stuff of Greek legends. On me…I’d been called a unicorn. I’d also been trophy hunted like one.
That was a subject I didn’t talk about to anyone except Dad and my lawyers. Ever.
Not even Molly knew how bad things had been.
We finished our breakfasts with the music of the birds and the sea as our soundtrack, and then it was time for the day to begin.
If I put on my shades, my AirPods, and my attitude like armor in preparation, no one really had to know why but me.
Chapter Three
Stone
Every time I found myself on a film shoot, I vowed I would never do it again. Hours passed in excruciating boredom while we waited for the few minutes my animals were needed. Then the director had them go through take after take. We invariably grew tense and frustrated.
The scene they were shooting that night was a simple one. It called for the leading female werewolf character to hold up a lantern and lead Hades and Persephone into the woods. On its face, the action didn’t sound like a big hairy deal, but like everything in the movies there was a catch.
The actress, Madison Ling, was viscerally afraid of dogs. I don’t know whether she’d disclosed this fact before she was offered the role of female alpha werewolf Tiffany Xeng, and it wasn’t any of my business. My job was to keep my animals quiet and safe while the powers that be worked out the details.
Unfortunately, the more tension ratcheted up between Mads, her people, the director, and his crew, the more agitated Hades and Persephone got. They’d gone from their usual alert suspicion of humans to pacing back and forth inside their pen, and I knew the shoot would go south before they were even called to hit their marks.
I had to find Deacon and tell him so before things went any farther.
“What is it, Stone?” Deacon looked like a man with the weight of the world on his shoulders.
“All this tension is starting to get to my animals. I’m going to need to move them away and calm them down before I can—”
“Don’t you fucking dare.” With rare anger, he jabbed a finger at me. “I do not need drama from you too. Get the fuck back there, and get your goddamn dogs ready to go.”
“Why don’t you tell that to ‘my dogs’ and see where it gets you?” My grimace had caused lesser men to piss themselves. “If you feel like you have superfluous limbs.”
He took his headset off. “Goddamnit, we’re going to lose the shoot when the sun comes up. That’s a whole day behind. You know how much that would cost?”
“Would you rather Mads lose a body part? My hybrids can’t work under pressure. You know that. Bring in the Huskies if you need to. They love the excitement.”
“Craig wants the hybrids for this scene. We already shot the close-ups.”
“I’m not risking my animals’ lives for your show.” Hades and Persephone weren’t actors. If they sensed a threat, their instincts for self-preservation would take over. I didn’t know how that would play out, and I wasn’t about to find out under these circumstances. “We’ll walk, and you can complain to your lawyers.”
“All right. Okay. Let me think.” He paced while I stood my ground. After a minute, he tilted his head side to side like a prizefighter before donning his headset. “Somebody find me a stand-in for Mads who is bombproof around dogs. Is that doable? Yeah, we film her from behind when she leads the hybrids away anyway. Pull everyone from the area who isn’t critical. That okay?”
I guessed someone was shouting in his ear because he flinched visibly. Even from where we stood in the clearing with the kennel, we could hear a ripple of talk among the actors and crew while they hashed things out.
“No, I’m not fucking with you. Mads’s tension is making the hybrids nervous. If you want to bring in the huskies—” He winced. “No, it was just a suggestion. No, I don’t want you to have to reshoot the closeups. No—”
Deacon’s shoulders climbed to his ears while he listened, but he held his temper. In the end, they found a stand-in, and I had time to calm my furry friends down.
Hades and Persephone did the scene in three takes. Even if I was the only one who thought so, they had been spectacular, regally following a stand-in who wore a lookalike costume and wig into the mist shrouded trees.
Deacon was