl by Kate Rudolph

19

The army hadnothing on Em's tour when it came to efficiently moving a large group of people. True to the thirty minute warning, they had rolled out in two large tour buses and a handful of semi trucks that contained most of Em's stage.

He hadn't realized just how much they would be taking from town to town.

There were a few hours of travel planned before they would stop for lunch, and then another couple hours before they reached the next city and their hotel for the night. And Andre was hoping the hotel was just as booked as the last one. He didn't want a room of his own. He wanted to be with Em.

He regretted not letting the kiss go further. And if she kissed him again, he didn't think he would hold back. A man only had so much self-control.

But right now, he was content to sit back and watch as she held a meeting with her band. Jerry, Floyd, and Kristin were sitting with her on a couch and two chairs in the middle of the bus. It was more like a motorhome than a bus, designed for comfort on a long drive.

If he concentrated, he could make out the words they were saying over the road noise and the rumbling engine. But Andre let it fade away. He didn't know much about performing music and couldn't tell one chord from another, so when Em gave Jerry a slight rebuke about missing an intro, he wasn't sure what that meant and he knew it wasn't his problem.

If ever he had thought that Em was just some overproduced rock star who didn't care about her craft, watching the meeting blew that assumption out of the water. She was speaking to her band as a musician, not a celebrity. And as they finished up discussing their performances, they shifted over to playing songs that he recognized from the radio but knew were not Em's.

With her safe on the bus, he let his thoughts wander back to the shadow beast. He didn't know if it would attack again now that they had moved on. It was possible that some crazed fan had sent it roaring at her. And though Darlene and Vi had spoken of weird things happening at other stops on the tour, there was no reason to believe they were connected.

Andre wanted an excuse to stay with Em. He didn't want anyone hurt, but if the shadow beast showed itself, then it was evidence that either a crazed fan was following them or something else was causing it to appear.

Someone on the tour? Some sort of charm or totem? At this point Andre was racking his brain for what he had seen in movies and television shows. That was his only touchstone of magic. And he didn't think that episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer that he hadn't seen in over a decade were going to help him.

Eventually the bus stopped for lunch. They were at a large truck stop, and Em stayed right around the buses while Melinda and her fleet of assistants met up with one of the people from the restaurant attached to the truck stop to grab large platters full of food. They were far enough away from most of the truckers and commuters that people could not see that Em was with them. But Em didn't seem too concerned. She walked among her crew and smiled and laughed, finally fixing a plate and sitting down to eat her lunch under a tree. Andre got a plate of his own and joined her.

"Afraid the ghost werewolf is going to attack me?" she asked before stuffing a fry into her mouth.

"Shadow beast," Andre corrected.

"What?" It came out muffled around her food.

Andre had to suppress a smile. "Ghost werewolf is a little… I don't like it. Shadow beast. It's a beast. It's made of shadows." At least he thought it was. Shadows and teeth.

"You're changing its name because you want it to sound cooler." She rolled her eyes with a laugh.

Andre felt a bit of heat in his cheeks, but he wouldn't relent. "Shadow beast."

"Shadow beast." She put enough emphasis on it to make it sound just as dumb as ghost werewolf.

"Do you always have meetings like that with your band?" he asked, wondering what tour life was really like for a rock star.

"Jerry's been hounding me for a meeting. We talk. Obviously. And they make me sound good. But I think maybe I've been neglecting them. This is Jerry's second tour with me. The other two are new."

"You don't have the same band all the time?" He'd never thought about it before and didn't know what to expect.

"No. Mercy is a one-woman act. You know, except for the backup band and the backup singers and backup dancers. But those are hired specifically for the tour and when I record an album. I work with a bunch of different people." She looked over at the buses with a faint smile.

"And do you think there's any sort of resentment in the band or the singers? Something that might have them do weird magic shit?" If people changed every tour, it didn't sound like there would be longstanding resentment.

She took a bite of her sandwich and thought, and then she shook her head. "I can't think of why. It's not like I'm any different than a lot of other bands. They know the score. And they’re well-compensated."

Andre filed that information away. He didn't know if it was important, but anything could be at this point.

Em's phone buzzed, and she looked at the message. "Melinda is summoning us back. Time to get on the road."

They got to their feet and threw away their disposable plates. Most of the crew and others traveling with them were either on the bus or turned towards it, which explained why no one yelled out to warn them about the beast.

It seemed to materialize out of thin air, and any thoughts that Andre had about it being afraid of the light were gone. The sun shone brightly overhead as the inky black beast charged at them.

Em was a step in front of him, and his heart stopped as he realized the beast was too close for him to protect her. It charged, but instead of attacking her, it went straight through her and swiped its claws at Andre, raking bloody tracks down his arm.

The growl Andre let out sounded weird coming from his human throat, but he used the beast's momentum against it and sent it flying a few feet away from him.

He thought he heard someone call out, but he wasn't sure if it was shock or even if it was a man or a woman. Then there was a bright flash of light, almost like a lightning strike, but that seemed impossible on such a beautiful day, and the shadow beast disappeared.

Andre whipped around, looking to see if the burst of light had come from somewhere or if the beast was regenerating and ready to charge again.

He thought he saw someone move around the back of the bus, but they were too far away and too shadowed for him to make them out.

It wasn't a crazed fan.

But now Andre had to figure out who on Em's tour was trying to hurt her.