As promised the second chapter.
A Net Solution
The first day of rehearsals for the ballet started and although it was only seven o'clock in the morning, Nadir had already dropped Christine off to join the ballerinas in their early class since with no singing, Meg had turned her mother's apartment into a tiny ballet refresher studio as she worked with Christine during last couple of days of the week off and then convinced her mother to allow Christine to join in the rehearsals and classes to keep her occupied… And in the same location as Erik as part of her master plan to help get Christine and Erik together.
ooo
Nadir was now getting comfortable at his desk with his newspaper and coffee in the security office as Erik strode through the stage door much later than expected.
"Good morning to you too Erik!" Nadir chirped as Erik shot past, stopped, and backtracked into the security office.
"I'll say it is for several reasons!" Erik declared happily, "If we get a good return on this ballet, I might have enough money to pay Piangi back and I can fire that dreadful wife of his and make Christine our new Prima Donna!" he replied.
"What else has gone well this morning?" Nadir asked, Erik was just too happy, and Nadir knew not all of it was due to Christine coming home. The music director was just about to reply as Annette came dashing around the corner.
"Erik, we have a problem!" she cried out as she entered the office. "We are down one member of the Corps, most likely permanently!" she added as she stood in front of Nadir's desk and stared at Erik expectantly.
The reaction she got, was not what she expected as Erik grinned broadly, "I know, but face it, Jammes Rousso was not the best dancer we have ever had was she?" he asked rhetorically.
Nadir sat silently as Annette did a double take, "I do not remember telling you who was missing?" she questioned, "How did you know who was gone?" she asked.
Erik grinned even wider and looked at Nadir, "After you picked Christine up this morning, I took a phone call from Detective Inspector Robin Mifroid thanking us for our diligent work, then checked the newspaper!" he declared joyfully, as he lifted Nadir's pristine unopened copy off his desk and displayed the front page for both Annette and Nadir to read.
"Chagny and Co Accountancy Collapse. High level police investigation and arrest warrants issued in relation to suspected major embezzlement and fraud." Nadir read out aloud.
"If you read further down it states that Philip Chagny is already under arrest and awaiting a bail hearing. Ralph Chagny and his current girlfriend a ballerina called Jammes Rousso are believed to have fled the country in the early hours of this morning before they could be arrested." Erik added as he shared a knowing smirk with Nadir.
"What do you two know that I don't?" Annette enquired suspiciously as she eyed the two smirking men.
Erik made himself comfy on the corner of Nadir's desk. "You remember from that Thursday, our discussion, Nadir is a qualified forensic accountant amongst other things."
"Yes, I recall that." Annette replied taking the seat Nadir offered her.
"And you are aware that we are trying to ensure that Christine feels safe in her place of work, which she doesn't when certain people are wandering round the opera house like they own the place since they were patrons." Nadir chipped in.
"It started before we found out about Christine's connection to the Chagny's." Erik continued, "Angle Architecture was expanding, and we needed additional accountants as our accounting team not only handle the cash flow of the company but also do checks on our clients. We like to ensure that they can pay legally before we agree a contract."
"What has this got to do with ballet?" Annette asked feeling a little exasperated.
"Angle took on several senior accountants that were let go from Chagny and Co, to fill the new posts and during our security checks they revealed with evidence, they were let go because they refused to cover up fraudulent activities committed by the Chagny brothers." Erik told her, "They could not go to the police, due to ND agreements, so Angle put Chagny and Co on the watch list since they were patrons of my opera house."
"So!" Annette all but demanded.
"So after that disastrous dinner, when Christine informed us of her interactions with the Chagny's, I upped the anti from watching them to protect my businesses to full on kill mode, that same weekend, I asked Nadir to take personal charge of investigating them because of the contract they signed when they became patrons, which asks them to declare that they are persons of good character that are supporting the arts." Erik said, "The information Nadir dug up because of that contract went straight to the police since I will not be covering up any illegal activities that can affect my businesses. The bonus was that it kept them away from Christine."
"As you can tell, a set of court papers trump an NDA, so our new employees were more than happy to speak to the police and this morning, the hard work paid off." Nadir added with a huge grin.
"AND!" Annette all but screamed in frustration.
"And therefore, they are no longer patrons of this opera house, and are no longer going to upset Christine!" Erik pointed out.
Annette looked like she was about to explode. "WHAT ABOUT MY CORPS BEING A BALLERINA SHORT!" She all but screamed at the now stunned men.
ooo
A rapid calming down of a very heated Mrs Giry followed by quick word with Christine and the Corps de Ballet later and Christine had very happily gone from joining in for fun to now being a minor part of the cast for Fille Mal Gardee. It was not a hard choice; gossip about Jammes and Ralph's disappearance due to their arrest warrants had already reached the Corps.
ooo
"I bet you're regretting that pedicure now." Meg remarked gently as she helped Christine tape her toes to give them some protection until the skin on her feet hardened up again.
