Evie
The Recast
Me: Raissa, this is Evie. Tell Dante I have to go. I won’t be filming anymore
Raissa: What?
Me: this week. Sorry, hit send early. I’ve got to go.
With shaky hands, I turned off the cheap burner phone I’d bought on the way to the airport and shoved it into my pocket.
They’d warned me about being tracked.
I stared ahead, watching people come and go through the lobby. I pressed my lips together, trying to hold in my fear and emotions.
The video I’d been sent hours ago had rattled me to the core. My hands were still shaking from the initial text, and my heart rate refused to slow. Someone had kidnapped Antoinette. They’d tied her to a chair and gagged her with a handkerchief. I’d watched the video a dozen times, memorizing everything I could about the brick background, the noises the floor made, and the lighting coming from the windows.
“This industry only works if everyone falls in line. We have been given no choice but to teach those who need it a lesson. If you don’t learn your place, this will end in a bloodbath.”
Following the video came a text message with an address in Detroit, along with a timer for ten hours.
I’d already burned two just getting here and waiting.
There was a chance that following the sender’s instructions—to come alone and leave my phone at home—would get me killed too, but I couldn’t ignore the video. Antoinette had been taken, and if I were lucky, she’d be alive when I found her.
And if I wasn’t lucky…then I hoped they’d bury us together.
ANTOINETTE’S BODY HADbeen left tied up and slumped in a chair in an old, abandoned restaurant. I’d slowly walked over, although it was obvious from the hole in her temple, the blood on the walls and down her body, that she was dead.
This will end in a bloodbath.
I untied Antoinette and used all my strength to drag her body out. Adrenaline powered me, and once we were out, I dropped to the sidewalk and sobbed, holding her body to my chest. Antoinette had been more than just an agent. She was my friend. She’d helped me start my career and encouraged me to come back to Hollywood. To sit there with her body, waiting for the police to come, it rivaled the pain of the day my mom died.
I screamed, I sobbed, I fought for air as I clutched her to my chest, soaking her hair with my tears. It was as if I’d been torn in two, my entire heart shredded, as the realization that she was gone, and it was my fault hit me, wave after wave, harder and harder each time. With each moment that passed while I waited for the disinterested police to show, the pain grew. The anger grew.
How could they take so long? She was human. Antoinette did nothing but shine light out into the world, and when flashing lights finally came and they pulled her body from my arms, my grief shifted to fury.
“Well, I doubt we’ll find much. There’re no cameras in this area, and she’s been dead a while.”
They weren’t even going to look. I knew how people like this worked. They didn’t care because they knew it was too dangerous to go digging. It was what happened to my mother. No one dared investigate deeper, because they knew whatever they found wouldn’t be worth their own lives.
That’s what separated them from me. I didn’t care. I was going to get my revenge. But now, it was more than Lita Reyes. I was doing it for Antoinette as well.
“Would you like a ride, miss?” An officer asked. I turned to him, stone faced, and nodded at the ambulance taking my friend away, covered in a sheet. He saw my pained expression and attempted to offer sympathy. “There’s nothing you can do for her.”
Oh, I could think of a few things.
RETURNING HOME Aweek later, I turned my phone on. It had died while I was away. I felt numb. One day, we were making deals and talking about the future. The next, I had been sent a clip of her snuff video and an address to retrieve her body. I found out later that day that I’d only seen the first half of the video. The full-length version had been sent to news outlets, where, right after the man gave his speech, he put the gun to her head and pulled the trigger.
They’d never intended to let me save her. They’d been trying to draw me out, and it had worked. I was lucky to be alive, having left everything behind the way I did—with no phone and without telling anyone where I was going. But I didn’t feel all that fortunate.
Once the phone powered on, it pinged for almost three minutes straight with notifications. I’d expected this, as I’d dropped everything right in the middle of filming the biggest horror movie of the year with no notice or explanation. I was sure they’d gotten word of Antoinette’s murder by now. It was everywhere. The flowers on my doorstep confirmed it.
The dings eventually stopped, and I picked up the phone to sort through them all. I gave up a moment later, feeling so overwhelmed by the names, numbers, and messages on the screen. Setting an alarm, I lay down in bed and decided to show up to the studio tomorrow morning and hope I could plead for my job back.
Even though I fell asleep the instant my head hit the pillows, my alarm came too soon. I pulled myself up and almost fell back down. I ached from a week’s worth of tears and strain on my brain and body.
I braced myself for the looks of pity and awkward apologies for my loss on my way to set, but there weren’t as many as I’d been prepared for. Instead, there were a lot of confused stares. I reached my trailer and stopped short when I saw a dent in the door.What the hell?
