Page 7 of Cast to be Mine

My thoughts circled back to those blue eyes and the way she’d delivered every line like the stakes were real. She’d looked at me for that split second before starting. Something had shifted in the air I couldn’t quite name. Professional interest, sure. But underneath it, a pull I had no business examining on day one of casting.

I grabbed my jacket off the back of the chair. “I’m heading out to clear my head. Tell her agent we’ll meet tomorrow morning. And Doris? No callbacks. She’s the one.”

3

GRACE

Afew hours later, I was flat on my back on a yoga mat, staring up at the fluorescent lights of the gym and wondering if death by leg press was a real thing.

“Come on, Grace! Give me five more!” Becky’s voice cut through my pain and suffering like a drill sergeant who’d had way too much caffeine. “You can do this!”

“I can’t,” I gasped. “I’m dying. Tell my mother I loved her.”

“You’re fine. Five more!”

I groaned and pushed through another rep, my thighs burning with the kind of pain that promised I wouldn’t be able to walk tomorrow. But that was the price of maintaining what Hollywood considered an acceptable body without resorting to the kind of starvation diets that left you hollow-eyed and cranky.

I preferred the cranky that came from physical exhaustion, thank you very much.

“Four more!”

“I hate you.”

“You love me. Three more!”

I did love her. Becky had been my best friend since college, back when neither of us knew what the hell we were doing with our lives. She’d figured it out faster than me. Got her personal training certification, built up a client list, and now spent her days torturing people for money.

Lucky me, I got the friends-and-family discount on torture. She loved her job a little too much. A bit of a sadist, really, but it made for a good workout.

“Two more! Think about Jack Montana!”

I pushed through another rep, my arms shaking. “What about him?”

“You nailed your audition.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Girl, we were on video chat for an hour while you rehearsed,” she said. “I believed you were the CEO. I’m sure you totally killed it.”

I did kick ass in that audition but I had seen my competition. Some I knew just from being in the business. They had actual resumes. They’d actually had parts that required them to speak.

“There are a lot of other great actresses trying out,” I panted, finishing the last rep and letting the weights drop with a satisfying clang.

Becky handed me a towel and I wiped the sweat off my face. “Be honest. How do you think it went?”

I sat up, my muscles already starting to stiffen. “I honestly don’t know. I thought I did well, but it’s impossible to know what they thought. The director barely said anything. Just ‘that was great, we’ll be in touch.’ Which could mean anything from ‘you’re hired’ to ‘please never darken our doorway again.’”

“What was he like?”

“Professional. Focused.” I paused, remembering those intense eyes watching me from behind the camera setup. “Hot, actually. Really hot. Dark hair, blue eyes, looked like he hadn’t slept in a week but it worked for him.”

Becky grinned. “Oh really?”

“Don’t start.”

“I’m not starting anything. I’m just saying it couldn’t hurt to look good for the hot director too. Isn’t that a thing in these parts?”

“That’s not why I’m working out. These parts? You grew up here. We live in these parts. And that is frowned upon these days. I’m a professional.”