Putting on her pointe shoes, Christine grinned, "Not as much as someone else is regretting their supposedly free meal ticket." She smirked.
"You are sounding so like Erik; he has definitely had a positive influence on you." Meg replied, "How was Sunday?" she pried.
"A little embarrassing to start with." Christine replied cryptically, as Erik appeared from seemingly nowhere.
Pushing his jacket out of the way and grabbing the waistband of his trousers as he walked carefully past the friends "Good morning, ladies." Erik called as he headed toward Annette's office. Only releasing his grasp on his trousers once he was clear of the two.
"Good morning, Maestro Jardinier!" Meg and Christine called back, as they watched Erik head into Annette's office and close the door.
"Well, that was weird." Meg commented, as she watched her mother's office door. "He's wearing a belt, braces and held onto his trousers for grim death as he walked past us. Christine, do you know why?" Meg turned to look at her friend as she enquired curiously.
Christine knew she could bluff all she liked but the burning sensation as her blush caught fire told Meg enough. So, she came clean.
"I ripped his trousers off him yesterday for the second time." She mumbled not realising how bad her answer sounded.
With her eyebrows threatening to leave her face entirely, Meg gasped with shocked admiration. "Dammit, girl! That is intense. Even I don't work that fast."
Christine's brain finally figured out what her mouth had said, a look of embarrassed horror now accompanied the blush. "No, no, no, not like that... It was a complete accident!" She sputtered, before quietly telling Meg about both incidents.
Meg couldn't resist Softly teasing her mortally embarrassed friend. "Both times an accident? Really?" Meg asked gently noticing that Christine looked like she was about to have a panic attack. "Sweetie, face it you are in love with him if you try to hide it you will not only make yourself miserable, but you will eventually really hurt him, because to mama, me and Nadir it is clear as day, how you feel. Let me help you get him." Meg offered with sisterly affection.
A defeated sigh and slumped shoulders was the only indication that Christine had taken on board what Meg had said, until after a few moments of silence, Christine finally spoke.
"Has everyone noticed?" she asked quietly.
"Not everyone, just those who know you and Erik well... Except for Erik himself, but Christine remember he has been hurt before so he would rather ignore the obvious than risk being wrong." Meg pointed out.
Christine nodded, "So what do I do?" she asked.
"Well first off, we get to class before mama gets there and get warmed up. Then we go from there." Meg pointed out.
With that the two friends left the wing of the stage and headed to the studio, unaware that their entire conversation had been overheard.
"So, it's Erik, huh!" Joseph Bouquet hissed as he came out from his hiding place between some scenery flats. "Who does that little swede think she is." He growled, as his mind came up with a fiendish plot to finally get his hands on Christine.
ooo
Day one over and as the rest of the ballerinas were making their way home; Meg and Christine were still working on a few steps that needed a little more refining.
"Finally, you've cracked it!" Meg declared as Christine perfected her Grand Jette.
"Thank heavens for that, my feet are killing me." Christine replied, "You're a bigger perfectionist than your mother." She added with a smile.
"Have to be, if I want to be in with a chance to become the Prima Ballerina when Sorelli retires." Meg pointed out, as they both started their cool down exercises.
ooo
Cooling down complete, and shoes changed. The two friends made their way out of the studio.
"Meg can you do me a big favour?" Christine asked as they made their way down the stairs to the stage.
"What do you need?" Came the reply.
"Could you grab my stuff from my locker and bring it to the back practice room, I can't leave until Nadir has finished and I have to warm up my voice while I wait as my first lesson this week is straight after I get home." Christine asked, handing Meg the key to her locker.
"Not a problem. Nice to see Erik back to his slave driving ways." Meg called as she turned and headed to the lockers.
"It's nice to have everything back to normal." Christine said to herself as she headed to the practice room.
ooo
Arriving at the lockers, Meg grabbed her stuff first, then went to Christine's locker and noticed an unaddressed folded piece of paper taped to the door.
Removing the paper, Meg opened it and immediately recognised the scruffy scrawl. The last time she had seen that scrawl, the note was for her and it resulted in her applying a toe shoe hard enough to dent Joseph Bouquet's groin. At least he left her alone after that. Meg read the note.
'I know your little secret with 'Erik'. Pamper my ego well enough in the back practice room tomorrow morning and I may not ruin him by revealing to the managers and cast what I know. JB.'
"Sneaky little shit!" Meg growled, grateful that she had found the note and not Christine or Erik. "He wants his ego pampered! I'll ensure it is well and truly pampered." Meg hissed as her mind started plotting.
ooo
Christine was oblivious to the machinations of her friend's mind as Meg happily entered the practice room and waited as Christine finished her current exercise.
"Here you go, your stuff." Meg announced as she handed over Christine's bag. "Remember just act normally, 'Operation Get the Guy', starts tomorrow."
