Cast to be Mine (The Billionaire Legacy #8)

Chapter 1

GRACE

I’d left my apartment in North Hollywood at eight fifteen my ten thirty audition in Studio City, five miles away. Normally a five-minute drive. In Los Angeles, that meant thirty minutes on a good day.

On days like today, it would take me an hour, which was fine. I’d have plenty of time to sit in the waiting room and rehearse my nine pages of dialogue back to front until they called my name. I had to get this part.

The woman in the lane beside me had been stationary long enough to pull out her book. I leaned forward in my seat so I could get a look at the cover. A black and blue skull and sprayed edges.

“Naughty, naughty,” I laughed.

I’d finished it last week. It still lived rent free in my head. And by “it,” I meant the male lead. Maybe one day all us romance girlies would get to see him on the big screen.

On my other side was a man in a Mercedes eating a burrito with his AC blowing so hard it ruffled the red and white checked wrapper around his meal. Los Angeles commuters. You could fight the game or just figure out how to accept it and make the most of your commute.

I leaned to the left, bonking my head against the window. I could see the emergency lights up ahead. An accident. There was always an accident.

My phone rang through the Bluetooth, cutting off the podcast I’d been listening to.

My agent.

“Hi, Loretta,” I answered.

“Tell me you’re not doing the breathing thing,” Loretta said, her voice rattling out of speakers.

I turned down the sound. “I wasn’t, but maybe I should.” I inhaled loudly through my nose to taunt her and exhaled forcefully. “I feel better already.”

“You didn’t over-practice, did you?”

“No,” I said, perhaps a little too quickly.

I had to walk it back. I could feel Loretta’s red flag popping up.

“I practiced just the right amount. I had to make sure I had the delivery of my final lines down to a science.” The car in front of me inched forward, and I shimmied along through traffic behind them.

“I told you not to do that,” she sighed. “It’s better to be a little raw. You don’t want to sound too rehearsed. The best performances are the ones that don’t feel like performances.”

“I don’t want to sound unrehearsed,” I replied. “This is a Jack Montana movie. I can’t just show up, bat my eyelashes, and shake my ass. I want to be an actress they take seriously. I can’t just be a pretty face. I’m not going for Bond Girl. I don’t want to be typecast on my first big role.”

“I didn’t say you were just a pretty face.”

“How many people are auditioning for this part?”

“Do you really want me to tell you?”

“No.”

I wanted the damn part. With a star like Jack Montana on the movie posters and media circuits, it was guaranteed to be a box office hit.

It wasn’t just some shoot ‘em up movie, either. This was a thriller with grit, clever writing, and a working title that might have been a bit generic but would hopefully be memorable. Breathless. I needed something big. Something to put me on the map. People like me had a resume that fit on an index card. I’d played a corpse on a procedural.

My biggest role yet was a barista with a secret on a medical drama, and the secret was never revealed, because the show got canceled.

“You’re going to do great,” Loretta said. “You’re a natural. This part is perfect for you. Sassy, sexy, and smart. So you.”

“Thanks. You’re a good hype-woman.”

“I’m your agent. Don’t go in there looking like this is your first audition. You don’t need the role. They need you. Be chill but also serious.”

I rolled my eyes and inched my car forward. “Not a contradiction at all.”

“Give me your lines,” she said. “Just like you’re going to deliver them.”

“No!” I looked around at the other drivers all lost in their own thing. “People will think I’m nuts.”

“You’re talking now,” she reminded me. “And everyone in LA is nuts. It’s fine.”

“But I have to deliver my lines with pizazz.” I wiggled my fingers over the steering wheel, the tiniest jazz hands I’d ever done.

“Say it.”

I groaned and did what she asked.

After I was done, I glanced at the screen to make sure the call was still connected.

“Loretta?”

“That,” she said. “That’s the whole reason I took you on and it’s the whole reason I haven’t dropped you even though you are, and I say this with love, the most stubborn client on my list. That was damn good. That was the fire they want to see.”

The brake lights ahead flickered. Somewhere in the wall of cars a horn sounded. We moved again, the right lane flowing. The temptation would be to push my way into that lane, but I knew better. They’d be at a standstill soon and I’d cruise on by.

“They put everybody on tape, right?” I asked.

“Every single read, and the director watches every single tape personally, which I know sounds terrifying, but it’s actually the good news. It means it’s not about who had the best blowout. It’s about what’s in your eyes.”

I pushed up my sunglasses and looked at my eyes in the rearview mirror. Did I have the right eyes? I didn’t know what eyes the director was looking for. Should I have put on more eyeliner? Less? Shit.

“Why didn’t you tell me he’d be looking at my eyes?” I muttered.

“They always look at the eyes,” she said.

“Great. Something else to obsess over.”

“You know…”

“Don’t,” I warned. “Don’t say it.”

“You don’t even know what I was going to say.”

“You were going to say the thing you say every audition. And the answer is the same as it’s been every other time.”

“All I’m saying is, if you’d let me put your real name on the submissions, you’d be the leading lady.

You have the talent. You just need a door to open.

The Sterling name does that. It doesn’t get you the role but opens the doors.

Lists get shorter. Rooms get bigger. Callbacks happen.

It’s not cheating, it’s marketing. Your father spent thirty years building that name.

It’s sitting there like a key to a house you already own and you won’t use it out of spite. ”

“It’s not spite.”

“Out of principle, then, fine, but principle doesn’t pay your rent. Principles don’t make you a co-star with Jack Montana.”

