A Sprinkle of Sabotage by Fiona Leitch (bill gates book recommendations TXT) 📗

Daisy and I both let out a long breath.

‘Wowsers, who is that?’ she said, Zack almost forgotten.

‘Someone I clearly underestimated,’ I said.

Chapter Twelve

As interesting as it had been to watch the filming to start with (and as amazing a revelation as Jeremy Mayhew’s performance had been), the constant stopping and starting soon began to get a bit tedious. I once again thanked my lucky stars (and silently apologised to Gino) that events had conspired to get me out of being an extra and back to doing what I loved most. No, not eating or confusing myself over what passed (just about) as a love life, but cooking. I could honestly say that I would not have swapped places with anyone on that film shoot; they could keep their fame – although I wouldn’t have minded a bit of their fortune – if their working day consisted of standing around in uncomfortable clothing, and being forced to repeat the same lines, the same scenes, over and over and over again. An actor’s life was not for me.

We watched as Sam and the camera operator (or ‘director of photography’, as I heard someone refer to him) discussed where to put the camera next; they were going to re-shoot what we’d just seen them do (five times) from another angle, and then they’d shoot it again, from another angle, to get Zack’s reactions. Some of the actors dismounted and stretched, but Jeremy stayed on his horse, leaning forward to pat it and fuss with its mane. I saw the horse’s ears twitching as he talked to it; they’d obviously made friends.

Daisy was quite taken with the horses (and Zack, of course, although he hadn’t had the chance to do much other than stand around and look hunky while Jeremy acted the bejesus out of himself), but even she had to admit that she was getting bored, cold, and hungry, so we turned and headed back towards the warmth of the food truck. I’d found a couple of fold-up chairs tucked away, which Gino obviously used when he wanted to hide in the truck away from demanding customers, and thought we could sit in there and warm up until it was time for me to drop Daisy home.

We hadn’t got very far when there was a loud BANG! and a commotion behind us. We turned back just in time to see Jeremy and his mount charging straight at us. The horse’s nostrils were flaring and it looked alarmed, but Jeremy was clearly a good horseman; he didn’t panic and just hauled back on the reins, all the while still talking to the frightened beast. I grabbed Daisy and threw her out of the way, then instinctively reached out to grab the bridle. I was lucky that the horse had begun to slow down, otherwise it probably would have dragged me along, but the combination of Jeremy’s surprisingly calm voice and my brute strength (I was pleased to see that I hadn’t gone completely soft) managed to bring the poor thing to a halt.

‘Oh my God, Mum!’ cried Daisy, rushing over to us. I preened for a moment, thinking she was going to tell me how brave I was, but— ‘That was so stupid! You could have been trampled!’ I deflated a bit, but at least it meant my daughter loved me.

‘Your ma’s a hero!’ protested Jeremy. I tried not to notice that he had a similar accent to Nathan. He slid down off the horse and held it firmly by the bridle, so I let go.

Lucy and Sam arrived at a run.

‘Are you okay?’ asked Sam. ‘What happened?’

‘Didn’t you hear that bang?’ Jeremy demanded angrily. ‘What the bloody hell was it?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Lucy. ‘Are you all right?’

‘I’m fine,’ said Jeremy, calming down. ‘Just tell me it didn’t get caught on camera. I don’t want it on YouTube, me being rescued by the caterer.’ He looked at me. ‘No offence, love.’

‘None taken,’ I said, although there was a little bit taken.

‘Wow, you’d better make my movie that exciting!’ We all turned to look at the owner of the booming American voice behind us. I am rubbish with US accents, but I could place this one: pure New York, or ‘Noo Yoik’ as he no doubt would have said. He turned to me. ‘You sure got some balls on you, ma’am.’

I shrugged modestly. ‘It was nothing…’

‘Was it? Okay then.’

Daisy looked massively affronted but I shook my head: ignore it. Movie people.

‘Mike! When did you get here?’ said Sam. So this was the famous producer, Mike Mancuso, was it? I had to restrain myself from saying, ‘Hey, Mikey!’ like something out of Goodfellas; he looked and sounded like an extra from an early De Niro movie, but I wasn’t sure how he’d take it.

‘Got here just in time to catch the excitement,’ he said. ‘I hope this ain’t gonna hold up shooting.’

‘Of course not,’ said Sam, testily, and I got the feeling there had been words between them – probably about the hold-ups the saboteur had been causing. Had this been another act of sabotage? I wondered. It seemed unlikely to be a coincidence, but at the same time, there could have been no way of knowing that Jeremy’s horse would take fright; none of the other horses had bolted.

My question was soon answered as a technician rushed over to talk to Lucy and Sam.

‘The generator’s packed up,’ he puffed. Lucy groaned and Sam looked exasperated.

‘What? How did that happen?’ he asked, irritated.

‘I don’t know,’ said the technician. ‘All the fuses blew and it tripped the power breaker, so we need to reset the whole thing—’

‘That’s what went bang?’ I asked, and he gave me a ‘who-the-hell-are-you?’ look before nodding.

‘Well, what blew the fuses? Did you overload it or something?’ Sam was furious but the technician stood his ground.

‘No, we didn’t. In fact, I went and checked it myself this