He sighed. “Weight of the world. Wasn’t your hair pink yesterday?”

“Fuchsia. And that was then. What do you want?”

“Tina sent me in to see if they . . .” A nod toward the closed bull pen door. “. . . have spit out something like the final rewrite of next week’s script.”

“You’re in luck.” She lifted a file folder off the stack of assorted papers on the floor beside her desk and handed it over. “Hot off the press. I’d have sent it in with Veronica, but she’s dropping a deposit for our next location shoot off at the city manager’s office. And then getting coffee.”

“What’s wrong with the pot in the kitchen?”

“The writers emptied it again. What do you mean, ‘weight of the world’?”

“Things on my mind.”

“Like?”

“I don’t remember.”

“You need more B vitamins.”

“I need . . .” He stopped, ran a hand up through his hair, and exhaled explosively. “I need to get back on set.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Before something happens.”

“What?”

“That’s the part you didn’t say. Before something happens. What’s going to happen?”

“Answer the phone.”

“It’s not . . .” The ring cut her off. “How did you . . . ?”

Tony shrugged, turned, and headed out of the office, the familiar “CB Productions” sounding behind him. A no brainer on the phone ringing since it rang every thirty seconds eight to ten hours a day.

Before something happens.

He had no fucking idea what Amy was talking about. All that dye was obviously affecting higher brain functions.

The red light went off as he passed the women’s washroom and the sound of flushing followed him out onto the soundstage. The living room set for the whatever-the-hell-they-decided-to-call-it estate looked incredible even though it was the same old furniture from Raymond Dark’s living room, jazzed up with a couple of cushions, a blue-and-yellow sheet, and some duct tape. One of the electricians was already sound asleep on the couch. Had Peter called lunch? Tony checked his watch, the movement dumping papers out of the file and all over the floor.

“Son of a fucking bitch.”

It had just been that kind of a day. Nothing had gone right from the moment he’d woken up in Henry’s condo. Between the whole déjà vu of that and the forgotten toast problem with his memory, he hadn’t been able to concentrate on anything. Fortunately, they were killing Catherine this morning and once Nikki’s replacement had been safely delivered to the set, he didn’t have a lot to do.

Dropping to his knees, he started gathering up the papers.

One of them had slid almost to the edge of the fake hardwood floor. He stretched out his hand and froze as a line of shadow crossed the piece of paper and was gone. His heart started beating again as he realized the sleeping electrician’s boot had moved for a moment into the light. Boot shadow. That was all.

Given the variety of lights in play, the soundstage was filled with unexpected shadows.