Read Online Hot Target by Suzanne Brockmann - Free Book Online Page B

school.”
    “When we finally cast our young Jack,” Jane leaned closer to tell him, “we’ll film scenes showing him at school and at the recruiters, and so on, beneath this voice-over.”
    “When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, I raced to the recruiting office, as eager as any of my fellow Americans to defend my country.
    “Within days I’d finished a battery of tests and had already been shipped off to boot camp, when suddenly I was pulled out of line and given new orders. I was being assigned to the Twenty-third Special Combat Group—to a unit that no one had ever heard of.
    “After a full day and night of travel, I finally reached Pine Camp, back in good ol’ New York. I was brought into a barracks that was almost completely filled with men, told absolutely nothing, and left there to wait.
    “For what, no one seemed to know.
    “Back then it wasn’t called
gaydar,
of course, but whatever you label it, mine was clicking furiously. I was far from the only homosexual in that Quonset hut. In fact, darlings, I quickly realized that instead of the usual small handful, a large percentage of us were friends of Judy Garland. So to speak.
    “What were the odds of that happening by coincidence?”
    “That’s the end of the voice-over segment,” Janey said. “Now here’s the first part of Pierce’s screen test. Please, God, let him be good. It’s the scene that immediately follows the voice-over, where Jack—”
    “I remember,” Jack said.
    The camera’s focus would be on the auditioning actor’s face as the scene—a conversation among the other enlisted men in the army barracks—went on around him. The final version would be intercut with close-ups of classic gay code—eye contact, smiles, a red tie or two, jingling keys—all from young Jack’s point of view.
    But right now, on the screen, Pierce Hugo swung an army duffel onto an empty bottom bunk, as the actor playing relentlessly hetero Ducky McHenry said, “Special combat. What the fuck is special combat anyway?”
    As young Jack turned, the camera began a slow zoom in on him.
    “He’s not as cute as I was,” Jack pointed out.
    Janey laughed. “No one is as cute as you were, Jack.”
    “Shut the hell up, McHenry,” one of the actors said wearily as the camera moved to a full close-up of Pierce’s face.
    He was good-looking in an extremely superficial Abercrombie ad way. Robin tried to imagine kissing him and couldn’t.
    “Ah, Christ,” another off-screen voice complained, “is he starting with that again?”
    “No, no, guys,” Ducky’s voice said. “This shouldn’t be so hard. I been thinking, and what we need to do is figure out what we have in common, right? Then we’ll know what they’ll be sending us out there to do.”
    Meanwhile, the camera stayed on Pierce’s face.
    “He’s not
too
awful,” the Jack sitting beside Robin said.
    “Hey, new guy,” Ducky said, and the camera pulled back to include him in the shot. He was speaking directly to Pierce. “What do
you
think?”
    The audience was supposed to see a flurry of emotions cross young Jack’s face as he wondered how to answer that question, because he knew damn well what so many of the men in this barracks had in common. Pierce Hugo managed only to look frightened.
    Jane made a sound that was half pain, half disgust.
    “Whaddya do before Uncle Sam got his hooks in ya?” Ducky asked.
    Relief appeared on Pierce’s face. It was a little too obvious, too “I’m acting!” and again Janey made that unhappy sound.
    “I’m—I was—an art student.”
    “Aha!” Ducky exclaimed. “Another artist! That makes twenty-two artists, seventeen actors slash waiters, and three radio announcers—”
    “It’s obvious, friends,” someone interrupted as the camera stayed focused on Pierce, who was about as interesting an actor as a wooden spoon. “We’re going to put on a show for the Nazis.”
    “I’m serious here,” Ducky shouted over the laughter. “New