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Keep moving out of the room . . . But that door was locked, the key long gone. And for now, Gary had his job to do.
     “You’re fired, Errol.”
    “What?”
    “Keep the initial payment.”
    “But . . . that isn’t . . . It’s not . . .”
    “And I will give you the same amount in one month, provided you do not tell anyone
     else that we have ever met or spoken. Consider it a severance package.”
    “But . . .”
    “Great. It’s been a pleasure.”
    Gary hung up with Ludlow and headed back into Ira’s studio. Ruth rushed at him, still
     apologizing. Gary smiled. “Don’t worry about it,” he said, Plan B already taking shape
     in his mind.
    B renna had no intention of calling Gary Freeman—at least not anytime soon. No way was
     she going to get any truthful information out of a man who’d worked so hard to mask
     his identity that he didn’t even want Errol’s subcontractors to know his name. (Hell,
     the number he’d given Errol himself had been a disposable phone, its minutes bought
     in advance, virtually untraceable.)
    No, Brenna had wanted Gary Freeman’s name and number so she could find out who exactly
     she was dealing with. Who exactly Lula Belle had been dealing with. And once she found
     that out—very quickly, it turned out, as Gary Freeman, successful Hollywood theatrical agent , was all over the Web—she’d be all the more able to understand Lula Belle.
    Already, Brenna understood why Freeman had wanted to keep her on the down-low: His
     life was about as far from that Coke bottle trick as you could possibly get.
    An agent specializing in children and an adjunct professor “at several renowned arts
     schools,” according to his website bio, Freeman had been married for twenty years
     to the same lovely blonde woman, and had three lovely blonde daughters—aged fifteen,
     twelve, and seven—all of whom seemed to accompany him to any event where he was photographed.
     Turned out there were many of those. When he wasn’t doing paid engagements at high
     schools and youth centers about navigating the treacherous world of Hollywood “with
     your values intact,” Freeman was participating in walkathons, auctions, days at the
     races, and fund-raising dinners for Wise Up—a literacy program for inner city kids
     founded by his wife, Jill.
    Scrolling through Google Images back at her office, Brenna found a picture of the
     Freeman family, posing with a clown at a Wise Up circus event this past summer. She
     blew it up so that it filled her screen, and then gazed at Freeman’s face—a nice face. What’s a nice guy like you doing pimping out silhouettes?
    He wasn’t a classically handsome man. He was stocky and ruddy and slightly shorter
     than his wife, with a thick hank of graying hair and a nose that looked as if it had
     been broken one too many times. But there was something about that face—a comfort
     level in the set of the features, a warmth to the eyes. Brenna imagined he had a wide
     circle of friends who thought they knew him a lot better than they actually did.
    A voice behind Brenna said, “Looks like that dude on the cornflakes commercial.” Trent’s
     voice. She recognized it immediately, but she jumped a little anyway. “You scared
     me.”
    “I usually have that effect on women. But in a good way.”
    “There’s a good way to scare women?”
    Trent started to answer, but Brenna held up a hand.
    “The question was rhetorical,” she said.
    “So who’s the cornflakes guy?”
    She opened her mouth, then closed it. “Potential client.” She minimized the screen.
     “I thought you were meeting with Annette Shelby.”
    “Uh . . . that was at one-thirty? There’s a little thing at the bottom right side
     of your screen. It’s called a clock. Check it out sometime!”
    Brenna glanced at the clock: three-thirty. “Oh no . . .” It was her day to have Maya—the
     last day before Christmas break, and she had her for the rest of the week. Brenna