In the hotel room, the chandelier's soft glow caught the red threads in Sarah's hair as she perched on the edge of a leather armchair. Her fingers drummed an anxious rhythm on the armrest while Alex paced, his borrowed red jacket now hanging loose and unbuttoned over his black shirt.
"So," Alex said, running a hand through his hair, "were you planning to mention that I'm broke, or was that just going to be a fun surprise?"
Sarah's fingers stopped their drumming. "It's... complicated."
"Complicated?" Alex barked out a laugh. "Like how you handed me your credit card days back without saying a word? That kind of complicated?"
Sarah stood, smoothing her dress in a gesture that seemed more defensive than practical. "What was I supposed to say? 'Oh, by the way, while you were in a coma, They managed to burn through your savings, max out three credit cards, and possibly anger an ancient deity'?"
"That would've been a start!" Alex threw his hands up. "Instead of letting me walk into that..." he gestured vaguely at the window, "whatever that was, like a lamb to sacrificial slaughter!"
'Though I have to admit,' he thought, 'I handled it better than expected for someone who learned Greek from a menu at that Mediterranean place downtown.'
Sarah sank back into the chair, deflating slightly. "Jason… You haven't been making the best decisions lately. The transition from R rated movies to serious acting hasn't been very smooth, and you know it."
"The transition to—" Alex stopped pacing. "Is that really why I joined a literal cult? For networking?"
"They prefer 'ancient theatrical society,'" Sarah corrected automatically, then caught herself. "And that was three years ago, remember? You were desperate. The ... You know...porn work was drying up, and then this group promised connections, opportunities..."
"Let me guess – at a price?"
Sarah's silence was answer enough.
"So I'm not just in debt to the studio," Alex said slowly, the pieces falling into place. "I owe money to a secret society that believes they apparently have the power to bring people back from the dead. Fantastic." He collapsed onto the bed, sitting with his head in his hands. "Any other financial bombshells you want to drop? Did I also take out a loan from a dragon? Mortgage my soul to a demon?"
'Note to self,' he thought, 'update resume skills to include "Expert at accidental method acting in situations involving divine debt."'
"That's... not exactly how it works," Sarah said carefully. "The debt isn't exactly financial. It's more..." she searched for the right word, "metaphysical."
Alex looked up. "Metaphysical," he repeated flatly. "Because that makes it so much better."
He pulled the invitation card from his pocket, the red ink glowing in the room's warm light. Sarah's sharp intake of breath made him pause.
"Oh god, not again," she whispered, her face draining of color.
"Again?" Alex's voice rose an octave. "What do you mean, again?"
Sarah stood and began pacing herself now, her heels clicking against the hardwood floor. "Have you forgotten the last time you got one of those?... Let's just say it didn't end well. There was an incident, something about a failed transaction ritual..." She shuddered.
'Transaction and ritual,' Alex thought hysterically. 'Because those two things definitely belong in the same sentence.'
He fell back onto the bed, staring at the ceiling. His perfectly styled hair splayed out on the Egyptian cotton duvet. "Shit," he muttered, quiet enough that Sarah might not hear. "What did you get yourself into, Jason?"
Sarah watched him with growing concern, her earlier irritation melting into something softer. 'He must be feeling so overwhelmed by everything,' she thought. 'It's a lot to process, especially considering he's still recovering. I should stay with him a little longer, keep him company...'
The silence stretched between them, broken only by the distant sound of city traffic and the gentle hum of the hotel's premium air conditioning. Alex could almost pretend this was all some bizarre stress dream brought on by too many late-night accounting sessions. Almost.
His phone buzzed.
With a sense of impending doom that was becoming uncomfortably familiar, Alex pulled it from his pocket. The screen's harsh light illuminated his face as he opened the message.
His blood ran cold.
'Well,' he thought, staring at the words that had just popped up on his screen, 'can this day get any better?'
Alex's throat went dry as he stared at the notification. Jessica's name on the screen felt like a neon warning sign flashing in the darkness of the hotel room. Sarah's concerned gaze weighed on him as he opened the message.
"Everything okay?" Sarah's voice was soft, tinged with worry.
"Yeah," he managed, forcing a casual tone. "Just a colleague checking in." The lie tasted bitter on his tongue. 'Add that to the growing list of things I'll probably go to hell for,' he thought.
His eyes returned to the screen, where Jessica's message waited like a digital landmine:
"Hey tiger *Kiss emoji* How about I come to LA? Getting awfully lonely and bored here... We could spice things up, pick up right where we left off last time *Devil face emoji*"
The string of suggestive emojis made his stomach turn. 'Great, because dealing with an ancient theatrical cult wasn't enough drama for one night.'
His fingers hovered over the keyboard as he composed his response: "Jessica, now is not the right time okay? I'm here purposely for work so let me focus on that please. I'll see you once I get back."
'There,' he thought. 'Professional but firm. Like rejecting a particularly aggressive tax audit.'
He glanced up to find Sarah absorbed in her tablet, her perfectly manicured nails tapping against the screen as she scrolled. A strange knot of guilt tightened in his chest.
'Why do I feel guilty?' he wondered. 'It's not like we have a thing going on between us, and it's not like I'm actually going to sleep with that psycho.' He paused. 'Though given Jason's track record with life choices, maybe I shouldn't make assumptions about his taste in women.'
***
Across Manhattan, in a penthouse that screamed new money with its gilt-edged everything, Jessica reclined on a white leather chaise lounge. Her red silk robe draped strategically across her curves, one manicured foot dangling off the edge. In her left hand, she swirled a glass of Château Margaux 1982 – because if you're going to plot seduction, you might as well do it with a five-figure wine.
The crystal chandelier above cast diamonds of light across her features, highlighting the predatory gleam in her eyes as her phone buzzed. Her red lips curved into a smirk as she read Jason's response.
"Oh, sweetie," she purred, setting her wine glass on the adjacent Carrara marble side table, its surface already bearing rings from previous glasses. "You can't keep avoiding me."
Her fingers danced across the phone's screen, composing her reply. The message was a masterpiece of calculated seduction, each word chosen to hook into Jason's memories like a perfectly baited trap.
After pressing send, she leaned back, satisfaction radiating from her perfectly posed form. "Let's see if you can resist this one." The words dripped from her lips like honey laced with poison.
The chandelier light caught the diamond tennis bracelet on her wrist – a gift from a different actor, one whose career had mysteriously imploded shortly after trying to end things. Jessica took another sip of wine, savoring both its taste and the memory.
'Jason always did have more potential than the others,' she mused, running a finger along the rim of her glass while staring at a ring with a goat head engraved on it.