I let my arms hang between my knees, eyes tracking a single bead of sweat as it slides down my shin. Annie rolls up yoga mats in the corner, pretending not to listen.
I stare at the polished gym floor, watching my reflection distort in the gleaming surface. “Guess I have no choice,” I say, my voice hollow against the rhythmic thud of treadmills and clanking weights. The studio executives sit in their sleek Century City offices with views of the Hollywood sign, making decisions about my life while I stand here drenched in sweat, my hair plastered to my forehead. When your star is still rising—a fragile, flickering thing that could be snuffed out with one wrong move—you play whatever game they choose.
Jessie smiles, triumphant and relieved. “I’ll text you the address.”
She’s already striding for the exit, Louboutin heels clicking against the gym’s rubber flooring like a metronome counting down my dignity, when I recheck my phone. Three notifications, all from Google Alerts, each one a tiny digital grenade. The toparticle: “Emma Rowan and Asher Dixon: On-Screen Sparks or More?” accompanied by a cropped photo of me—faded black Lululemon leggings with a coffee stain near the knee, frayed gym bag that’s seen better days, face stripped bare of even tinted moisturizer—leaving Pressed Juicery on Sunset next to a blurry male silhouette in a Yankees cap pulled low. Jesus Christ, now they’ve wrangled my bodyguard Marcus, who’s gay and happily married with twins, into these Hollywood mating rituals. At least his hubby will get a kick out of this. At the very least, it will make for interesting dinner conversation.
As I slip into the driver’s seat of my Range Rover, I wonder, for the thousandth time, why anyone would bother watching a movie when the city is full of stories better than fiction.
CHAPTER 2
ASHER
The city burnswith the kind of heat that makes you want to rip your skin off, and I’m already regretful by the time I pull my car into an empty strip mall on Highland. The air outside shimmers with gasoline and ozone. I check my teeth in the rearview, touch the nearly invisible scar below my lip—a souvenir from that hell shoot in Pretoria—and try not to think about Emma Rowan and her megawatt smile. Which is fucking impossible, since the entire reason Myrna Ross is beside me in the passenger seat, clacking at her phone, is to wrangle both of us into a “relationship” that’s half press release, half military-grade propaganda campaign for Eclipse Run.
“Have you reviewed the talking points?” Myrna’s voice could slice brisket. She doesn’t look up, just flicks her fake-tan thumb over the scrolling screen.
“I know my lines, Myrna. Even when the script is bullshit.” I twist the gold ring on my right hand, ignoring the flop sweat gathering at my collar.
She slaps her phone onto the dash. “Look, Asher. The public doesn’t care about the movie’s budget or the new gravity rig. They care about you and Emma, and whether you’re the next bigdevour-each-other duo. You’re a star; start acting like one. She’s already in there, by the way. Try not to offend her sensibilities.”
I kill the engine and let my head rest against the seatback. “I haven’t seen her since we reshot scenes in February,” I say.
“I know. That’s why it has to look like you’re both obsessed with each other. That’s what sells. Not the film.” She adjusts her sunglasses, which already cover half her face, and climbs out, stilettos clicking against the torn asphalt. I imagine her as a cartoon, a giant praying mantis with a Prada purse and the will to destroy.
The Vine is a long, glass-walled rectangle designed for A-list lunch meetings and breakfast soft launches. They let us in before hours, a flex of Myrna’s clout, and the AC is so cold I feel my exposed skin tighten. Emma is at the back booth. She’s in a white sundress with blue flowers, hair up, tiny crescent-moon earrings catching the sun. Her skin is as pale as I remember—like candle wax, like something that would bruise from strong wind. Next to her is Jessie, her manager, who wears a suit and expression so nondescript she could be airbrushed out of the scene.
For a second, I reconsider the decency of this entire enterprise. Then Emma looks up, catches my eye, and something in me goes punch-drunk stupid.
I clear the length of the restaurant, force a half smile that probably looks like a grimace. “Rowan,” I say, and slide into the booth across from her, bumping the table so hard her water glass wobbles. “You look, uh, lovely. How have you been?”
Emma’s mouth twitches at the edges, her cheeks flushing slightly. “I’ve been well,” she says, then immediately looks down at her napkin, fiddling with the corner. “You look tired.” She glances up, meeting my eyes briefly. “Though somehow that just makes you more photogenic.”
I recognize what she’s doing—classic Hollywood move. Insult me, then compliment me in the same breath. It’s how people inthis town tell you they see through the bullshit while playing the game themselves. I want to say something equally clever, but my brain has always lagged four seconds behind my mouth, a fact that’s ruined every serious relationship I’ve ever flailed through.
Jessie does the handshake thing with Myrna—manager to executive, hate disguised by good dental work and matching Botox foreheads—while Emma pours herself water from a sweating pitcher that looks like it belongs in a 1950s diner. Her hands are bare of jewelry, nails bitten to the quick like tiny shipwrecks. She catches me noticing and makes a big show of tucking them under the table, as if I’ve seen her smuggling contraband.
“So,” I say, fiddling with a sugar packet shaped like a tiny pillow, “are we here to rehearse our new roles as tragic lovers, or do we get to be ourselves for one more meal before the public execution?”
Emma leans forward, hands clasped like a Victorian orphan, elbows on the clean glass that’s probably been Windexed seventeen times this morning. “That depends. How much do you like lying to the general public?”
"As much as the next actor. Though I’m more comfortable with justified murder.” I mime stabbing myself in the heart.
She grins, revealing a slightly crooked eyetooth that somehow makes her more beautiful. “I know. I watched half of the back catalog last night in the name of research. You die, like, three out of five times. Always dramatically, usually with excellent lighting.”
"Eight out of ten if you count television. My death reel could win an Emmy for Most Creative Blood Spurts.”
From the far end, Myrna snorts, the sound like a designer horse. “This is adorable, but can we get to business? We’re on a schedule tighter than my Spanx.”
Emma’s eyes stay on mine, green-gold like expensive olive oil, and I feel them burrow in, exploratory, as if she’s picking apart the scaffolding of my face for the first time. It’s unnerving, and I love it. No one in this city ever really looks at you—they just scan for helpful reflections.
Myrna slings a thick manila folder onto the table with the thwack of a judge’s gavel. It probably includes everything from targeted hashtags to the exact shade of guilt we’re meant to project, possibly color-coded by season. “The campaign’s called Eclipse Together. We need to establish your dynamic early. No weirdness, no ‘just friends’ energy. I want you to see at Runyon, at Earthbar, at every place that telegraphs ‘we have sex, but also talk about books we never finish’. Got it?”
Emma picks up the folder, thumbs it open like she’s checking a bomb for wires. “Is there a section for allergy disclosures, or do you prefer we find out the hard way when I go into anaphylactic shock over your cologne?”
“Funny,” says Myrna, “but you’ll have handlers. You’ll be fine.”
Jessie, ever the silent executor, drains half her coffee and maintains eye contact with no one. She’s measuring, constantly. “Are you comfortable with this, Em?” she says, voice low.
