Winter Wolf Read online

  For a closed audition, there were a lot of cars parked in both the front and back parking lots of the second stage. For a small studio, Silver Moon’s property sported three stages, each one the size of a warehouse. Odder still was the number of people walking dogs; big ones, little ones, and an unusual number of dachshunds, who barked at anyone who dared to move.

  The chaos distracted me from my annoyance at my police escort. “Dominic?”

  “Yes, Nicole?”

  I waved my hand at the mayhem, not quite able to close my mouth. “Why are there a zillion dogs here?”

  Dominic’s smirk was a blend of amusement, pleasure, and something else. What, I wasn’t sure, but it put me on edge. I hated when he knew something I didn’t—and he would get pleasure out of flaunting it.

  Sometimes, I wanted to strangle him.

  “You’re not afraid of dogs, are you?” His smirk widened to a full smile.

  “I’m not afraid,” I retorted, glaring out the window at the nearest group of walkers and their animals.

  Afraid wasn’t how I’d describe my feelings. It was more complex than that. Normal dogs, like the ones swarming the movie studio, didn’t really bother me. Dogs were decent enough animals, though I found their excessive loyalty to humans annoying. The real problem was with their wild, violent brethren—although I’d lose my head if a Fenerec heard me compare them to dogs.

  “Then what’s bothering you?”

  I pointed at the nearest pack of dachshunds. I stopped counting them at fifty, and wondered what type of film needed so many small and obnoxious dogs. “Small dogs are so damned annoying. They number in the hundreds, Dominic. I’m going to go to sleep tonight and hear their yapping in my dreams.”

  Dominic laughed. “Well, don’t worry too much about that. They’re trained. From my understanding, there won’t be many scenes needing so many animals. They wanted to film all of this first to get it out of the way.”

  “This is supposed to be an audition. Why are they filming during an audition?”

  “Closed audition,” Dominic countered, winking at me. I wondered how many clients he won over with his pretty face and lithe physique. It didn’t hurt he dressed well, either.

  I lifted my chin, determined not to be distracted by his good looks. “No sane girl films without a contract in hand.”

  He parked the SUV in one of the last free spots in the lot, killed the engine, and reached over to pat my shoulder. “Don’t you worry your pretty head about a thing. You show the director you’re worth your spot and all you’ll have to do is read your contract and sign. I’ll take good care of you, don’t worry.”

  I sighed. “You always do.”

  “That’s my girl. If it makes you feel better, there will only be a few dogs sticking around for the whole film. Most are one or two day extras. I already read over the script and I think you’ll like it. From my understanding, you’ll be working with two animals most of the time. I suspect the closed audition is more for the animals than for you. If I’m right—”

  “—and you usually are,” I interrupted with a grin of my own.

  He graced me with another one of his brilliant smiles. “If I’m right, and I usually am, today will prove more of a formality than anything. I have it from a very reliable source that they want you, come hell or high water, for this role.”

  There was something nice about feeling wanted, but I wasn’t going to tell Dominic that. I hid those feelings behind a smile of my own. “It would’ve been nice to know this before I left my apartment, Dominic. I would’ve dressed up.” I grumbled for show. “You also know I have no real experience working with animals on set.”

  “You’ll be fine.”

  “So long as the packs of dire dachshunds don’t get me.”

  Dominic laughed. “You’re needed in makeup, young lady. It’ll be my head if I make you late.”

  True to his word, a girl late in her teens ran across the lot, staring at Dominic, then at me. My agent gave her a nod and she looked so relieved I felt sorry for her—probably a new intern to the studio. She opened the door of Dominic’s SUV, shyly bowing her head.

  “Good afternoon, ma’am,” the girl said, her eyes fixed on the asphalt.

  I climbed out of his SUV, chuckling at the thought of someone setting Dominic straight. Turning my attention to the girl, I smiled at her, reached out, and lifted her chin with a finger. “Chin up, young lady. Can you please go run and tell them I’m on the way to makeup?”

  “Of course. Is there anything else I can do for you? Do you want coffee?”

