Page 100 of The Hollywood Switch-up

She closed it. “How long were you watching me not read?”

“Long enough.” He leaned against the truck beside her, close but not touching. “What did Martin want?”

So he’d seen them. Of course he had.

“He wanted me to know he cast us for chemistry.” She kept her eyes on the set. “And that he’d hate to see anything compromise it. Or give the studio a reason to look too closely at his casting decisions.”

Stefan was quiet. Then, “He folded a threat to you inside a threat to himself.”

“In about ninety seconds flat. While squeezing my shoulder like a proud father.”

“And?”

“And he told me you have a pattern.” She turned to look at him. “That you do this. Connect, and then the project ends, and the woman’s the one left standing in it.”

Something registered on his face. Not surprise—recognition.

“Do you believe that?”

“I believe he’s good enough that I almost couldn’t find the threat underneath the concern.” She held his gaze. “I know what he is, Stefan. I just don’t know what to do about it yet.”

She almost told him then. The photo, the note, the leash tightening every hour. It sat right there at the back of her teeth. But the crew was twenty feet away and Martin was somewhere on this set, watching them.

He studied her for a long moment. Then he reached out—slowly, giving her time to pull away—and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. His fingers grazed her jaw, and she let herself lean into his hand for one breath. Two.

“You will. And I’ll be here when you do.”

She nodded. Stepped back before she lost her nerve.

“Come on. Time to be a professional.” The word tasted like Martin’s voice in her mouth. She swallowed it and walked toward the lights.

ERIKA

The next morning came too fast—four hours of sleep, concealer over the evidence, coffee she couldn’t taste. She was halfway across the lot, running lines in her head and almost believing she could keep the mask from slipping for another twelve hours, when it hit.

The set had gone quiet. Not between-takes quiet—the other kind. The kind that meant everyone had found the same thing on their phones at the same time.

The makeup artist caught her eye as she passed. Looked away fast, but not before Erika saw it—pity, the kind people wear when they know something about you that you haven’t learned yet. She was already reaching for her phone when the headline loaded—Page Eight: EXCLUSIVE—Bradley Smart Photos Raise Questions About Morgan’s Whereabouts—and beneath it, #TwoAnnelieses, trending.

Fuck.

She scrolled without breathing. Side-by-side photos—Anneliese on the set in the Bahamas, looking “vulnerable” in a sundress, and a grainy shot of Anneliese in oversized sunglasses outside the Malibu clinic, timestamps twelve minutes apart.

Martin was watching from the monitors. Phone to his ear, eyes on her, and when she looked up, he didn’t smile. Didn’t need to. He just held her gaze for a beat longer than necessary, then turned back to his call.

That was worse than the smile. Anneliese’s name was on her screen before she’d made it off the sand. She declined it, kept walking, and was inside her villa with the door locked before she called back.

Anneliese answered on the first ring. Hair perfect, makeup perfect, eyes absolutely furious.

“How bad is it on your end?”

“The set went silent when I walked on. So. Pretty bad.”

“Bradley and I took separate cars. Separate flights. I made him wait forty minutes before leaving the restaurant so we wouldn’t be photographed together.” Anneliese was flat and precise. “So someone explain to me how Page Eight has side-by-side timestamps twelve minutes apart.”

“Has Olivia seen it?”

“Olivia’s been on the phone with Page Eight’s editor since six a.m.” Anneliese leaned closer to the camera. “But that’s not why I’m calling.”