It had only taken Henry a day to reach out to me after the gala. I appreciated how fast he’d worked. I also appreciated the monster connection he’d hooked me up with. Ralph Anderson was a guy I’d been fucking dying to get in the same room with since I became an agent. He was the most talented director in the industry, and he held the record for the most awards. His films weren’t just stories; they were experiences that captivated you so hard, you forgot you were watching a movie.

Ralph didn’t meet with agents. He didn’t hold auditions either. His team called the actors Ralph wanted to work with, and private auditions were then held to make sure it was a good fit. The only way to get into an Anderson film was to be the best in the business and hope to hell someone from his team noticed you.

Not one of my clients had gotten that phone call.

So, when I’d spoken to Ralph’s team and found out he wanted to meet immediately, I had known I had to get us on a plane. The call from the detective couldn’t have worked out more perfectly because it meant I didn’t have to tell James about Ralph until we were outside his house. Had I told her, she would have been a mess during the flight and at the police station, and I didn’t want that kind of pressure weighing on her.

It was a good decision because, as I looked at her now, seconds before the butler reached her door, I was worried she was going to throw up.

Quickly, I lifted my hand off her leg and brushed my fingers across the back of her neck, giving her a last bit of encouragement. “Fucking kill it, baby,” I whispered and then moved away from her, so the butler didn’t see.

“I’m going to kill you,” she said softly over her shoulder, sliding out of the back once the door opened.

I walked behind her, following the butler into a large sitting room, and took the chair next to James’s.

“Can I get you anything to drink?” the butler asked.

“Water, please,” James said.

He looked at me, and I nodded, silently asking for the same.

I was close enough to see every breath she inhaled, how her chest rose and fell, how her hands fidgeted in her lap. She crossed her legs, and her fingers moved to the ankle of her jeans, running her nails across the hem.

She was nervous as hell.

“James,” I said and waited for her to glance at me before I added, “stop thinking about why you’re here. Stop worrying about what you’re going to say. I just want you to think about what you were doing around midnight last night.”

In case the cameras in the corners of the room were able to pick up sound, I didn’t want to say she had been on her back at midnight with her legs spread and my face between them. But it was around that time and over the next thirty minutes that my tongue had been on her cunt, and she’d been screaming through each orgasm I gave her.

The expression on her face told me she remembered.

But it was gone the second the butler returned with two glasses of water. He set them on the side table next to our chairs.

As he left, Ralph came right in and said, “I didn’t mean to keep you waiting.”

He walked over to me first, and I stood to shake his hand, surprised by how young he appeared in person. He didn’t attend industry parties, just award shows, so I’d only seen him on camera, and it had aged him older than fifty.

“It’s a pleasure,” I said, taking in his grip that was as firm as mine.

“My golfing buddy, Henry, doesn’t praise many people, and he had some nice things to say about you. Therefore, I knew you were someone I had to meet.”

“Thank you for giving me the time.”

He released my hand and moved over to James. “It’s nice to meet you, Miss Ryne. I was just upstairs in my screening room, reviewing your last release.”

She surrounded his hand with both of hers. “Wow. Thank you. I’m a huge fan, and I’m so honored you were willing to meet me.”

She sounded humble, but I could still hear the anxiety in her tone.

Neither of us sat until Ralph walked to the other side of the coffee table where he took a seat on the couch. That was when the butler came back in and placed a can of soda in front of him.

“Tell me something, James,” Ralph said once we were alone. “What type of role are you looking for?”

She paused, and I could tell she was thinking about his question. “I want one that challenges me.”

She could do better than that.

“You haven’t been challenged so far in your career?” he asked.

She was thinking again but finally said, “Not emotionally, no.”

I wanted to reach across the space between us and shake the hell out of her. Her short answers weren’t going to impress him. They were flat, generic. They showed him nothing.

“Explain,” he said.

And, again, she stalled before slowly parting her lips. “The roles I’ve taken had me act with such basic human emotions—love and sadness. I’m not opposed to either, of course, but I want to dig deeper. I want to read a script and feel the full range, my chest pounding, my tears streaming, my stomach churning. Angst and anger and pain and courage. I’ve experienced them all in my life, and I want to channel those memories. I want to feel the script. I want to become the character. But I don’t want to be known as an actress who can only do love and sadness.”

That was my fucking girl.

She was finally turning it around.

