Better Than Revenge [Chapters 1-15 Rewritten]

Chapter 8: The Audition

I tried to internalize my discomfort, but in the end, I couldn't. The scent of his cologne finally almost blinded me and I had to take a few steps back. "Okay, this is not going to work," I said, coughing until my throat hurt.

"What now?"

"The smell of Axe is okay," I said, fanning the air around my nose. "Spraying the whole can onto yourself isn't."

Everyone except for Christian seemed to be amused by my comment, however admittedly unprofessional it may have been. It was that damn mouth of mine.

Instead of denying my accusation, he said, "I don't use Axe. I use a personalized cologne."

"One spray, Christian. Not ten."

He shot me a dirty look and was about to say something when Rachel interrupted us. "I think I have a scene in mind that you two might be able to pull off," she said, sharing a look with Nora. "Actually, there are several scenes that I think you guys could pull off, but we'll try this one for today."

For today? That made it sound like there'd be a collective tomorrow, which was good enough for me.

Rachel handed me a new sheet and I studied it for a moment. It didn't take me long to deduce that this was one we could definitely do.

Christian was also handed a new sheet. When Nora asked the cameraman if he was ready to go, we discovered he hadn't bothered cutting the tape. The last scene had been ruined thanks to me and the camera had caught every second of it. Great.

Christian and I got back into position and were ready to go again.

"What the hell—" I said, slipping back into character, except this was a little easier for me to pull off.

"Good morning, sunshine," he said. "Beautiful day, isn't it?"

I looked over at him in alarm. My surprise quickly faded into amusement. "I'd say good morning, but judging by the boner on your face, I'd say you weren't having such a good morning."

Yeah, I liked this character much better. Emma was spunky – enough so that she hit Christian's character in the face with a pair of handcuffs and left his eye swollen and bruised.

Natalie, on the other hand, was just downright depressing. That role had also felt a lot more forced. With Emma, I didn't have to put in as much effort to stay in character. I felt like I was really her and the obnoxious guy standing in front of me was actually Will.

"Actually, I'm having a pretty good morning," he said. "My luck's about to change. You wanna know why?"

I didn't say anything.

"You know what? I'll tell you why. I've just successfully kidnapped the daughter of one of the richest men in the country. So face boner or not, I'd say I'm having a pretty damn good day."

"Don't start counting your lucky stars just yet," I said. "This isn't over yet."

He raised his eyebrows at me. "Isn't it, though? I'm not the one who's naked and tied up in a stranger's back seat."

Luckily for my character, by naked, he meant bra and underwear, not butt naked. I looked down at myself once again in alarm but didn't let it show for too long. "Twelve hours ago, you were the one who was naked, beaten, and lying on the side of the road. I can assure you, if your tiny brain managed to figure out how to turn this around in your favor, I can do the same, and it will go ten times smoother."

"You're a bit overconfident, don't you think?" he asked.

I smirked. "Worried?"

"No. I can handle you."

"If you could handle me, you wouldn't have gone to these extremes. Is there any part of me you didn't tie up or duct tape?"

"Yeah, your mouth," he said. "Clearly that was a mistake."

Rachel and Nora had us skip over a few lines that were spoken by the other two main characters until it was time for the lines between us again.

"Welcome home," he said with a smug smile.

I looked at my surroundings with a disgusted look on my face before screaming at the top of my lungs. He flinched at the sound and put a hand over my mouth to make me stop.

So I did exactly what the script told me to do. I bit him. Hard.

He let out a stream of cuss words and screamed. "What the fuck, Sophia? Stop! Ow!"

Eventually, I let his hand fall out of mouth and laughed as he stood there and frantically waved his hand around, rubbing it on his shirt to clean it off.

He gave me a dirty look. "You weren't supposed to actually bite me."

I smiled innocently. "Whoops. Must have slipped my mind."

"What kind of an actress are you? For Christ's sake." He held his hand against his chest, still rubbing it.

"The kind that gets deep into character, of course," I said.

He just scowled at me and shook out his hand. Meanwhile, Nora and Rachel were still sitting at the table talking. They seemed amused, although I wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not. I knew I'd acted childishly. It was just that when it came to Christian, I seemingly had no control over my smart mouth. Even when I thought I was exerting self-control, it seemed as if I had none.

Considering Nora and Rachel had made me try out for two parts, I was especially lost. I had no idea where I stood. At that point, I would have been grateful to be cast as an extra.

Hell, I would have taken the role of a tree again.