Read Chapter 18: The Rival's Next Move

The sterile hum of Vivienne’s office coffee machine was the only sound for a full ten seconds after she slid her phone across the glass table. Elise stared at the screen. The headline was already burning across every entertainment feed she’d ignored since 6 a.m.

*CAMILLE VERNAY: “ELISE MOREAU IS USING THEO BLAKE TO LAUNDER HER REPUTATION.”*

Below it, a clip of Camille at some premiere, all dewy-eyed sympathy, saying the words with a practiced tremor. *“I feel terrible for him. He’s a good man. She’s just… using him. Everyone in Paris knows what she did. Now she’s hiding behind his clean image.”*

Elise’s stomach turned to gravel.

Vivienne pressed her palms flat on the table. “We have a forty-minute window before Theo’s team calls. They’re already drafting a joint statement on their end. The word ‘termination’ has been floated twice.”

The flatness of the word struck Elise like a slap. Termination. Just another contract clause. She forced herself to breathe. “What do they want?”

“Distance. A quiet, mutual end. ‘Creative differences’ or some such nonsense. It saves his reputation and leaves you holding the bag.” Vivienne’s jaw tightened—the only crack in her professional armor. “I’ve stalled them. Claimed you were in a meeting, which you are. But I need something to give them, Elise. A reason he should stay.”

Elise thought of Theo’s hand in hers at the screening. The weight of it. The way his thumb had traced her knuckles during the quiet scenes, as if grounding himself. She thought of his manuscript, raw and bleeding on the page, and the way he’d accused her of exploiting his grief. That had been before. Before the raw argument in his flat. Before she’d seen him waver.

“He won’t want to end it,” she said, more to herself than to Vivienne.

“Don’t mistake guilt for loyalty.”

Before Elise could answer, the door to Vivienne’s office opened without a knock. Theo stood in the threshold, still in yesterday’s shirt, his jaw shadowed with stubble. His eyes found hers. For a second, the world shrank to that gaze—unreadable, intense.

Vivienne stood. “Theo. We were just—“

“Can you give us a minute?” His voice was low, but it wasn’t a request.

Vivienne looked between them, then gathered her phone and notepad. She paused at the door. “I’ll hold the line as long as I can. Don’t make me regret this.” The door clicked shut.

Theo walked to the window, hands in his pockets, looking down at the London street below. The morning light caught the silver in his hair. He looked like a man carrying something heavy.

“Marcus called me at 5 a.m.,” he said without turning. “He’s thrilled. Says this solidifies his leverage—I’m now seen as a victim of a scheming woman, which kills the ‘free agent’ narrative he hates. And Cole’s people have already reached out to my producer, offering a distribution deal if I ‘get out cleanly.’”

Elise’s chest tightened. “You haven’t signed anything?”

He turned then. His face was carefully composed, but his eyes were anything but. “No.”

“Why?”

He crossed the room, stopping a few feet from her chair. He was close enough that she could smell yesterday’s cologne, faint and warm. “Because Camille leaked that photo of your meeting with Cole to a gossip site three hours before her interview, and she did it with a timestamp and geotag that proves she knew about our contract before it was even publicly confirmed.”

Elise blinked. “How do you—“

“James called me last night.” The name landed between them like a grenade. His jaw tightened as he watched her face. “Yes. My brother. He saw the news this morning, knew Camille’s sourcing, and told me she’s been building a dossier on you since Cannes.”

Elise felt the blood drain from her face. James had called Theo. Which meant Theo knew they’d spoken at the opening night. Which meant—

“You met him,” Theo said, reading her silence. “He told you about the fire.”

It wasn’t a question. Elise’s throat seized. She nodded once, unable to form words.

Theo exhaled slowly, running a hand through his hair. “He wanted me to know what she’s planning before her next move. He also wanted me to know that you promised him you wouldn’t hurt me.”

Elise’s eyes stung. “Theo, I never—“

“I know.” His voice cracked, barely audible. “That’s why I’m here. Not because Marcus wants me to run, or because Cole is offering me a way out. Because you promised my brother you wouldn’t hurt me, and I saw you cry at my film when you thought I wasn’t looking.”

