1
NATE GLANCED UP FROM THE SCRIPT,and nearly choked on his ham sandwich.
“Careful there, hun.” The set hairdresser, Frankie, patted him on the back and then placed a manicured hand on Nate’s shoulder. “Can’t have our leading man keeling over before we even start shooting.”
Swallowing the rest of his mouthful, Nate leaned back in the makeup chair and allowed Frankie to continue fussing with his hair, preparing him for the first day of filmingSt. Barnes Medical:a historical miniseries based around Doctor Raynard—a fictional character, and in Nate’s opinion, a jerk.
“Just thought I saw someone from my…past,” Nate said, glancing at the now empty spot in the hallway of the old Rangiora Hospital where she’d been standing only seconds before. His body pulsed with a confused mix of rage and desire, neither of which he’d felt in weeks.
Was he imagining things?
The long raven hair. The hourglass curves hugged by a tight black dress, revealing her endless legs. That familiar way she’d stood in her heels: rounded hips tilted to one side, talking with her hands.
She’d been facing away from him, but she was undeniably his ex. Did she follow him all the way here from London to rural New Zealand?
“Seeing ghosts, Nate Mitchell?” Frankie teased. “Who said you could start drinking without me?”
Nate shook his head, trying to clear it of ridiculous visions. No, it couldn’t be her.
“I’d never dream of it,” he said, attempting a laugh, but the image of his ex, standing only metres away, was unsettling. Surely, there was some other explanation. “You didn’t hear anything about a new hire on set?” Nate asked.
Frankie stopped fussing with Nate’s unruly dark waves and tapped a thin comb to his cheek. “There was something about a midwife at the production meeting… Not an actress, so I tuned out to be honest, sorry, hun. I’m just here for the hair.”
The cast and crew had spent three long days together, getting oriented to the set and running lines; he’d met all of them. The director must have hired a consultant. Although the woman in the figure-hugging outfit, with shiny black hair tumbling almost to her waist, looked more like a Hollywood starlet than a midwife.
“Fair call. I’d heard talk of a midwife consulting on set.” A little unnecessary, he thought. He’d read the script, and the writers had managed just fine with the historical and medical aspects of the show.
“That’s our Laney. Every little detail covered. She has ‘A Vision’ forSt. Barnes Medical,don’t you know?” Frankie winked playfully at him in the mirror, before frowning at a misbehaving strand of hair on Nate’s head. “More importantly, who do I have to flirt with to get decent hair product around here?”
Nate watched the hairdresser work in silence, but couldn’t help wondering about the woman he saw. Could she be the midwife Laney hired? He’d assumed a consultant would be older. The woman he’d seen in her tight nightclub outfit couldn’t be over thirty. What would she know about medicine in the 1950s?
Though, he could respect attention to detail, and it wasn’t his business who the director hired. For this job, he was an actor, and he planned to stay firmly in his lane. Head down. Do what you’re paid for. No responsibilities, except delivering his lines each day and then drinking in the small-town pub with Frankie and the crew afterwards. If the director felt the need to check every medical detail for accuracy, that was nothing to do with him.
“You’re gorgeous.” Frankie flicked the last strand of hair in place before suffocating him with half a can of hairspray. “All ready for lights, camera, action?”
“Ready as I can be.” His stomach clenched with nerves for the first time since he’d arrived on set. Distraction was the last thing he needed today, but the memory of his ex’s face insisted on flashing through his mind: specifically the shocked expression she’d had on it the last time he’d seen her, caught with her skirt high around those curvy hips, long legs wrapped around his old school friend.
Focus.He swallowed the last mouthful of ham sandwich, careful not to ruin his makeup, and stared into the mirror, trying to compose himself. A manicured-twin stared back at him.
His on-camera look would take a while to get used to again. It was more subtle than the greasy theatre makeup he’d been forced to wear in his late teens when his one and only stage role inFootlooseleft him with bad skin for weeks. Screen acting had proved much kinder to his pores, but the makeup artist stillspent a good 40-minutes over Nate’s already smooth olive skin, fussing with brushes and sponges until even the smallest flaw vanished.
Nate’s naturally thick black lashes had to be thicker, each hair in his eyebrows forced into submission, darkened and shaped to give him a brooding, sexy gaze, according to Frankie. He hoped he could pull it off. Brooding and sexy weren’t exactly words he’d ever used to describe himself before. Lately he’d leaned toward adjectives such as intellectual or serious, boring maybe. Perhaps he was being too hard on himself with that last one. At least doing this show was slightly less boring and serious.
It was certainly unexpected.
He’d spent years of his childhood and teens cast in a long-running daytime soap opera, but as an adult, being back on set felt out of character. He’d thought he’d left his acting days behind him. But wasn’t being out of character exactly what attracted him back? He could shake off his life and pretend to be someone else for a while. Pretend to be the younger, more free-spirited version of himself. The person who’d seen the world as exciting and made time for fun. Could he even be that person anymore?
Nate breathed out slowly at the highly groomed T.V. doctor staring back at him. He hardly recognised this smoothed-out version of himself. Although that didn’t surprise him. He hardly recognised his life at all now.
2
JESS SIGNED THE CONTRACTand placed the pen down on the foldout table, wondering for the hundredth time if agreeing to be a medical consultant on a film set was a good idea.
The director waited beside her, and Jess handed over the signed contract, plastering on her best full-beam smile.
“Looking forward to it.”
It was half a lie. When her manager begged her to fill in as a midwifery consultant at the last minute, she’d agreed, but that didn’t mean she was fully comfortable with it. She hated leaving her mums and babies, and she had a serious case of imposter syndrome about how useful she’d be as a consultant. On the other hand, the buzzy atmosphere on set, with people rushing around carting film equipment, setting up cameras and rearranging lights, was catchy.
