Acting Brave (Fenbrook Academy #3)

by Helena Newbury

  Upstairs, the first thing I saw was a huge banner for Foxtrot Company, the smash-hit war series Dixon had produced the year before. I could actually feel the wave of dread silence sweep across the room when I stepped out of the elevator. Every face read, is it me? Has she come for me?

  “Do you have an….” I pretended to consult my notebook, like they did on TV, “A.K. Dixon working here, ma’am?”

  The receptionist looked toward a glass-walled corner office where a dark-haired man was working. “Yes,” she squeaked, reaching for the phone. “I’ll let him know you’re here.”

  I wanted the element of surprise. This would only work if he was off guard. So I marched straight over to the corner office and threw open the door. “Dixon?” I asked, making it a snarl.

  He looked up. He was only in his mid-thirties and, with his dark hair all loose and tousled and his shirt and jeans, he looked more like one of the young creatives in the main office than an industry power player. But the trophy case behind him, packed with Emmys, told me I had my man. “Yes?”

  Four big, cop-sized paces took me to his desk. “Stand up, sir.” Cops always said sir, especially when they were angry.

  He got to his feet, looking slightly nervous, now. He glanced around at the rest of the office. I didn’t turn around to look but I knew that everyone would be watching through the glass walls. “What’s this about?” he asked. His eyes narrowed. “Does security know you’re here?”

  He reached for the phone. That was one thing I couldn’t let him do. This whole thing could get out of control very quickly...if it hadn’t already.

  “Hands where I can see them!” I yelled, one hand going to the butt of my nightstick.

  Dixon snatched his hand back from the phone and then put both hands over his head. Holy shit! This really works!

  “Mr. Dixon”—I had a feeling I was meant to say his full name, but I had no idea what the “A” stood for—”I’m arresting you on suspicion of”—argh! What am I arresting him for?! Think! Think!—”possession of narcotics.”

  “That’s ridiculous!” he said, sounding genuinely shocked.

  “Hands on the desk,” I told him, coming around to his side. He did as he was told, bending at the waist and planting his hands on the wood. I kicked his feet apart and started frisking him. “You have the right to remain silent!” I told him, snapping the words out. “You have the right to an attorney!” What now? Handcuffs! I grabbed them from their belt pouch, pulled Dixon’s hands behind him, and tried to slap the cuffs on him smoothly, like they did on TV. It wasn’t as easy as it looked, but I got it in the end.

  I let Dixon straighten up. His whole demeanor had changed. He was sweating, his wrists pulling nervously at the cuffs, his eyes searching for a way out.

  It was time.

  “Now we can do this the hard way or the easy way,” I told him. “I can take you downtown and put you in an interrogation room with my partner—”

  He gulped.

  “Or...you can give me a part in your show.”

  The words didn’t sink in immediately. He blinked at me three times before he got it.

  “You’re not really a cop?” he asked disbelievingly.

  I dropped the aggressive cop voice. “Nope. Jasmine Kane. I’m from Fenbrook Academy. Final year. I missed the casting this morning.”

  His mouth opened and closed a few times, his face reddening. “Are...you...insane?!” he finally yelled. “You impersonate a police officer and walk in here and—” His wrists jerked at his cuffs, the chain jangling merrily. “Are you insane?” he asked again.

  This is where he calls the real cops, I thought. This is where Sierra and I get the book thrown at us and I never act again.

  “It worked,” I told him. “Didn’t it? You believed it.”

  His eyes were bugging out. “I—But—this isn’t how you audition!” He stared at me. “Have you any idea how many laws you’ve broken?! You put me in handcuffs! In front of—” He tried to indicate the office around him.

  I was desperate, now. “I’m sorry! I know! But I missed you at Fenbrook and this was my only chance. I’m perfect for this. This is all I’ve dreamed about for three years. Please give me a chance!”

  He shook his head, backing away from me. “This is crazy. I’m calling security.” And, with some difficulty, he pressed a button on his desk phone with his handcuffed hands.