Elise felt the floor tilt beneath her. She opened her mouth, but nothing came.

Theo sat on the edge of Vivienne’s desk, facing her. He looked exhausted, frayed at the edges—not the polished, controlled Theo Blake of billboards and talk shows. Just a man. “Camille’s play is simple. She paints me as a wounded saint and you as a predator. The public eats it up for a cycle. Then my team cuts ties, you’re finished, and she steps into the gap as the ‘survivor’ who warned the world about you.” He paused. “She’s not targeting you because she hates you. She’s targeting you because she wants my career.”

“Your career?” Elise’s voice came out raw.

“She was my first serious girlfriend,” he admitted, looking down at his hands. “Before the fire, before all of this. She knows things. I broke it off when I started building the clean image—Marcus made me. She never forgave me.” He looked up, a bitter shadow crossing his face. “This isn’t about you, Elise. It’s about punishing me through you.”

The weight of it settled over her. All those years of public vitriol, of being branded a scandal-hungry liar—and now she was collateral damage in someone else’s war. She thought of Nathan Cole’s offer, sitting unsigned in her bag. A lead role in *The Long Light*, a future free of all of this—if she denounced Theo. If she added her own knife to the wounds he was already bleeding from.

“I have something I should tell you,” she began, reaching for her bag.

Theo’s phone buzzed fiercely on the desk. He glanced at it, then his expression darkened. “It’s my manager. She’s sent seven messages in the last minute.” He swiped it open, then read aloud, his voice flattening: “‘We have an opportunity. Public sympathy is at an all-time high. If we pivot now, you can come out as the victim and position yourself for auteur projects. I’ve already spoken to a therapist who will co-sign a narrative of emotional manipulation.’”

Elise felt the floor drop out. “Theo.”

He stared at the phone. His thumb hovered over the keyboard. Then he locked it, set it face-down on the desk, and looked at her.

“I’m not going to do that, Elise.” His voice was steady. Quieter than she’d ever heard it. “I told you I only entered this contract to fund my film. That was true. But somewhere in the last six months, the reasons got tangled up in you.”

A silence stretched between them—fragile, electric.

“So what do we do?” she whispered.

Theo’s phone buzzed again, violently, and then again. A new message popped up on the lock screen from his manager’s group chat: *“Theo—Camille just posted again. She’s going live in an hour with ‘evidence’ of Elise’s contract terms. If she has the actual document, we need pre-approved language for your denial NOW.”*

Elise’s blood ran cold. The contract. She had the only unsigned copy—but Marcus had negotiated the original template. If Camille had gotten her hands on that—

She reached into her bag, her fingers closing around the folded pages of Cole’s offer. She pulled it out, smoothing it on her knee. “You said the reasons got tangled,” she said, meeting his eyes. “I need you to know something first.”

Theo watched her, wary but waiting.

“Nathan Cole offered me the lead in *The Long Light*,” she said. The words scraped her throat raw. “On one condition: after our contract ends, I publicly denounce your film. I have until Friday to decide.” She laid the papers on the desk between them. “I haven’t signed it.”

Theo looked down at the offer, then back at her. His expression was unreadable for a long, agonizing moment. Then, slowly, he picked it up—and tore it in half. Then again. Then a fourth time, until the pieces scattered across the glass like snow.

“Then we fight her together,” he said. He held out his hand. “Call it a truce. No more secrets.”

Elise looked at his palm. The same hand that had held hers through the darkness of his film, steady and warm. She took it. Her fingers were cold against his, but his grip was sure.

“No more secrets,” she echoed.

His phone lit up on the desk—a new message from his manager. Theo didn’t look at it. He just held her hand, his thumb brushing across her skin.

But in the corner of her eye, Elise caught the screen: a photo of her and Theo at the opening night, their hands intertwined, with a caption from Camille beneath it:

*“He doesn’t know what she’s really after. But I do. See you tonight, Elise.”*