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Tyler:You’re doing the film for scale.60

Fred:You’ll be hearing from my agents about that. You can’t offset a personal debt against what production owes me.

Tyler:Just watch me.

Fred:Why are you being such an asshole?

Tyler:Pay me now or you’ll regret it.

That was the last message, sent a couple of days before filming started. A threat? A statement of fact?

None of it is good, and it raises a lot of questions.

Like why the hell won’t Fred just pay him?

And what happened between then and now?

“How did José get the number?” Oliver asks. “And why did he call Fred, of all people?”

“I have no idea.”

“If it even was José.”

“Right. Plus, there’s the other messages.” I show him the ones with the dates and locations. “Was he having an affair?”

Oliver’s forehead creases. “He was meeting with someone. But look, not for a while.”

“When was the last one?”

He scrolls through the texts. “Four weeks ago?”

I purse my mouth. “When he got engaged to Emma.”

Our eyes meet.

“It doesn’t have to be that,” Oliver says.

“I know. But...he doesn’t have the money he owes Tyler, and he says he’s going to get the money, but then he doesn’t...It doesn’t look good.”

“You think he’s marrying Emma for the money?”

“It’s possible. But why does he need it?”

I pick up my phone and google “Fred Winter net worth.” “It says he’s worth fifty million dollars.”

“Those sites aren’t always accurate.”

“I know, but...even if it’s half that, he’s clearly in some sort of money trouble. What did he spend it all on?”

“All excellent questions,” Oliver says. “But if this is aboutpaying Tyler back, and he’s going to get his money from Emma, then why the threats to the wedding?” Oliver runs his hands through his hair, then mats it down.

“You’re right. Tyler should want the wedding to take place.”

“Except he’s in love with Emma.”

“Maybe Fred owes money to someone else? Maybe that’s what those texts are about? They’re pretty dry for an affair.”

“But smart if you don’t want to get caught because then you can make that exact point,” I say.