Page 6 of The Hollywood Switch-up

Beside her, Anneliese’s shoulders stiffened. Her smile stayed frozen in place, but her knuckles whitened around her champagne flute.

A nervous ripple of laughter moved through the crowd.

“But surely some have genuine creative vision,” pressed a woman in a severe blazer. “Anneliese Morgan has built an empire.”

Stefan’s laugh was low and dismissive. “An empire built on what? Lip gloss tutorials and staged vacation photos?” His voice hardened. “Real artistry requires sacrifice, discipline, and training. Years of study and failure and getting back up again.” He leaned toward the reporter. “Not just knowing your angles and which filter makes your eyes pop. That’s not art—that’s narcissism with a business plan.”

Erika’s cheeks burned. The champagne turned sour in her mouth. No talent? Anneliese at 2 a.m., hollow-eyed, hunched over her tenth video edit. The tearful calls. The vicious comments. The grind behind the “effortless” perfection. This beautiful, arrogant asshole had erased it all with a flick of his hand.

“What a prick,” she muttered, loud enough that a nearby publicist shot her a startled look.

Olivia found her in the crowd. “He torpedoed his relationship with the most powerful director in town.”

“Good.” Erika’s voice was tight with fury. “Maybe someone will finally tell him he’s not God’s gift to cinema.”

As if sensing her stare, Stefan’s attention swept the sidelines. His eyes landed on her.

The smug, condescending smirk vanished from his face, replaced by an unnerving stillness. His eyes locked on hers. It felt like a hand on her sternum. The roar of the party, the percussive clatter of shutters—it all faded into a dull hum.

She should look away. She wanted to look away. This was the man who had eviscerated her sister on camera, the arrogant prick she’d been ready to hate five seconds ago.

He wasn’t looking at her the way one looks at a stranger in a crowd. He was looking at her like he was trying to solve something he hadn’t expected to find. And everything in her wanted to break the connection. She didn’t look away.

Her gaze darted to her sister. Anneliese was staring at her. Furious. Wounded.

Her stomach dropped. But when Erika looked back, Stefan was still staring, his expression unchanged, his focus absolute—a silent question that had nothing to do with her sister and everything to do with her.

She wasn’t going to recover from being looked at like that. She was already trying to figure out how to be looked at like that again.

“Eri . . .” Anneliese’s grip on her wrist tightened, a warning or plea that Erika couldn’t decipher.

Her chest went tight. She needed air. Needed to be anywhere but between Annie’s face and Stefan’s eyes.

“I need—bathroom.” She pulled free of Anneliese’s grip, didn’t wait for a response, pushed through the throng of elegantly dressed figures, looking for the first escape that didn’t involve eye contact with anyone else tonight.

STEFAN

The flashbulbs were a physical assault, white-hot flashes that left spots in his vision. Stefan forced a smile, the familiar upward pull of his lips feeling less like an expression of joy and more like a reflex. La cara es el espejo del alma, his Tita used to say. The face is the mirror of the soul. What a lie. Here, it was a mask—and not even a good one tonight.

The red carpet gave slightly under his Verramago loafers. Smile, cabrón. You’re supposed to be enjoying this. This was the part of the job he despised the most—the performance before the performance.

But his agent, Sarah, had been insistent. After the box office disaster that was Explosion Avalanche: The Reckoning—$180 million budget, only $18 million domestic gross, a career-defining humiliation—his image needed rehabilitation. He had to be seen, had to smile, had to remind the industry that he was still a star. Three studios had already passed on meetings. The Verramago campaign was hanging by a thread. If he didn’t turn this ship around soon, he’d be headlining streaming movies with titles like Deadly Vengeance 3 by next Christmas.

A flash of white crossed his vision. Mierda. But fate had a cruel sense of humor tonight. He came face-to-face with Anneliese Morgan in a white dress designed to be seen from a satellite.

“Stefan! What a surprise to see you here,” Anneliese said, all teeth. The smile didn’t reach her eyes.

He kept his own smile steady. “Anneliese. It’s always a pleasure.” The tabloids had feasted on their rivalry for two years, ever since the Temmys. His costar had lost Best Supporting Actress to Anneliese for Midnight in Malibu—a glorified influencer vehicle—and he’d told a reporter exactly what he thought. The word “undeserving” had followed him ever since. Fame without the work. Success without the sweat.

“I have to admit, I’m surprised to see you,” she said, the camera-ready smile thinning. “Don’t you usually avoid events like these? Or did you run out of reporters to trash-talk me to?”

His face gave nothing. “I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, please.” Her laugh was bright and entirely for the cameras. “One word at the Temmys and you’ve been coasting on it ever since. Must be exhausting, being so principled.”

“It wasn’t a talking point. It was the truth.”

Something flickered behind her eyes—hurt, maybe, quickly buried. “You know what, Stefan? Funny how your ‘truth’ always sounds like jealousy.” She smiled, all teeth.