  Amused by her antics and behavior, I sent her off with a request for tea. Once she left, I turned to Dominic, arching an eyebrow at him. “You weren’t kidding. They have an intern for me?”

  “I told you, they want you and only you.”

  “Just what kind of film is this anyway, Dominic? Dachshunds and chihuahuas?”

  “The best kind,” he said.

  I’m not sure why I thought he was lying, but there was something about his tone that made me wonder what was wrong with my being cast in the film. But I was in no position to complain. I needed the work and we both knew it.

  “It’s fine.” Dominic patted my shoulder. “I’ll be honest—maybe you don’t mind dogs, but if another one of those rats nips at my ankles, I’ll kick it. Two of them came at me yesterday.”

  I whacked his arm with the back of my hand. “That’s not nice.”

  “Neither is getting my ankles gnawed off by a rat disguised as a dog.”

  “It’s not so bad for the rest of us. You’re too tall anyway.” Laughing at his expense, I led the way into the studio.

  ~~*~~

  I didn’t recognize anyone in the makeup room. The two women put in charge of me looked me down from head to toe. They were dressed casually enough I didn’t feel too out of place, but there was something predatory about their gazes as they inspected me. Their attire took me by surprise; normally those in makeup and wardrobe dressed as well as the talents. The older of the two, almost old enough to be my grandmother, clucked her tongue.

  “We need to do full body makeup today, so strip to your underwear, please,” she ordered, tapping her soft-bristled brush against her chin.

  Privacy was normally given by makeup and wardrobe, but my scars made me an unusual actress. While the request would have offended many in Hollywood, it was par for the course for me. It was also the part I hated the most, when the makeup and wardrobe realized there were a lot of scars they needed to hide. Some people were body shy because of their insecurities, but I hated the sympathetic hissing and the looks I got when people noticed my scars.

  There was nothing wrong with my body. There was a lot wrong with how people perceived it, though.

  Stifling a sigh, I obeyed the woman, standing with my hands braced on my hips. I was experienced enough that I wasn’t going to lose my temper over a brisk makeup artist. They had a job to do, and I gave them more work than most actresses. I had a job to do, too, and it didn’t involve starting problems with the staff.

  Other actresses probably would have tried to have the women fired for their behavior, but not me.

  “Not enough scars,” was the declaration after a long moment of silence.

  My mouth opened, but I couldn’t make a sound. I didn’t have enough scars?

  There was a first for everything.

  When I didn’t protest, the two women descended on me like a pack of hungry hyenas, cackling as they worked their magic on me. Instead of hiding my scars, they enhanced them, paling the marks stretching from shoulder and throat to stomach so they stood out against my skin.

  Then they took photographs, and lots of them.

  When they were finished, wardrobe dressed me in a pair of shorts modest for Hollywood’s standards and a pink spaghetti-strapped shirt that exposed my belly. They wrapped my calves in strips of ratty linens before stuffing my feet into combat boots.

  It was the older woman who, grinning with far too much
enthusiasm for my liking, buckled a holster complete with handgun around my hips and shoved some sort of rifle into my hand. No sooner had I wrapped my fingers around the weapon, I realized that it didn’t feel like a plastic prop. Prop guns I could handle, but the real things tended to make my skin crawl.

  Like me, guns were weapons and I couldn’t get past that fact.

  Some of my hesitance must have showed on my face, because the younger woman patted my shoulder. “Don’t worry. The safety is on and it’s loaded with blanks. Just don’t play with it or point it at anyone, okay? Justin will be in charge of your weapon for the shoot, but he was needed elsewhere for a while.”

  That didn’t comfort me at all—why would they give me a real gun at a closed audition, even if it was loaded with blanks? Especially before I had any training in its use? It went against every safety code I knew of. With nervous awareness of what I held, I made sure I kept the gun pointed away from anyone and my finger far from the trigger.

  Before I could question—or ask them for their names—I was guided out of the makeup room along with a script. I was herded onto set, juggling the rifle and the thick pad of paper.