  Shit! I could feel my stomach shrinking down to a tight, cold knot of fear. I was going to get kicked out…maybe arrested. Sierra was going to get suspended. I had no way to pay my rent, now that I’d given her the $500. “Mr. Dixon, please!”

  He just shook his head again and dialed a three-digit number. He had it on speakerphone and I heard it start to ring at the other end.

  I looked toward the door. Should I run? Was there any point? They’d catch me in the lobby. Shit! How had this gone so badly wrong?!

  “Security,” said a voice from the phone.

  I closed my eyes and waited for Dixon to seal my fate. Several seconds passed. I opened my eyes and he was staring right at me. Furious…but considering.

  “Security?” the voice said. “Hello?”

  Dixon kept on staring at me. And then he pressed a button and the phone went dead. He took a long, shuddering breath. “You better be one amazing actress, Jasmine,” he said.

  I swallowed, barely daring to hope. “I am!”

  “You get one shot,” he warned.

  “That’s all I want!”

  He took a deep breath and then nodded. “Okay. Okay, I’m probably going to regret this, but...I’ll put you in the screen test. We’re doing one big one for everyone next week. I’ll see how you are in a scene, and how you mesh with the rest of the cast.”

  My heart soared. “I won’t let you down! I swear!”

  “You’d better not. Now please: get these cuffs off me?”

  He turned around and I started fiddling with the cuffs. After a few moments, he asked, “What are you doing?”

  “I don’t understand,” I said. “There’s normally a little lever you press….”

  There was a long pause. When he spoke, he kept his voice carefully neutral.

  “I think what you’re describing are sex shop handcuffs,” he said. “Real ones don’t have a quick-release lever. You need the key.”

  I felt my face go beet red. Yes, that was exactly what I’d been basing my experience on. I said nothing and looked on the belt for the key.

  And looked.

  And looked.

  Dixon broke the silence. “Please, in the name of all that is holy, tell me you haven’t just locked me in handcuffs you don’t have the key for.”

  “No,” I said quickly. “I have it. It’s on this belt somewhere. I just...don’t know where.”

  There was another silence. It was exactly long enough for Dixon to have counted to ten in his head.

  “Jasmine,” he said. “I have a feeling your screen test is either going to go very, very right or very, very wrong.”

  ***

  Ten minutes later, I’d rushed down to the street so that Sierra could show me where the key was located, dashed back up to free Dixon, returned back down to swap outfits with Sierra so she could get back to her beat and finally trudged back up to Dixon’s office.

  “Would you like a glass of water?” asked Dixon, looking at my panting, reddened face.

  “Yes...please…” I managed. I need to start going jogging with Clarissa.

  He passed me a cool glass of water and I glugged it down gratefully.

  “Okay,” he said. “The show.”

  He explained that the show - Blue & Red - was going to be a drama series following the lives and loves of a group of cops, ranging from rookies to old hands. There’d be breaking down doors and chases and arrests, but also affairs and rivalry and even some sex. He was going for a gritty, realistic feel. “I’ll need you to really get into the mindset of being a cop,” he told me. Really become one of them.”

&nb
sp; Playing a cop was my dream role. But become one of them? Old habits die hard. I’d spent too many years tensing up whenever I saw a cop

  Something must have shown in my expression because he asked, “That isn’t a problem for you, is it?”

  “Of course not!” I said quickly. And I told myself I was being an idiot. He just wanted me to make it realistic. Fine. I could do that. It was still just acting.

  “The part I want you for is Isabel O’Mara, a rookie cop fresh out of the academy,” he said.

  O’Mara. I could do Irish. I sure as hell had the hair for it. And then my stomach tightened as I thought about my auburn locks and their origins.

  “She’s young, shy, a little naive,” said Dixon. “But she also has a big heart. She falls for a cop and they have an on/off relationship throughout the first series. In fact, you two are the big romantic interest.”

  Romantic? I could do romantic! “Sounds great!” It was looking like my crazy plan might actually pay off. I just hoped I’d hit it off with the actor playing my love interest.

