I hadn’t known it at the time, but the article was a trade-off. Attention and career stability in exchange for a certain kind of notoriety. A reputation. It had always seemed foolish—and pointless—to wonder if it had been worth it, when at the very least I had been pleased with the work. Even when everyone seemed to focus on the content of the article, I’d been proud of the writing itself.

But now, knowing that Gabe hadn’t even liked the article made the trade all the more difficult to stomach.

Just the latest in a long line of unexpected consequences.

After Gabe’s article, my agent had gotten a glut of requests from the people who represented the most promising up-and-coming stars. A few actresses, but mostly people wanted me to interview young, handsome actors. The implication was clear, and there was always an underlying quid pro quo to those interviews, but no one came right out and said it to my face.

Until Dan Mitchell.

The latest addition to the second Bond film, he’d greeted me with a lingering hug and kept trying to get me drunk throughout the interview, which he had insisted take place at the Chateau Marmont, where he was staying. I declined the drinks he offered and the conversation was awkward and stilted. It was clear that he was frustrated, and that frustration boiled over when I declined to go with him up to his hotel room to see “something cool.”

“Look,” he’d said. “Why don’t we cut to the chase? Let’s just go upstairs, and you can blow me. Okay?”

He’d had the temerity to wink when I stared at him in shock.

“It’ll make for a great story, and I can guarantee you that my dick is way bigger than Parker’s.”

I had left immediately, and shed no tears when he was released from the movie a week later due to “scheduling conflicts.” A diplomatic way to say he’d been fired.

At the other end of the plane, I can hear Gabe and Ollie talking. Their voices are low and slightly muffled by the deep, underlying humming of the engines and the wind. They’re talking about work—the upcoming press junket for The Philadelphia Story and something called MOTC.

“Are you going to be all right?” Ollie asks.

“Me? Oh, sure. When am I not all right?”

There’s a long pause.

“You don’t have to worry about me, Ollie.”

I can practically hear Ollie rolling his eyes.

“I’m okay,” Gabe says.

“Are you?”

“I am. Look at me, I’m in a private jet.”

The last time I had flown, I was leaving New York. Leaving Jeremy.