Ralph crossed his legs and put his pointer fingers in a steeple under his nose. “About ten years ago, I released a movie called Burnt Away. It’s about a team of firefighters who go into a high-rise that’s on fire. Once they get inside, the entire building explodes. It was an act of terrorism, and only two out of the twenty-five survive.”

“The sole female on the team and the rookie were the only ones who made it out alive,” she said.

“You’ve seen it.”

She smiled. “It’s one of my favorites.”

Ralph’s eyes narrowed. He was looking at her differently now.

I was, too, with so much fucking pride in my eyes.

“It took me months to cast that role,” he said. “Everyone I called in wasn’t right for the part. I needed someone to forget that there were cameras, that there was lighting, that there were lines to read. I needed that person to live in the moment. When actors came in, I made them audition the hardest scene in the film. The one where the female was in the hospital, and she’d just gotten her hands treated for third-degree burns. As she processed what had just happened to her and her squad, she moved into the corner of the room, and she rocked in a ball, losing herself, screaming out in so much pain.”

I remembered the scene well. The actress had won an Oscar.

“May I be frank?” James asked.

I wanted to smile but didn’t.

“Please,” he said.

“I heard the pain in her sobs, and I saw it on her lips, but it didn’t make it all the way to her eyes. It stopped at her cheeks and didn’t go further.”

His hands dropped, and he rested them on his knee. “You’re right.”

She had balls, and I wanted to fucking kiss her for it.

“She did a wonderful job,” James added, “but her eyes lacked emotion almost the entire film.”

“You’re right again.” He stared at her, and I would kill to know what he was thinking. “Show me your version.”

“Right now?”

He nodded. “Yes.”

I knew our meeting would be short. I had a feeling it would only take a few minutes before he knew if James would fit into one of his roles.

I knew this was the moment that, if she nailed it, would change her future.

I felt the pressure in my chest, so I could only fucking imagine how heavy it was for her.

Slowly, James held out her hands and gazed at them like she’d never seen them before. Her fingers shook and twitched, her mouth opening as she moved her hands around her face, checking them at every angle.

She gasped, the air getting caught, and a choking sound released from her throat.

She slapped her hands on the armrests, screaming as they hit the wood, the pain so great that her ass fell from the chair. She landed hard, crying out once more, and tumbled forward until her palms banged on the floor.

“Nooo.”

It wasn’t a scream. It was an emotion that came out, and it followed her as she crawled to the corner of the fireplace before falling once again on her ass.

Her body rocked.

Her eyes widened.

Tears streamed so goddamn fast, I wanted to wipe them away.

“They’re gone,” she whispered through sobs.

She might have been talking about the firefighters who had been lost in the explosion, but James was pulling from the time she’d lived in her closet, her career gone, her naked body exposed to the world.

I saw that in her face. I heard it in her voice.

It reflected in her fucking eyes.

She didn’t need a script. She didn’t need a camera or lights or a set.

This was what she was meant to do, and she gave it everything she had.

When she finished, when there was no air left in her lungs, when the camera would have zoomed out for the next shot, she wiped her face and finally looked at the two of us.

No one spoke for several minutes until Ralph said, “It’s too bad you were just a young kid when I casted that role. Had the actress done what you just did there, Burnt Away would have been my favorite movie, too.”

I watched her swallow, and then I saw the shock register across her face.

“There’s a difference between someone who’s studied their craft and someone who was born with natural talent. I’ve worked with both, but natural is a rare find. I’ve put some of the most educated actors into roles no larger than a walk-on because that’s what they deserve. But not you, Miss Ryne. You’re raw. You’re natural. What’s holding you back is life. Once you get that part figured out, you’ll be unstoppable. Mark my words.”

Jesus fucking Christ.

I ran my fingers through my beard to hide the smile on my mouth.

“It’s time for me to go,” Ralph said and stood.

James thanked him, and I did as well, shaking his hand like a goddamn robot because I still couldn’t believe his reaction to her. As soon as he walked out, the butler appeared, and he took us down the hall and toward the front door.

Once we climbed into the back of the SUV, James turned toward me with tears in her eyes.

Real ones.

Ones that had come from happiness, not because she was in a hospital room with burned hands.

“Brett, what the hell just happened?”

I shook my head, licking across my bottom lip, thinking of the ways I was going to fucking devour her on the plane. “You just killed it, baby.”