John needed to get to work. Everyone was either taking notes furiously, stunned by the amount of work, or staring into space, stunned by the amount of work.

“Ultimately, the movie is going to belong to the studio, not anyone in this room,” Anna said. “How good it’s going to look will depend on the CGI budget. Whether it makes sense will depend on the editor. Whether anyone buys a ticket will depend on the marketing. The only thing we have control over is the next four weeks. At the end of the day, this is a straight-to-video B movie about the leader of a vampire coven, his lost love, and his immortal enemy who wants to take him down, but no one is exactly sure why—”

“I fixed that,” Jenny interjected.

“It’s quite good, actually,” Reed said.

If Reed was going to compliment Jenny every time she did something right, they would be there all day.

“The next four weeks are ours,” Anna said. “Let’s make them as bearable as possible when the inevitable hurdles come up, and we can leave knowing we did our job.”

She got a few muted nods of assent.

“Let’s begin.”

The group turned to the first page, and they got to work.

Anna ran the read-through efficiently. She and Jenny allowed input, but if they didn’t agree with an idea, they politely moved on. Anna had created an atmosphere where they all acknowledged this movie wasn’t going to win any awards, but it was their job to do their best and get it done. The actors left to learn their new lines, the crew had specific instructions for the next day’s set, and there was the promise of decent food. The group dispersed. It had been a productive three hours, mostly because Anna had built a tentative camaraderie between the cast and crew.

John stared at the script in his hands. He had a ton of work to do. He glanced at Anna. She fit right in with this group of misfit actors and crew members, just like she’d fit in at the bar, sitting in the booth and arguing about movies.

Anna had done a lot of work in the past forty-eight hours to make this shoot run as smoothly as possible.

John let out a breath. They were going to be working closely together for the next four weeks. He needed to apologize for being so rude to her at the party and admit he knew who she was all along.

He pulled out his laptop and worked on the shooting schedule until Anna was alone. He stood and walked over to her. She tensed as he approached.

“Are you sure you’re up for this?” Anna asked.

“I told you I’ve AD’d before.” He clenched his jaw. “This ridiculous movie is not a problem.”

Anna stiffened. “You aren’t going to say anything, are you?”

“About what?”