  Chapter 7

  Ryan

  I was a different person.

  I remembered Ryan, that guy I used to be. I remembered the way he used to laugh and joke and get drunk and sing too loudly in the local cop bar. I remembered him falling hard for a beautiful woman named Jasmine he could never have.

  But that guy wasn’t there anymore.

  When I looked at myself in the mirror each morning, it felt as if I was looking at someone else. As if I was inhabiting another body, an empty shell I could operate like a puppet to fool all the normal people. Their bodies still had personalities inside. All I had was anger.

  It would hit me out of nowhere, the slightest thing—even something innocent—setting it off. It was like when you turn the faucet the wrong way, and instead of the trickle you expected you get a blasting torrent. And when it happened, I couldn’t shut it off.

  They’d offered me counseling, of course. They were all about counseling, in the first week after it happened. And I don’t doubt the woman they sent me to was the best, but counseling only works if you participate. Day after day, I’d sat there in silence. I couldn’t put into words what I’d seen and heard. A man—a man with a wife, with kids—transformed into a cold mound of flesh on the ground by my own stupidity. The word I focused on most was if.

  If I’d gone into the house ahead of him.

  If I hadn’t answered the call when it wasn’t even close to us.

  If I hadn’t been hounding Jasmine in the first place.

  The counselor asked me if I’d had any troubling thoughts. When I asked what that meant, she asked if I was suicidal.

  I lied and said no.

  In truth, I couldn’t think of a fair way of doing it. What I really wanted was to bash my head against a wall until I stopped thinking anymore, but that would be an escape and I didn’t deserve escape. I deserved to suffer for all time.

  Hux made sure of that. I mean, not in a cruel way. It wasn’t like he was haunting me out of malice. He was just there, looking over my shoulder at everything I did and offering comment. I wasn’t sure whether I was being full-on supernatural haunted, or just hearing voices and cracking up. I wasn’t sure which explanation would be worse.

  So I kept going, the anger rising and falling inside me but never disappearing. I kept it caged, most of the time, so in retaliation it tore up whatever was left inside me. A month after Hux died, I was the walking dead, just a shell with the hot, black, twisting anger coiled inside, ready to strike at whoever was unlucky enough to set me off.

  ***

  I was parked up on the street, engine off. In theory, I was supposed to be taking a statement from some jeweler who claimed he’d seen suspicious characters hanging around. It wasn’t the first time I’d been out to him, and I knew that the reason for his suspicion was down to the color of their skin.

  I’d been there ten minutes, though, and hadn’t gone inside. All my attention was focused on a sign way, way down the street, so far away that the white and the orange and the pink blended into a blur, and you could only discern what it was if you already knew.

  It was Dunkin’ Donuts. The same one I’d bought Hux the donuts from that day.

  That’s all it took. I was back there, on that warm afternoon, horsing around with Hux outside the house. Watching him climb the steps one by one—

  Someone hammered on the window.

  I snapped round to face them, every muscle tense in an instant, and a sweat breaking out across my body just as it had that day. My heart was hammering, my breath tight—

  It was the jeweler. His expression was changing from annoyance to...fear?

  I took a breath. “Sorry. Don’t creep up on me.”

  He was backing away across the sidewalk, shaking his head.

  “What?” I asked. No response. “What?” Jesus, he was really overreacting. All I’d done was look round and glare at him.

  The jeweler tripped and went down on his ass. He started scrambling backward toward his shop, feeling for the door. His face was white.

  I realized he wasn’t looking at my face. His gaze was lower.

  I looked down. I had my gun pointed right at him. I hadn’t even been aware of drawing it.

  You asshole, said Hux in my head.

  ***

  An hour later, I was studying the carpet in my captain’s office. Every time he yelled—which was a lot—it flattened the hair on the top of my head. An instant later, the windows behind me would rattle.

