Morose didn’t even begin to cover her current mindset. Each time she let her thoughts wander for even a few seconds, she could hear her own voice dripping with accommodation as she sacrificed her vision to Brian’s vanity. Then, when she’d exhausted her annoyance, inevitably Talia and Caroline’s voices would autoplay their reminders that no matter how good she got, or what creative force she wielded, genius bore little correlation to power. All the things she’d done to try to move ahead would likely be used against her in perpetuity, while others were applauded for never being forced into similar choices in the first place.

That, of course, led her back to Vic and the conversation Sophia most wanted to forget. The others brought anger or resentment. The echoes of Vic’s pure pleading proved harder to compartmentalise.

All day long, every time the pain nipped at her or the depression shrouded her like a fog, she strove to stay firm in the knowledge that she’d done the right thing, but here, alone with the ghosts of unhappy endings, she had a harder time forcing herself to swallow that jagged pill.

There was no use asking why the world worked the way it did, but she still couldn’t fathom why loving Vic should cost either of them so much when others got rewarded for so little. And now she’d circled right back to Caroline’s comments about sugar mamas who believe in something being as valid as nepotism. She didn’t want either, really. She wanted to be seen for who she was and appreciated for what she had to offer, without either of those things being weaponised against Vic. On the surface, that didn’t seem like too much to ask, and yet nothing that had happened since she arrived here had ever been what it seemed on the surface.

She flopped onto her back once more, but as she did, the sound of metal clinking caught her ear.

Afraid she’d lost some piece of costume jewellery in the comforter, she sat up and glanced around for an errant earring or bracelet she’d inadvertently brought home from the set. Only, she’d changed into yoga pants and a hotel robe the first chance she got.

The sound clinked again, and she widened her search, scanning the room for things like pull chains, or even a radiator. Then there came two more taps in close succession, this time obviously from her window.

She hopped up. Peeking through the curtains, she stopped short at the sight of Vic holding a bottle of gin in one hand and something she clearly intended to throw in the other.