"I hope you know what you are doing." Christine nervously asked.
"My plans worked out with Jean." Meg remarked cheerfully as she gave her friend a hug. "He's coming over for dinner with mama and I tonight." She added, "Talking of which, I'd best find mama and get home to get ready." She continued. "Try to leave Erik's trousers on him for now, plenty of time for that later."
"Stop reminding me, you're going to make me nervous." Christine mumbled, though a small smile showed that she was starting to see the funny side of it.
With a final hug, Meg left Christine to her warming up. Apart from dinner with her beau, Meg had some serious fish to fry.
ooo
Despite the previously wonderful evening, with Christine perfecting everything in her lesson followed by a lovely dinner, a happy cat and winding down for bed by actually beating his student in a game of chess. Erik was not a happy bunny the following morning.
So far, Nadir's car had mysteriously broken down with Christine in, so they were running late. Annette seemed to already know that Christine was running late and was not concerned, and to add insult to injury, a very pleased Andrews and Firman had caught up with their music director just as he was heading to his box, to inform him that their top patron had been encouraged by them to renew his patronage and was visiting later today. So Erik had to be present to take Senor Piangi on a tour of the opera house.
Little did he know that things were only going to get worse before they got better.
ooo
After their late arrival and ensuring that Christine was in class, Nadir quietly settled down at his desk with a coffee and grabbed from his lunch bag, his favourite snack. Looking carefully around to check for grumpy music directors. Nadir readied himself to open and enjoy his morning bag of cheese puffs.
A flash of a long thin hand and to Nadir's dismay he found himself suddenly relieved of his snacks.
"Cheese puffs at a time like this!" Erik complained waving the bag of puffs just out of reach of his friend.
"There is nothing wrong with cheese puffs in the morning!" Nadir hotly declared grabbing for his snacks and failing dismally.
"You were bloody late, which made Christine late. Those damned managers are trying to drive me round the twist, and all you are worried about is a bloody bag of snacks!" Erik yelled as he threw the bag on the floor and jumped on it.
The bag popped open loudly as Erik landed both feet firmly on it spraying the carpet liberally with bright orange crumbs. Nadir sighed.
"What are Andrews and Firman up to now?" Nadir asked as he forlornly stared at yet another deceased bag of his favourite snacks.
"They have only gone and encouraged Piangi to renew his flaming patronage." Erik growled, grinding his heel viscously into the already destroyed bag of puffs as if it had personally insulted him. "How the bloody hell am I supposed to get rid of that howling harridan if he renews."
The Iranian sighed, knowing all to well, that Erik wasn't looking for suggestions he just wanted to throw a paddy whack. Nadir then distracted himself by quickly scanning the security monitors and noticed something a little more urgent in nature dangling in front of one of the fly loft security cameras.
"Err Erik..." Nadir started.
"WHAT!" Erik shouted.
"When is Piangi due to visit?" Nadir enquired calmly.
"They said about two this afternoon… What has that got to do with things?" Erik yelled back.
"I think we need to head to the stage right now." Nadir said his voice still strangely calm as he continued to look at the monitor of the fly loft camera.
"What are you blathering about?" Erik demanded as he turned to look at what Nadir was staring at. "WHAT THE FLAMING HELL?"
ooo
"I really think the Ballerinas this time have seriously had enough." Nadir stated as he handed a note to Erik and looked at the cargo net, he had lowered from the top of the fly loft, it contained a very frightened Joseph Bouquet, who was gagged and bound very tightly with various flesh toned shades of medical tape.
Erik read the note, with a sigh.
'Either this sex pervert goes or there is no ballet.'
It was signed by the entire Ballet Company. Everyone including Annette as the Ballet Mistress, well everyone except for the newest member who was; to Erik's mind now, conveniently late that morning.
"Piangi is not going to take this well." Nadir unhelpfully pointed out.
A muffled murmuring from Bouquet, that sounded like 'You wait till my father hears of this.' Hit Erik's ears shortly after.
"Erik what are we going to do? We can't leave him like this." Nadir implored. "Erik!"
"You are going to ensure that the gag is tight and not going to come off. Then hoist him back to the top of the fly loft. Also switch off the camera feed so the rest of the security guards don't investigate. The orchestra are in at nine for rehearsal so once they start no one will hear him. I am going to my office to think of a way to get us out of this disaster beyond even my imagination." Erik decided quickly, turning on his heel to head off. "Oh, send your beloved up to my office. I want a word with her about this." Erik added before he vanished, leaving Nadir and a captive Bouquet alone on the stage.
"You should have left the ballerinas alone." Nadir informed his captive, as he checked the gag would hold. Stepping away to the controls for the winch that lifted the cargo net, Nadir started it up, raising Bouquet back into the flies. "It's your own fault." He added as he completed the lift and locked the controls, before heading off to find Annette.