“Save that for the interviews,” she says, spearing a piece of broccoli with her fork.
Danna’s not big on enthusiasm.
“You don’t think there’ll be any fallout if I take the part?” I ask.
“How should I know?” she asks.
“Well, you’re my agent,” I tell her. “Isn’t that part of your job?”
“That,” she says, “is most certainly not part of my job.”
“Remind me what I pay you for again?” I ask.
“I get you exposure, give you a bargaining chip, and I’m easy on the eyes,” she says. “I think any one of those is worth my fee. You people really don’t pay me enough.”
“We’re both paying you 15 percent,” I tell her. “That’s really not bad.”
“I guess,” she says, and Damian comes back to the table.
“I always get a little nervous when I leave the two of you alone to talk,” he says.
“What do you think we’re going to do?” she asks. “Do the end around and scam you out of a role—ow!”
My toes hurt a bit and I feel a little bad about kicking her, but without any calls having been made yet, I’d really like to wait before I tell Damian the news.
I wonder if we’ll celebrate tonight the way we usually do when one of us lands a hot role.
Dinner is reasonably uneventful, but Damian keeps shifting his gaze between Danna and I as he tries to figure out just what we’re up to.
“Why don’t I make that call so we can talk about this?” Danna asks.
“Fine by me,” I tell her.
“Still don’t know what you’re talking about,” Damian says.
Danna excuses herself and takes a walk outside to make her phone call, and I’m running my foot up Damian’s calf, wondering how far he’s going to let me get before he scoots back.
He doesn’t.
When I get up to his knee, I use it to slip my shoe off my foot and I give him a touch of quick, covert pleasure before I pull my foot back and kick my fallen shoe toward me.
“You know,” I tell him, “that might be a pretty long phone call.”
Damian smiles and says, “You think?”
“It’s hard to say,” I tell him. “Sometimes she’s quick like a bunny. Other times, she’s on the horn for hours trying to work out the details, but either way, I bet we could slip into the ladies’ room and back before—”
“So I talked to Chet,” Danna says, startling me as she returns to the table, “he said the role’s yours if you want it.”
“Congratulations!” Damian says.
And this is where it gets a little awkward.
“Yeah, about that,” I tell him. “Listen, I took that role you told me about by the pool.”
“You’re in?” he asks. “That’s fantastic! I’m telling you, it’s going to be a good thing, us working together.”
“That’s t