Page 38 of Just Killing Time


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No, not a hardship at all.

SURPRISINGLY, NO ONE in the cast—or the crew—was killed on the set of the reality show the first day. Even more surprisingly, Mick wasn’t either.

He’d expected Caroline to come after him with both barrels—or a meat cleaver—after his parting shot in her trailer that morning. He still didn’t know what impulse had made him give her that salacious look as he’d left her so-called office.

Because she thought the worst.

Yeah, that was probably it. Because just like in the past she’d accused and found him guilty in one snap judgment. He’d let her think his comment about the couch was a come-on. It hadn’t been. At least, he didn’t think it had been. Considering his brain had been pretty mushy since Caroline’s surprise return to his life, he couldn’t be entirely sure. Could be the big bad wolf on his ass had been in control of that conversation.

Tonight, when Caroline had returned from the Little Bohemie Inn a few hours earlier than she had all week, he was prepared for fireworks. But she seemed to have forgotten all about what had happened this morning. One glimpse of her pinched, weary-looking face, and he knew the arrival of the cast had been less than auspicious.

“Beer,” she said the minute she closed the front door and dropped her briefcase on the floor in the foyer.

“Porch,” he replied, just as succinctly.

She turned right around, and yanked the door open again. Somehow, she managed to kick off both her high-heeled shoes midstep as she walked onto the porch. He heard the fridge open and close, then the hiss of a bottle being uncapped. She was pulling a deep draught of it by the time she walked back into the house. “Ahh,” she said, wiping off her lips with the back of her hand.

Totally non-Caroline. Somebody had had a bad day.

“I wasn’t expecting you so early.” He didn’t approach her, never leaving the kitchen counter where he’d been chopping up some veggies for dinner. He’d planned a dinner for one, since she had never returned from the set before 9:00p.m. this week. Without asking, he grabbed another handful of mixed vegetables and tossed them in the colander.

She walked toward him down the narrow hallway, then through the archway into the kitchen. “Food.”

Amused by her one-word grunts, he replied, “Ugh. Hunting not good today, Captain Caveman.”

She didn’t even react to the joke.

“I’d give my Vera Wang gown—the one I bought for last year’s Emmy’s by taking out a second mortgage on my condo—to be sitting in a mud bath at the Casa de Helena spa in San Diego.”

He glanced toward the back door. “It hasn’t rained for a few days, but the garden might still be a little muddy.”

“Oh, don’t I know that it hasn’t rained,” she said, taking a seat at the kitchen table. She sipped again from her bottle. “Renauld was cursing Mother Nature all afternoon.”

Without being asked, he scooped up a big bowlful of tossed salad and walked it over to her.

“Bless you.”

Remembering it was her favorite, he grabbed a bottle of French dressing from the fridge and put it beside her salad. Then he returned to chopping vegetables. “Why did he want it to rain?”

“Atmosphere. He wanted a rainy, gray day when the contestants arrived. Forecast called for it today, which is why he brought them in instead of waiting until tomorrow, when they were supposed to come. Everything was thrown off to take advantage of the rain.”

Mick tossed the vegetables into a pan to stir-fry them, distributing them over the hot surface. “But the rain didn’t show?”

“Right.”

Remembering the leaf-painting issue, Mick asked, “Tell me he didn’t try to create rain.”

“Okay, I won’t tell you.”

“Is this guy a fool or what? How does he keep his job?”

Caroline shoved a big mouthful of salad in her mouth, cooed a little, then dug in again before answering. “He’s been aroundforever. I think he must have something on the head of the studio. They keep him busy, but alwaysawayfrom L.A. where they don’t have to deal with him.”

“How’d he make rain?”

She ate a few more bites before answering. Then, with a roll of the eyes, she explained, “He had the crew pull a tight shot of each person getting out of the limo and doused them with a sprinkler.”

He grinned, picturing the scene.

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