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Chapter 42

 

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 15TH

Janna got her script. She was to play an archaeologist—tough, intelligent, beautiful—who, on a dig with an ex-fiancé, uncovered proof that at least one form of dinosaur lived during the time of the Minoan civilization, which was the precursor civilization to classical Greece. And she and her ex-fiancé would discover a sacred box, and unlock it, and in it find three perfectly preserved eggs. When the eggs hatched into a previously unknown form of pterodactyl, she and the ex-fiancé would be headed toward fame and fortune . . . until something went wrong.

It was a great script. The dialogue had been written by someone who'd actually heard the English language spoken, and who had a sense of humor besides. The characters were surprisingly well developed within the hundred-plus pages. The premise was a little goofy, but the writer had gone to a lot of trouble to make it logically consistent within the framework of the story. The story was good. Really good. ILM was already set up to do the special effects, which meant the pterodactyls would live.

It was the project she'd worked her whole life for, and she was going to star in it, and she'd just heard that Brad Pitt had tentatively agreed to play her ex-fiancé, barring scheduling conflicts. And Harrison Ford was a possible as the brilliant scientist whose work brought the pterodactyls to life.

She should have been walking on air.

Instead, she felt only a sick, tight knot in her gut. This wasn't any fun. This wasn't the way she'd wanted to do it at all. She discovered, too late, that she wouldn't be satisfied with enormous success unless she earned it—and now, with success guaranteed her, with the rest of her life mapped out and looking like the star-studded path of a goddess, with everything she wanted in the palm of her hand, she didn't see any way that she could go back to the place where she'd been before—to being the woman who was willing to work her ass off to get what she wanted if only she could know when she got to the top that she'd done it herself.

I want to know that Anton Leighton-White liked me, she thought. I want to know that I was really the actress he wanted. And I won't ever know that.

Everything I do from here on out is poisoned.

What do I do?

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Framed