  “I have the commissioner,” Captain Barnes was yelling, “up my ass about complaints against the department. I have the mayor up my ass about our relationship with the community. I have an internal affairs guy asking questions about the fitness of officers to serve—do you know where he is?”

  “Up your ass, sir,” I said dutifully.

  “And then you, Kowalski, you pull this shit that has all three of them yelling at me. Do you have any idea what it’s like to be yelled at?” he yelled.

  “No, sir.”

  “No!” He leaned over to his office door, flung it wide, and yelled, “Because I mollycoddle the whole lot of you!”

  Everyone looked up for a moment and then returned to their work. This sort of thing was normal for Barnes. Everyone accepted his shouting because, usually, he had our best interests at heart. He was tough but fair and sat like a fatherly shield between us and the truly terrifying layers of bureaucracy above us, absorbing the worst of it.

  He slammed the door and slumped back into his chair. “Do you hate me?” he asked. “Are you trying to give me a heart attack? Is that it?”

  “No sir.”

  “Do you want to go back to psych? I can send you back to Doctor Fuller, and she can show you ink blots and talk to you about your mother. Would that help?”

  “No sir.”

  “Then in the name of God, Kowalski, what am I meant to do with you?! You pulled a gun on a guy!”

  “He surprised me.”

  “What are you gonna do when someone gets in a fender bender with you? Blow up their car?”

  I took a deep breath. “It was a one-time thing, sir. Won’t happen again.”

  Captain Barnes sat back in his chair and his voice softened. “Look...I liked him too, kid.”

  “It’s not about Hux.”

  “The hell it isn’t. How many suspects have you yelled at? How many times have you been late for duty, since it happened? Are you sleeping...at all?

  I winced. I had lost my cool and yelled at suspects a few times, but I hadn’t known that it had gotten back to the captain. And yes, I’d lain awake until four or five in the morning and then missed roll call more than once.

  Barnes took a long breath. “This is your last chance,” he told me. “Final warning. Mess up again, you’re gone. Are you hearing me?”

  I nodded. I heard him. I just had no idea how to fix myself.

  You can’t, said Hux. I’d say you’re royally screwed.

&
nbsp; Chapter 8

  Jasmine

  “It’s cold,” said Karen, dipping her toe in nervously. “Maybe there’s something wrong. Maybe it’s switched off.”

  “It’s meant to be that temperature,” said Nat patiently.

  Karen blinked. “Really?”

  I shook my head. “It’s not cold. It just feels cold because you haven’t got in yet. I still can’t believe you’ve never been swimming!”

  “You’re sure you can swim, right?” asked Clarissa. “We don’t want the lifeguard to have to save you.” She looked over at the chair where a six-foot hunk of bronzed magnificence in red shorts sat on high alert. “Although….”

  “Yes,” said Karen, oblivious. She was being brave and putting a whole foot into the water, now. “I’m sure I remember swimming lessons when I was a child. Before the cello.”

  Clarissa, Nat and I all looked at each other.

  “Perhaps we should stay in the shallow end,” I said.

  It had been my idea to come to the huge, indoor water park. None of us had been before, which was sort of the point. I thought it was time we did something other than just Fenbrook or Flicker or Harpers. I was buzzing with the news of the screen test, but I still had that feeling that I needed to keep being Jasmine, to keep shoring her up by being silly and fun and lively. Otherwise she might collapse from the inside out, and the cracks would make my friends suspicious.

  First rule of fooling people: don’t appear mysterious. If you put up the shields and refuse to answer questions, everyone will want to know what the big secret is. But bouncy, flirty, Jasmine? Everyone already understood what she was, so there was nothing to ask.

  We sat on the edge of the pool for a moment, looking down at our reflections in the water. Nat and Karen had gone for one piece bathing suits, Karen blinking nervously, still unused to her new contact lenses. Clarissa was wearing some sort of black and white designer thing that looked like three small handkerchiefs tied together with bootlaces. If her boobs had been as big as Nat’s, let alone mine, it would have been obscene but, as usual, she managed to pull it off with aplomb.