Thank you everyone for reading! I appreciate all of the reviews!

Note: So, I realized that the timeline is a liiiiittle bit off, and that's my mistake. Raoul and Meg's story is currently later "today", at dinnertime, while Erik and Christine are still in the morning. They will be on the same "schedule" by the end of this chapter.

Enjoy!

Chapter 37

Christine

"Hurry and change, Christine."

I nodded, closing the door to my dressing room as he waited against the wall outside. We'd realized fairly quickly that wearing my day clothes, big and heavy as they were, through the hidden spaces of the stage and theatre...was not ideal. Not if I wanted to be stealthy and quiet. The hallway to his lair was different - it was spacious. The secret passages aboveground were not.

So I'd wear the costume I'd worn for Hannibal. Light, close-fitting, if not a bit revealing. But it was nothing Erik hadn't already seen. Not if he'd watched the show himself.

And he made no comment about my exposed legs and arms, either. His eyes didn't linger anywhere except my eyes. A gentleman. Not like Buquet.

Buquet. The man Erik claimed he suspected. Though I'd mentally started at this, it hadn't...well, it hadn't truly shocked me. Not when he'd been so lewd to me. To Meg. To all of the girls. It was certainly plausible.

"We will come back to collect the dress after we investigate," he said, nodding to the dressing room. "Rehearsal is not until this afternoon. No one should be here for hours."

"All right." I set my shoulders back and nodded. "Yes. Good."

He signaled for me to follow. We went immediately to the stage. He was still holding his lantern, as the theatre was dark; and that did put me on edge. Every creak of the floorboards made the hairs on my arms stand straight up.

"Don't be afraid," he said, obviously noting my jumpy nature.

"I'm not afraid." I said it too quickly. Harshly. I blew out a breath.

He said nothing to that.

But looking out at the empty rows of seats, barely illuminated by the yellow light, knowing anyone could be hiding behind the back of a chair, unseen, unnoticed...I stood a bit closer to Erik, even though the yellow light threw shadows across him too, making him look like the threatening ghost he played.

"You are safe, Christine." He was watching me with those strange mismatched eyes. "I won't let harm come to you."

I bit my lip and nodded.

"Come." He offered his hand. "Buquet's station is this way."

I took his gloved fingers. I relaxed exponentially at the contact. Safe. I was safe. I had to remember that. I was being protected - by the Phantom of the Opera, for God's sake. I was beyond safe.

His eyes warmed at my softened posture. The prologue of a smile met his lower lip and he led me forward, toward the right wing of the stage, opposite of the one we'd emerged from.

"There." He lifted the lantern and lit a workstation - the largest one. A wooden table with drawers underneath like a crude desk. A stool made of a similar material. Stacks of paper on the desk, a pen, and a little knife, like a paring knife but smaller and curved. As we came closer, it became clear what the instrument was for - a whittling knife, next to which was a carved fish, made of a reddish wood.

"A fan of arts and crafts, I see," commented Erik.

I smirked in response. "Heckling women isn't his only hobby. Color me shocked."

He hardened beside me, as though he were wood himself. "Has he ever heckled you?"

"Once or twice." I shrugged. "Nothing I couldn't handle. It was the other girls I was worried for."

"I see." He stared at me a moment longer, then took a step toward the station. "You know..." His throat bobbed. "I do admire your strength."

"Oh?" I watched him.

He nodded. "You needn't have pretended...changed your personality. To deceive me."

Guilt again gnawed at me. "Erik - I..."

"No." He shook his head. "You've apologized enough. I'm merely saying..." He sighed. "You don't shrink from me."

"Why would I?" I knew why.

He gave a low, one-note laugh. "Am I not intimidating?"

"No."

"Jules seems to think so."

"Well, Jules doesn't like me, either."

He turned to me fully again. "You're the first woman to treat me like..."

"Like?"

"I'm a man." A bit of pain line his eyes, and he turned away quickly. "Like I'm not some sort of...devil. A criminal. A predator. All for what I look like - a thing I cannot change, but would if I could." He exhaled. "Don't pity me, please."

"I don't."

He whipped his gaze to me.

I repeated, "I don't. I think it's awful you have gone through that. Your appearance did...surprise me, yes. I won't lie. But then I saw your-" I shut my mouth, blushing.

"My?..." he pressed, looking entirely needful in his want to hear the rest of my thought. Like he depended on it. Like he couldn't not know what it was that proved to me he wasn't a monster - like that information was his lifeblood.

I obliged. "Your eyes." I knew I was beet red. "You have gentle eyes. And my father always said that the eyes are the window to the soul, so..." I shrugged. "I - I trusted you." And he'd trusted me. I betrayed that trust. It had been for Meg, for Isabelle...but how unfortunate that he'd been in the crossfire. I'd put him there.

His mouth parted just slightly, and those eyes widened, shining with some sudden emotion. "My..." He closed his mouth and swallowed. He paused, then laughed without joy. "I always found my eyes ugly. Sunken and bicolored. Abnormal. The fact that they're what endeared..." He laughed again, but the sound was heartbreaking. I nearly responded when he cleared his throat, placing the lantern on the station. "Let's start. Here." He halved the stack of papers and put them in front of me. "Skim through these. If you find anything amiss, let me know."

I nodded, feeling a change in the atmosphere. It was somehow smaller, more intimate. I didn't hate it.

We set to work. The pages, I saw, were of the current opera being performed. They were scribbled on with notes, illegible likely but to the very person who'd written them. I squinted at the letters, wondering if Buquet were perhaps not literate.

Both of us were silent as we scanned through, but half my mind was on his presence. His movements. How tall he was, thin but deceptively strong - I'd seen with what ease he pushed the boat across the lake. And not just that, but how intelligent, kind, talented-

"Christine."

I was taken from my thoughts. I looked at him. "Yes."

"Look."

I moved my gaze to where his eyes were laying. And with how terrible his handwriting was, it took a moment to realize what I was seeing.

Names.

Names of all of the girls and women in the theatre.

And timestamps next to each one.

"What..." I whispered.

He stared at it momentarily, then said, "I...think...I think this is a notation of when ballerinas and singers are coming and going."

I think he was right. The thought chilled me.

I looked for my own name. I found it. It was crossed off. So was Meg's. Madame Giry's. Isabelle's. Emma's.

That feeling took hold of me. That fear that something was standing behind me in the dark. Those tendrils of ice, that rush of adrenaline that made me want to scream or run or both. I did neither.

No, like I was taken over by some animal instinct, I grabbed Erik's hand and squeezed it, my breath coming in and out sharply.

He froze. I didn't look at him.

"Christine," he whispered.

"Hm."

"You're safe." His voice, his beautiful voice, was gentle. "I promise."

I nodded rapidly, but my grip on his hand didn't relent. He didn't pull away. But he did go for a sheet of blank paper and pick up a pen. I watched him write - and, as I was holding his right hand, I realized he must have been left-handed. Or ambidextrous. Either, I felt, was somehow fitting.

"What..." My voice had gone. I tried again. "What are you writing?"

"A letter of warning for our friend Joseph Buquet." He frowned, but there was a glint of mischief in his eyes. "Letting him know that the Opera Ghost and Ballet Wraith are onto him. That he'd better be careful or he, himself, will swim with Isabelle in the Seine."

I stared at him. "You plan on killing him?"

He paused. "No, I'd rather let Paris and its police deal with him." He glanced at me. "But a little fear is good for the heart. Keeps it pumping. And our overweight friend could use the cardiovascular exercise. Don't you think, my dear?"