“I don’t know. He could have been just about anyone. Maybe I was looking for him as part of another case and he wasn’t important.”

“For someone who wasn’t important, you were sure searching the hell out of him.”

We had come up on Pear Magic and he steered the car into the driveway. “Then I guess I should figure out why.”

7

WHEN I WAS a kid, and I used to follow Dad around on his shoots, I went to lots of the studios. None of the huge ones, of course. But plenty of little ones like Pear Magic, which were generally pretty underwhelming. A few warehouse-looking buildings crammed with people and props and cameras and pouty actresses who ordered my dad around like he was their dog. And some doughy guy eating cookies in a tiny “security” building at the head of the driveway, acting like he could do something if you wanted to bust your way inside. One time, when I was fourteen, one of the security guys at a studio I can’t even remember the name of tried to kiss me when I was hauling one of Dad’s anvil-like camera bags through the parking lot. Even though he was kind of cute in a completely unkempt way, I was still skeeved out and elbowed him in the ribs to let him know I wasn’t into older guys with neck beards. I tried not to go to too many studios after that.

Chris inched his car up to the security hut and rolled down his window. An impossibly short guard with a buzz cut ambled to the car, one thumb tucked into his waistband like he was some sort of Old West gunslinger.

“Help you?”

“Celeste on set today?” Chris asked.

The guard frowned, tapping his finger against the front of his pants just under the waistband. “She expecting you?”

Chris opened his mouth, and my world exploded with yellow. If I let him talk, he was going to blow everything. I lunged across the seat so the guard could see me.

“I’m late. Sorry,” I blurted. Chris and the guard looked at me with equal amounts of surprise. I had to come up with something, fast. I tried not to think about it too hard. “Makeup?” I said, miming brushing something onto my cheeks. “I’m her makeup artist.”

“I thought Jayelle was—” the guard started, but I shook my head to cut him off.

“Something about a situation at home? I don’t know. The agency sent me to take her spot.”

“And you are . . . ?” the guard asked Chris. I could see the back of Chris’s neck instantly redden.