  Someone had spent a great deal of time and effort building a scale model of some sort of power plant, which was surrounded by the ruins of a city. The burnt out, skeletal remains of skyscrapers tilted and threatened to fall. Surrounding the structure was an intricate fence, miniaturized to scale. I couldn’t help but crouch next to it, marveling at the thin wires making up the chain-linked panels.

  I’d seen labors of love in the movie business before, but never quite to the detail level of this model. I was afraid to breathe, in case the ash and dust littering the fake ground wasn’t paint.

  “Impressive, isn’t it?” an unfamiliar voice asked from beside me.

  I straightened, glanced out of the corner of my eye at him, and nodded. Judging from his jeans, utility belt, and the cables looped under the man’s arm, he was a part of the crew.

  He wasn’t much older than Scott and I wondered if they had known each other.

  I hid my discomfort behind a smile. “Sure is. With so much digital, it’s nice to see some models in use.”

  “Luck,” he said, shuffling off to the main set. Green screen was layered on the floor and hung as a backdrop, while a reproduction of part of the model and fence served as physical props.

  Dominic emerged from deeper within the studio, taking hold of my elbow as he drew near. “We’re going to be taking promotional photos, plus a screen test,” he explained, guiding me to the elevated chairs for the director and producers.

  I didn’t know the casually dressed man perched on the chair, his baseball cap on backwards and crooked. While he looked young, I got the feeling he probably knew his way around a set better than most. Age was a number, but he stared at me with old eyes. I was a little surprised the man had time to sit—most directors I knew scrambled non-stop during filming making sure everything was just right.

  “The outfit suits you,” he announced, his tone satisfied. “You ever fire a gun loaded with blanks before, ma’am?”

  Something warned me, maybe some basic instinct I didn’t know I had, that the director was as old fashioned as he sounded. Until a contract was signed and sealed, I wasn’t about to go irritating the man who controlled my fate—and placement in the film.

  Old fashioned I could handle. I nodded my head, careful to look polite without grovelling. “Thank you, sir. I’ve never shot a gun before, loaded with blanks or otherwise.”

  I think my answer satisfied him—old fashioned, traditional women didn’t handle guns. “You’ll learn, then. Dominic, I’ll call you with the name and number of an instructor. Miss Thomas, in this scene, you’ll be observing an approaching group. You’ll be accompanied by a few dogs, as well as one of your co-stars. Your job is to put her in her place. You’re the boss, and she led the enemy straight to you.” The director pulled a sheet off of his clipboard and handed it to me. “I understand you haven’t had a chance to read the script, so use this and improvise. Justin, the tall fellow with the blue shirt and ripped jeans over there, will show you how to fire the rifle if we need you shooting it today. Ask him if you have any questions. Don’t be afraid to use any force you deem necessary, even if you need to call a cut to learn how to handle the rifle properly.”

  I hid my surprise behind a nod. What kind of force he did he expect me to use? Why force? What sort of person was I supposed to be for the camera? And what sort of person would return to someone they had betrayed?

  Excitement accelerated my pulse rate. All I could do was hope my role wasn’t minor and that Dominic wasn’t getting my hopes up unnecessarily. My career was a graveyard of minor roles.

  I turned to stare at the model, trying to deduce what sort of character I played. What sort of person would set up shop at a power plant, among a bunch of ruins? Not someone soft, that’s for sure. There were no feather beds in such a place. But if I played someone who would consider accepting a betrayer back, she was a fair individual—harsh, but reasonable.

  I could act like that.

  At the director’s gesture, I stood on the set. “One more thing, Miss Thomas.”

  “Yes, sir?”

  Maybe the director had taken lessons from Dominic, but there was an unpleasant edge to his smile. “Your co-stars.”

  “Sir?”

  No one moved; everyone found something interesting to stare at—that didn’t involve me or the director.

  Interesting.

  I felt like I was walking into a trap, but I couldn’t figure out what sort it was. What was so wrong with my co-stars to get this sort of reaction from the crew?

  The director hit a button on his radio. “Bring them.”

