The last shot of Low Tide wrapped just before dawn. The three of them, Celeste, Damien, and Quinn, stood barefoot on the damp sand as the sun broke the horizon. Celeste’s voice was hoarse, her eyes raw from too many truths spoken into Quinn’s battered camera.When Quinn finally lowered the lens, no one spoke. There was only the hush of the waves and the quiet tremor in Celeste’s chest, like a second heartbeat that belonged to Damien.They didn’t rush to pack. They didn’t rush to leave. Quinn disappeared up the bluff to call in the rough cut, her footsteps fading behind the dunes. Celeste and Damien stayed behind. Just them and the morning tide.“You did it,” Damien murmured, brushing a fleck of sand from her cheekbone. His voice held something like awe, and something older, something that tasted like years reclaimed.“No,” she said, leaning into his palm. “We did it.”He laughed softly, the sound dissolving into the wind. “You’re right. We did.”She rested her forehead against his. Cl
They didn’t book some cold hotel conference room for their first official meeting. Instead, they took over Marisol’s converted loft downtown, high ceilings, old brick walls, windows that let the late spring sun pour through like liquid gold.Celeste stood at the edge of the makeshift “war room”: a giant reclaimed wood table covered in legal pads, laptops, empty coffee cups. Damien, for once, wasn’t wearing his armor of suit and tie. He’d rolled his sleeves up, top buttons undone, leaning back in a battered chair that looked out of place under the skylight.Aisha had her hair piled high and was tapping at her phone between scribbles on a whiteboard. Quinn sat cross-legged on the floor with a legal pad, sunglasses perched on her head like a crown. Marisol paced, barefoot, balancing a cup of espresso on her palm. It felt raw and real. Celeste loved it immediately.She leaned in, elbows braced on the table. “Okay, we know the pitch. We know the stakes. Where do we bleed first?”Quinn look
The city was soft in the hour before dawn. From the penthouse balcony, Celeste could see the sprawl of Los Angeles stretching endlessly west, lights flickering out as the night receded. It felt quieter than usual, like a hush that follows a storm that never quite made landfall.She sipped her tea, the mug warm in her palms, and let the memory of the televised interview replay in pieces. Arthur’s restless eyes. Priya’s calm voice. Her own words, spoken without script or spin.She’d slept after, tangled up in Damien’s arms, the two of them too exhausted to do anything but breathe each other in. She’d expected to wake to chaos, headlines twisted beyond recognition, opportunists circling again. But instead, her phone held something else: messages that felt different. Real. Not just fans or gossip rags, but from women in the industry. Quiet thanks. Small confessions. Words she recognized because once, they would have been hers.She was still sitting there, barefoot in Damien’s old shirt,
The studio was colder than she expected, one of those glass-box sets they used for high-profile “special interviews,” polished within an inch of its life, but still smelling faintly of coffee, nerves, and old wiring.Celeste sat alone at first, the countdown clock blinking red in the corner, a quiet pulse in her periphery. Across from her, the single chair Arthur Fielding would occupy sat empty, its leather seat gleaming under the ring lights.She rested her hands on her knees, fingers smoothing the fabric of her pale silk blouse. Jade had picked it, something soft but serious, no statement pieces, no sharp shoulder pads, just Celeste, clean and unarmored.Damien stood behind the cameras, just outside the cone of lights. His arms folded, expression unreadable except for the subtle clench of his jaw every time a floor manager moved too close to her line of sight. He didn’t need to say it: One wrong word and I’ll burn this building down.The host, a seasoned journalist named Priya Anand
They found the shell company within forty-eight hours. Calloway delivered the name on a rainy Wednesday, dropping a manila folder on Damien’s office table with a grim smile that said this rabbit hole’s about to get interesting. Celeste stood beside Damien as they read the cover sheet. The shell company was listed under an innocuous string of letters, Palladium Holdings, but the money trail looped back through two offshore accounts and finally landed somewhere in Zurich. “Anonymous ownership, layers of nominees,” Calloway explained, tapping the folder. “Someone wants this to look like a lone memoir, but they’re funneling real money into it. Promotion, distribution, the whole package.” Celeste pinched the bridge of her nose. “Someone wants this to stick. Not just a tabloid splash, but a legacy stain.” Damien closed the folder, fingers drumming the desk. “Do we know who’s behind Palladium?” Calloway lifted a shoulder. “We’re close. But it smells like someone who’d benefit from you
They’d woken late, still tangled in the quiet aftermath of the dinner, the string lights from the terrace barely cool when dawn crept over the city. Celeste had drifted back to sleep after Damien slid out of bed to make coffee, this time not the programmable kind, but by hand, something ritualistic in the press and pour.When she finally wandered barefoot into the kitchen, the scent of dark roast and toasted bread met her first. Damien was at the counter, sleeves pushed up, phone tucked between shoulder and jaw, murmuring something in that even tone he reserved for early calls.She lingered in the doorway, just watching him: the way his shoulders tensed ever so slightly, the clipped way he said "Understood" before ending the call. He placed the phone down face-first on the marble island and didn’t immediately look at her.She knew that look. The one he’d worn when headlines blindsided them. When Veronica’s claws were at their deepest. When survival meant fighting battles at breakfast.