“We’ve been over this,” I said on a long sigh. “If I walk into a room as Grace Sterling, I never know why I’m really in that room. I want to know if I got it because I’m good or because I’m Gordon Sterling’s daughter. If I use his name, I’ll never really know.”

“Grace, you’re talented but this business is all about who you know.

I hate to admit it, but some of those young men and women waiting tables are better actors than half the A-listers, but no one will ever see them on the big screen because they don’t have connections. You have talent and connections.”

“I need to do this myself, Loretta. On my own merit. As Grace Stone.”

She was quiet for a moment. The traffic inched forward again. I could see the tow truck now, pulling a crumpled sedan onto its flatbed.

“You’re making my life a lot more difficult,” she finally said, but there was warmth in her voice. “But I get it. I do. And look, if you land this role and do a good job—which you will—other offers will come rolling in. And it will have nothing to do with your father.”

“That’s the plan.”

“Just promise me you’ll go in there and be yourself. The prepared version of yourself, not the over-prepared robot version.”

“I promise.” I glanced at the clock on my dashboard. Nine forty. Still plenty of time if this mess cleared up soon.

“And, Grace? One more thing.”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t think about your eyes. Your eyes are gorgeous. They photograph beautifully. That’s not something you need to manufacture. It’s already there.”

I felt my throat tighten a little. Loretta knew exactly when to deliver the pep talk and when to back off.

“Thanks, Loretta.”

“Go get ’em, kid. Call me after.”

The line went dead and the podcast resumed. I turned it off, preferring the silence. The traffic finally began to move at something resembling normal speed as we passed the accident site. I merged left, heading toward my exit.

I pulled into the parking structure, checked my makeup in the visor mirror and gave myself one last pep talk before heading inside.

The building was one of those nondescript Studio City offices that could have housed anything. A small placard by the door listed the casting company on the third floor.

My heels clicked against the tile as I crossed the lobby.

The elevator took forever. I watched the numbers light up one by one, my reflection staring back at me in the polished doors.

The black pantsuit looked good. Professional.

Powerful. I’d paired it with a silk blouse underneath, nothing too revealing, and yes, the Louboutin’s.

If I was going to play a CEO, I needed to look like one.

The elevator dinged and I stepped inside, pressing three.

When the doors opened again, I stepped into a small waiting area packed with women.

At least a dozen of them, maybe more. Some were scrolling through their phones, others were running lines under their breath, and a few just stared straight ahead.

Perhaps their nerves were as fried as mine, and disassociating had become a survival strategy.

I offered smiles at a few who bothered to look up, but none smiled back.

I approached the reception desk where a young man sat with perfectly styled hair and the welcoming presence of a rock.

“Name?”

“Grace Stone. I’m here for Breathless.”

He scanned his clipboard, found my name, and made a check mark. “Have a seat. We’re running fifteen minutes behind. Someone will call you when it’s your turn.”

“Thanks.”

I turned to survey the room. Every chair along the wall was occupied. I spotted an empty seat near the end and made my way over, trying not to make eye contact with anyone. That was the trick in these situations—be friendly but not desperate, confident but not cocky.

I studied the pictures covering the walls like proud grandparents showing off their kids. Headshots of those that had come before me and made it big all looked down at the rest of us.

I sat down between a redhead who was furiously typing on her phone and a woman whose outfit made me do a double take.

She wore a dress that barely covered anything, sky-high platforms, and enough makeup for a night at a club.

I tried not to stare, but I couldn’t help it.

We were auditioning for the role of a tech CEO.

A powerful, intelligent woman running a billion-dollar company.

And she looked like she was headed to work the Sunset Strip.

Maybe I’d misread the character. Maybe they wanted someone unexpected, someone who defied stereotypes. I glanced down at my own outfit and suddenly felt overdressed. Or was I perfectly dressed and everyone else had it wrong? Maybe I shouldn’t have approached it all so literally.

Stop it, Grace. You made your choice. Own it.

“Guess who’s in there,” the redhead whispered.

I blinked, surprised she was talking to me. “Who?”

“Cami Carlysle. You know, from that vampire show? She went in twenty minutes ago and hasn’t come out yet. Either she’s nailing it or they’re making her do it over and over.”

I didn’t know if that was supposed to make me feel better or worse.

Across from us, a brunette with sharp features and an even sharper gaze looked up from her script. I focused on her eyes. Not good eyes. Sinister. Calculating. Was that the look they wanted?

“They’re seeing everyone for three minutes max,” the brunette said in a hushed voice. “If she’s been in there for twenty, she’s already got the part and they’re doing screen tests.”

The waiting was always the worst part. The actual audition would be over in minutes, but this slow torture of sitting and wondering and comparing myself to every other woman in the room—this could last hours.

“She’s just trying to psych everyone out,” Redhead said.

“Is it working?”

“A little,” she admitted with a small laugh.

I couldn’t stop looking at all the eyeballs in the room, not after what Loretta had said. Did they have the right eyes? Did I?

“Grace Stone?”

My head snapped up. A woman with a clipboard stood in the doorway, scanning the room.

Wait. Already? I glanced at my phone. I’d only been sitting here for five minutes.

“That’s me,” I said, standing up too quickly. I teetered on the five-inch heels. I’d been born in heels according to my mother. I never teetered.

Today, I did.

Great.

So much for looking confident and professional.

“They’re ready for you,” she said, opening a door.

I took a deep breath, channeled every ounce of CEO energy I had, and stepped inside.