  ‘Them’ proved to be two of the largest dogs I had ever seen. Their handler, a muscular brute of a man with dull eyes, held their leashes in a white-knuckled grip. Despite both of the animals walking at a sedate pace at their handler’s heels, those in the studio shied away from them.

  The handler looked ready to be sick all over the floor.

  I wasn’t a fan of dogs or their over-sized Fenerec cousins, but I hated the hesitant way the animals moved. The humans were afraid, but so were the dogs.

  Unable to pinpoint why it bothered me so much made me frustrated, but I couldn’t leave it alone. Slinging the rifle’s strap over my shoulder, I met the handler halfway. Without a word, I snatched the leashes, claiming responsibility for the dogs. Both animals regarded me for a moment, then as if deciding I was less likely to kick their furry butts in, they huddled around my legs, as far as they could get from their handler.

  I thought I had managed to keep from scowling, but the man saw something he didn’t like in my expression and beat a hasty retreat across the studio.

  When I turned around to head back to the set, the director looked pleased. “The gray one is named Silver. The darker one is Rocky. They’re German shepherds.”

  If Silver and Rocky were German shepherds, I was a harmless little girl with the voice of an angel. No German shepherd I had ever seen came up higher than my waist at the shoulder. Rocky was the larger of the two, leaving Silver dwarfed in comparison—and Silver was easily the equal of any mastiff I’d ever seen.

  With both of them crowding me, I felt smaller than usual.

  In front of the cameras with the two dogs at my side, I wondered if it was possible to feel any more insignificant. Yet, there was something empowering in the presence of both animals. No sane person would dream of messing with me while I was guarded by them. The director took his time, his gaze sliding over the crew. I settled in to wait, allowing myself to run my fingers through Rocky’s tan and gray fur. Their markings did look rather German shepherd in nature, although despite the tan cast to Rocky’s fur, neither had any real brown or black on them. I had thought all German shepherds had a lot dark colors.

  Maybe that was what made both of them look an awful lot like wolves—very large, tail-wagging wolv
es.

  They weren’t Fenerec; no one would ever bring someone capable of turning into a wolf onto a movie set. It was asking for humans to get eaten. Muttering under my breath about the stupidity of some people, I picked a spot on set with a good view of the fence and the scaffolding at my back.

  I was safe. I kept telling myself that in the hopes I would believe it.

  The dogs followed me without any fuss. I unclipped their leashes and tossed them to one of the production assistants.

  Every eye focused on me and more than a few faces paled.

  “Oh, come off it already,” I snapped, my raspy voice making me sound like a snarling animal. “There’s a reason people like German shepherds so much. Treat them right and they’ll treat you right. If these dogs wanted to hurt you, you’d be hurt.” To prove my point, I stared at the dogs. “Sit,” I ordered.

  They obeyed, their tails thumping the ground.

  “See? Good, obedient dogs.”

  The director dismissed the issue with a wave of his hand. “Take it from the top. Remember, the hordes will be added behind the fence on the green screen, so don’t forget them.”

  The cameras started recording, and before I could do anything, a woman staggered onto the set. So much blood covered her that I recoiled out of surprise, tightening my grip on the rifle and lifting it a little in wariness. A gun was holstered at her hip, some sort of pistol from what I could tell; it didn’t look to be in any better condition than my human co-star. Maybe it was the director’s attempt to get a natural reaction out of me, but it worked—almost too well. I didn’t quite jump out of my skin, but it was close. For a sickening moment, all I could think about was Scott. But the stuff coating the woman, matting her hair, and dripping to the green screen wasn’t real—it smelled sweet.

  And my memory of Scott’s keener senses told me I wasn’t smelling blood. It was sugar or syrup, whatever they used to make the fake blood look good for the cameras.

  It wasn’t real.

  My dismay faded under anger at having been taken by surprise. “So you’ve returned.” I growled the words, taking her in from head to toe, then staring at the fence and the oncoming horde to be added to the film later. In a drier tone, I continued, “With friends, I see.”