The night my life exploded smelled like stale beer, citrus cleaner, and somebody else’s heartbreak.
“Last call!” the bartender shouted over the low thrum of the sound system. The place was half-empty, just a Hollywood Tuesday: producers pretending to be tired, influencers pretending to be mysterious, and me—Quinn Avery—pretending my hands weren’t shaking around a chipped rocks glass.
I tipped back the rest of my whiskey anyway. It burned all the way down, drawing a line of fire I could follow, something that felt like proof I still existed.
“Okay,” Harper said, sliding onto the barstool beside me in a flurry of dark waves and structured blazer. “Tell me that’s your first, not your fourth.”
“Second,” I muttered. “And a half.” I set the glass down more forcefully than I meant to. It thunked against the wood, loud in my ears.
Harper’s eyes narrowed. My best friend-slash-publicist could read my micro-expressions better than any director ever had. “You hate whiskey.”
“I hate tequila more,” I said. “We’re on a journey of self-improvement.”
She made a low sound. “You got the call.” Not a question.
I stared at the faint smear of lipstick on my napkin. “Celeste wants to ‘talk in the morning.’ Double air quotes implied.”
Harper swore softly under her breath. “Ratings?’”
“‘Trajectory of the brand.’” My impression of Celeste Hart’s cool, level tone was too good. It tasted like imitation on my tongue. “Translated: the internet hates my guts and the platform wants to know why they bet on the wrong horse.”
Harper pressed her forearms on the bar, leaning in like we were plotting a heist instead of my public autopsy. Her perfume—bergamot and something sharper—cut through the sour of spilled beer. “You are not the wrong horse. You are the—”
“Please don’t say dark horse,” I said. “That was the headline on three think pieces this week.”
Her mouth twitched. “I was going to say main event.”
I huffed out a laugh that sounded a little cracked. “Tell that to the stans. They’re still tweeting ‘#NotMySelena’ like it’s a political movement.”
Selena was Lila Monroe’s character on Moonlight Tides. Beloved, untouchable, perfectly lit in every frame. Lila had left “to pursue films” and the internet acted like she’d died a noble death and I’d danced on her grave.
Harper’s phone buzzed on the bartop. Three rapid-fire vibrations. She flipped it over, glanced, and her shoulders tensed for a second before smoothing. “I’m ignoring Victor.”
“Victor?” My stomach sank. Damian Wolfe’s shark of an agent only called for two reasons: money or blood.
“Wants to ‘align messaging’ before the trades pick up the overnight numbers.” She did the quotes with two perfectly manicured fingers. “He can align my ass.”
I smiled despite myself. “Poetic.”
The sound system shifted tracks, something bass-heavy vibrating faintly through the barstool. I could feel each beat travel up my spine, throbbing under my skin, in time with the too-fast pulse in my throat.
“Look,” Harper said more gently. “Tomorrow, we go in. We smile at Celeste. We bring charts. We show the numbers stabilized after episode five. We talk about your Q-score. We—”
“I blew a line today,” I blurted.
She blinked. “What?”
“On set.” The memory flashed, raw and hot. The bright wash of the oceanfront set, the grip whispering “coming in” as a flag crossed the frame, Damian’s profile in perfect, indifferent symmetry. “I inverted two words. ‘Always have’ and ‘have always.’”
