Page 127 of Not Exactly a Small-Town Romance

“I’ll catch you later,” I tell Jester, although it’s possibly a lie.

I should go home anyway, work out for the first time since we left, eat something healthy.

And move on with my damn life.

Chapter 41

KELSEYRISKSITALL

I take my time getting to LA. I’m not sure I’m ready for Zachery’s “I told you so.” At least Desdemona is safely away.

I hole up in a cheap hotel in Utah partway through the first day, gathering material to convince the director ofLimited Fatethat Jason is our guy. Jason has already gotten the script I sent him from the homestead and told his agent he better let him read for it.

During the Utah stop, I eat, sleep, and breathe Jason’s social media feeds, chasing footage that’ll prove he’s perfect for the sensitive sculptor. Not just for the director, but for Jason himself to live up to the role as I know he can.

I need him the way I saw him at the party, not his tire commercial or even what I can find from the set ofDarkness Gathers II. It’s in the gestures, the flash of his eyes. I don’t want him to attempt a self-tape until I’m there to help.

I finally find what I’m looking for on the feed of a friend of a friend, who films Jason dancing with a young woman on a basketball court in a gritty neighborhood. I sit back, my eyes smarting. That’s it. That’s how he’ll be.

Now to set it all in motion.

It’s work I need. I don’t want to think about the meet-cutes, the tree farm, or what I set out to do almost two weeks ago.

And I definitely can’t think about Zachery Carter. But the farther I get from Wyoming, the more I wonder how I can work with him and not think about what happened in Colorado.

Drake Underwood calls me the next day, while I’m driving through Nevada. I pull over by a ramshackle gas station that reads sixty-seven cents a gallon on a long-dry pump.

“I expected to hear from Desdemona,” he says. “Weren’t you the one who sent me the other two?”

I don’t bother trying to blame that miscast on my boss. I’m not her. “I had misgivings about my previous choices, even though they’re both accomplished actors on their own.”

“I’m looking at the headshot of a tire boy. You think this Jason Venetian fellow is the right guy?”

“I have a clip for you. Let me send it.” I’m praying the clarity of the call means there’s a cell tower close enough to patch it through.

I forward the dancing video via text, closing my eyes and crossing my fingers that he’ll see what I do. I had hoped I would have a carefully prepared self-tape, but I don’t. I’m spending too much time driving across the country to fast-track an audition tape.

There’s a pause, then I can hear the background noise of the video. He got it. He’s probably in his office and looking at it on a different screen.

The silence is long. Nobody passes me on this stretch of road in the desert. I’m in the literal middle of nowhere, alone, trying to convince a veteran director that a twenty-five-year-old casting assistant with no credits to her name is right about her choice for this film with possible Oscar potential.

I can’t think of a less auspicious way to present something that matters so much.

I wish Zachery were here, silently holding my hand. He’d squeeze it at just the right moment, passing comfort and strength from himself to me.

Finally, Drake speaks. “Okay, I see it. So, all we have on him is a commercial and this action sequel that’s still in editing?”

“I saw some dailies. I can send them, but it’s a very different look.”

“I bet.”

Another pause.

What would Reese do? Be plucky and positive.

That’s good, but maybe I need to think—what would Zachery do?

He’d close the deal, make Drake feel like it was all his idea. His brilliant vision.

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