Page 17 of Best Served Hot
Mikey paused. ‘OK, well… Go ahead and recommend me. If I get the offer, I’ll take it.’
‘Great. Well, keep an eye out for an email.’
She said goodbye to him and got straight on the phone with the costume drama producer, Evan, to tell him she had to drop out because of a bereavement. But she had someone in mind to replace her. Someone talented that she recommended without hesitation if they were interested in a hot new name. Evan took the name, more than likely thinking how much he would save on her fee. He’d get a bargain and one that would more than likely deliver a good result if Nicole handpicked him.
Once that was done, she waited.
Viola called her the next day. The director for the very next episode ofFoundations, the season finale, had just pulled out, and she was scrabbling to replace him. She might have easily gone straight to Ethan with this problem and the plan would have stalled right there the moment Nicole’s name was mentioned. But Ethan liked solutions rather than problems. Viola was going around him, Nicole knew.
‘Are you still free?’ Viola asked eagerly.
What do you know, Nicole was free. But she had a few questions. Did they have the budget for her to bring along her own assistant? Viola thought they could probably manage that. Would she take a cut to her fee to offset it?
‘Why not?’ Nicole agreed.
She’d done it. Piece by piece, she’d slid her knight across the board, knocking a few pawns off, and it was now in a position to take the king. She’d never done anything like this before. How easily she’d done it shocked her.
The funny thing was that Ethan had made it easy. Ethan had made sure that no one on the show knew her name or her relationship to him. That was now a blessing. She was simply a jobbing director looking for work. And one with a very long credit list at that. A show likeFoundationswould be happy to have her.
While Nicole was shunting her chess pieces, she was careful to maintain contact with Ethan, though they stuck to texting. The tone was breezy. He’d relaxed, she could tell. He thought he was free and clear.
That’s exactly what she wanted him to think… For now.
Twelve
Alex should have anticipated the call. The steely eyed determination in Nicole’s voice had told her to expect it. But Alex had been sure it wouldn’t happen. How the hell was Nicole going to get hired on Ethan’s show without him finding out and putting a halt to it somehow? Impossible. Steel or no steel.
And yet…
‘I’m booked for the next ep. We start shooting in a week,’ Nicole said on the phone a few days later.
Alex was in her little flat, looking for jobs online. It wasn’t going well. ‘No. No way. Youdidn’t,’ Alex said, shocked.
‘I did.’
‘How?’
‘Utilising connections,’ Nicole said. ‘Which is something I hate doing. But for this purpose, it was ideal. People who know people who don’tknowme but knowofme? Perfect.’
‘But Ethan… Doesn’t he know? How are you going to handle that?’
‘He’ll probably find out pretty soon. And I’ll be ready for that.’ Nicole paused. ‘So?’
‘So…’ Alex took a deep breath while she seriously considered, for the very first time, if she was going to do this. At that moment, she was struck by a memory.
Alex had been working for Ethan for a good long stretch, and it was never anything but a professional relationship. He was her boss, and not her type. She assumed he would have to be married anyway. Just something about his age and demeanour made her think he would be.
But then he came in one morning, about a year ago, looking very forlorn. Now, she and Ethan were still doing politely cordial, so they’d never talked about what they did in their free time. But his hang-dog face that day broke the protocol.
‘You OK?’ she asked in the kitchen as she waited for the kettle to boil. She needed a caffeine fix.
‘Yeah, just didn’t sleep great,’ he said, getting his cup and adding a tea bag to it.
‘No? Everything… OK?’ she asked hesitantly.
He laughed with self-deprecation. ‘You don’t want to hear about my bullshit.’
And, of course, she bit.
