Page 5 of Undone
Chapter Three
“And, cut!”
I breathed a sigh of relief, wiping my brow with the back of my hand. The sun hung high in the sky. We’d gotten back to the dig site at about quarter after one, and even though the hottest part of the day was past, the thermometer still seemed to be reaching new heights.
The set had a different feel to it. Usually at the end of shooting a scene, even a small one, there would be something like a release from everyone on set. People would congregate and murmur, looking over the footage and adjusting equipment, or tearing down the set to bring it somewhere else. And sure, things were moving around, but the tone was different. The members of the crew spoke in quick, hushed spates. As the set moved, the motions seemed jerky, like everyone on the set had been replaced with a robot.
And, like a stony guardian, a police officer stood at the edge of the set. His badge gleamed in the sun, the edges of the star razor-sharp. He wore a baseball cap, and the brim concealed most of his face in shadow, giving him a sinister and brooding appearance. His gun hung in the holster at his hip, and while the officer had made no effort to reach for it, everyone noticed it, felt like they were going to be staring down its barrel if they so much as spilled a cup of water. I felt compelled to hide, but on a set as open as this one, there was nowhere.
“Cari,” a voice said behind me.
I turned around. It was Nolan. “Nolan,” I said. “What’s up?”
“Are you okay?” he asked.
I scratched the back of my neck. “Am I okay? I guess so, all things considered. How about you?”
“Just checking,” Nolan said quickly, glancing around. “Just making sure you were okay.”
“I’m fine,” I reiterated. “I mean it, everything is peachy.”
“Good. Let me know if things stop being fine.” Nolan tipped a piece of camera equipment over his shoulder and headed toward the site of the next scene.
I breathed heavily and made a beeline for the refreshment table. Jasper stood nearby. Before I’d even closed the distance, he was fishing a bottle of water from the cooler, twisting off the cap.
I accepted it gratefully, tipping it back. The cool, refreshing liquid sloshed into my belly. I felt like I’d been wandering the Sahara for the last two days. “I hate this,” I said under my breath, as though telling a secret.
“Hate what?” Jasper asked as he continued to scan the site like a hawk.
“This. I feel like we’re all under house arrest, like everyone is walking on eggshells.”
“It’s good,” Jasper said. “It means everything is under control.”
I took another drink of water. “It doesn’t feel that way,” I said. “It feels like a powder keg is about to explode. You know how when you were younger, you’d stretch out rubber bands until they were stretched as far as they could go? You could always tell when they were about to snap. That’s how this site feels to me today—like a rubber band that is about to snap.”
“I can’t relate,” Jasper said.
“No?”
Jasper shook his head. “Nah. I used to make guns out of rubber bands and shoot them at pretty girls.” He eyed me. “You’d have been shot a couple of dozen times by now, I think.”
I rolled my eyes. “Come on, Jasper, I’m being serious here.”
“I am, too.” He cast me that crooked smile. “If we were playing Dungeons and Dragons, I’d have slain a half dozen dragons to get your attention by now.”
“How did you ever get laid before me?” I leaned against the table. God, he was a geek. And I kind of liked it—liked that there was a wholly unexpected, not so cool side of him that he let me see. “You can’t protect me if you’re hitting on me.”
“I’m keeping my eye on the prize,” he said. “I’ve got you in my sights. Nothing can happen to you while I’m looking at you, right?”
“Right, I guess.”
“Right. So it’s a good thing if I keep my eye on you.” He gave me the elevator eyes. “And I’ll keep my eyes on you from head to toe.”
“Do whatever you have to do,” I said, finishing off the water bottle and tossing it into a nearby trash can. “I have to get ready for the next shot.”
I’d spun on my heel to follow the crew to the next scene when Jasper’s phone rang. I paused, looking back at him over my shoulder. His face remained stoic and solid as he spoke.
“Yeah? Speaking. Yeah? How’s he doing? No kidding? Yeah, I’ll see what I can do.”
