Dragon's Clutch (Sanmere Shifters Book 3)

through gritted teeth. “I just don’t want production to be held up because of any… incompetence.”
Callin leaned back against a cabinet and folded his arms. He smiled at Valerie. His smile was as fake as hers, but he was a good enough actor that he knew the smile looked entirely real.
“There’s one thing I can tell you. If you really want to look like a pro, then it all comes down to how you treat people like your assistant and the crew. The pros treat them with respect as they understand the hugely important role they play in all of this. I mean, think about it. We’re the least important people on this set, aren’t we? We’re just prancing around saying stuff. It’s the writers that bring the words to life, the director that puts us in the right place at the right time, the lighting crew that makes us look good, and hair, make-up, and wardrobe that hide all of our flaws. And the filming crew that captures the best angles. We’re pretty much props.”
Callin glanced at Brianne again. She was smiling more widely now. He looked back at Valerie, who gave him an amused-looking smile.
“Oh, you don’t need to do all of that fake modesty here, Callin,” she said. “We both know that despite all of that, it’s our names that sell the movie.”
“Perhaps,” Callin conceded. “But we’re a small part of a big team. You don’t even need to take my word for this. Just watch when you’re on set. The real stars, the ones who are confident of their place in the world, they’re pleasant and polite. The ones who snap at people, who are mean and nasty and, quite frankly, act like spoiled little divas for no good reason, they’re the ones who doubt their place here. The ones who need to belittle someone else to boost their own egos.”
“What exactly are you saying?” Valerie snapped.
Oh, she knew exactly what he was saying, but Callin had come here to appease her and he wanted to find a way to do that and get his message across too.
“I’m just saying that you should be yourself. Act like a real person instead of the stereotype people have when they think of Hollywood A-listers. Despite the misconception, you will be thought of as much more professional if you’re kind. And if things take a few minutes longer than planned, no one will go off on you if they think you’re one of the good ones,” Callin said.
Valerie smiled at him, a genuine smile this time, and he knew he had fooled her. He had gotten his message across without it sounding like an accusation. She didn’t know he had heard her berating Brianne, and she didn’t know that the camera crew was already laughing at her behind her back because of her attitude.
“Thanks, Callin. I’ll bear that in mind. I guess I’m so used to having to yell and command to get anything done at home, that I thought maybe I needed to bring that here too. But you’re right. The people here are professionals, not amateurs,” she said.
Okay, maybe he hadn’t fooled her entirely, because that was an obvious dig at the pack. But it was certainly some middle ground, and even if Valerie didn’t really believe his speech had been spontaneous, maybe she would still listen to him. The one thing Valerie hated was to be seen as anything other than an A-list star, and if she thought being nice would gain her that title quickly, then she would be nice. He hoped.
“Well, I’d better get on over to make-up,” Callin said with a smile, pushing himself up off the cabinet. “I just thought I’d come and see how you’re settling in. My assistant will be pissed if I’m late for make-up.”
“Your assistant tells you what to do?” Valerie asked, clearly surprised to hear this.
“Shauna is worth her weight in gold. She gets me where I need to be when I need to be there, and yeah, sometimes she gives me the ass-kicking I need if I’m slacking off which includes running late because I can’t stop talking. That’s what’s great about our assistants, though, isn’t it? How utterly lost we’d be without them and they know it, yet they don’t lord it over us.”
“Indeed,” Valerie said tightly.
“So be nice to Brianne. She keeps you right,” Callin said. He winked at Brianne, this time making it clear for Valerie to see. “And they bring us coffee and snacks, and I’d hate to think I’d pissed off the person who could bring me a sneezer.”
Brianne laughed softly and Callin felt the tingling inside of himself again. Her laugh was infectious, and he knew he would happily spend forever finding new ways to make her laugh like that. Valerie barked out a fake laugh and nodded her head.
“I think Brianne is far too professional to do anything like that,” she said.
Callin knew that was a thinly veiled threat, but he also thought Valerie had taken his hint about being nice to Brianne. It was unlikely that Brianne actually did sneeze in her coffee, and if she did, then good for her.
“It wouldn’t matter anyway,” Brianne said. “It’s not like any of the coffee I bring you is ever good enough for you to actually drink.”
She was laughing when she said it, made confident by Callin’s presence. But Callin could hear the truth beneath the laughter.
“What can I say? I’m fussy when it comes to my caffeine fix,” Valerie said with a fake laugh.
Callin left the trailer and headed toward the set. He didn’t know if he was secretly amused by Valerie and the way she acted so differently when she was around him compared to the stories he heard about her behavior with other people, or if he was utterly disgusted by her. He thought maybe it was a combination of both. But mostly it was disgust.
He thought perhaps he had gone a bit too far with the