“Nothing.”
“Doesn’t seem like nothing. Especially when you kept texting me about coming home.”
Bianca lifted a shoulder. Then, as if she couldn’t hold it in a minute longer, she faced her mother and blinked back tears. “I’m off the show,” she said with more than a touch of anger. “Michelle called a little while ago. Barclay Sphinx is ‘going in another direction.’” She cleared her throat. “Lara Haas is in and I’m out.”
CHAPTER 28
Pescoli rounded the end of the sectional while the dogs milled around beneath the counter, where the food still in the bags was probably getting cold. She took a seat next to her daughter. “What do you mean ‘Lara’s in and you’re out’?”
“Just that.” Bianca flopped back on the couch. “Michelle called.”
“What did she say?”
“She talked to Barclay. Like earlier today. And he . . . he’s thinking about ‘taking the show in another direction. ’” Bianca made air quotes with her fingers.
“After filming just one episode?”
“I guess.”
Pescoli thought the show was already scripted, at least loosely, and this didn’t make a lot of sense. “What other direction?”
“A direction that doesn’t include me. Or our family.” Bianca sunk lower on the cushions, her lower lip protruding, disappointment emanating from her in waves.
“Is he going to play up the feuding families angle?” Pescoli asked. Wasn’t there something about that?
Sighing, Bianca plucked at a nonexistent piece of lint on the arm of the sectional. “I guess. But it’s all because of Lara. She’s the last one who saw Big Foot, and Barclay is all over that.”
“Thinks she saw one.”
“Doesn’t matter. And then that Big Foot Believer guy, Carlton Jeffe, got a visual of a Big Foot on film with his drone . . . so it’s probably the same one that chased Lara. She was already on the news talking about it. First at the hospital and then at her home with her mom and dad there.” Cisco abandoned his position under the counter and hopped up onto the couch. Bianca absently stroked his rough coat.
“Okay, I see Lara’s got the media attention right now. But I thought they had some kind of plot line sketched out.”
“They did. Do. But after the pilot, where I’m the one who is chased by Big Foot, they’re going to focus on Lara, even make her live with one of the feuding families or something. They’re going to cut something into what we’ve already filmed, focus in on her at the campfire or whatever, so the viewers can connect with her or something. That’s what Michelle said. Then they want her to recreate what happened to her, when she went back searching for her cell phone, like she lost it during the party scene. They’ll make it fit in with the story and then follow her story line.”
“And what happens to your character?”
Pushing a lock of wet hair from her face, she said, “Don’t know. Michelle said she’d keep me posted.”
“Michelle still on the show?”
“Yeah. Remember: She’s the cop! She’s you.”
“I know, but if you’re out, I thought they might get rid of your mother as well, come up with some other investigator, or something.”
“Well, they didn’t,” she huffed, crossing her arms over her chest. “Michelle and Barclay are tight.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. She said she went to some seminar he gave a few years ago, or something, and I think they’ve kept in touch ever since, though, I think she kept it kind of a secret, didn’t want anyone to know.”
This was news. “She knew him before he showed up here?”
“I think.” Bianca nodded, her wet curls bouncing on her shoulders. “Well, kinda.”
Huh, Pescoli thought, filing the information away. “Well, I wouldn’t worry about it too much. If the reality show is in this much flux, if the episodes aren’t set in stone, which seems to be t
he case, then just do your job, best as you can and maybe things will change again.”