Page 6 of Sinful Desires
“Hi, Luke. It’s me.”
The suite was all marble and mirrors, screaming luxury.
A coffin for a queen overdosed on her own reflection.
Luke sprawled on the couch, shirt unbuttoned, cigarette already burning.
“I’m tellin’ you, babe, this is the best you’ll find in this goddamn city. You know what they say about LA.”
I pulled the hoodie over my head, stuffing every loose strand of red hair beneath the fabric. I couldn’t risk being seen.
Paparazzi were camped outside like wolves, and if one curl slipped free, just one glimpse of Scarlett Harper, they’d be onme. Flashbulbs. Dirt. Questions about my waist, my sex life, whether I looked bloated at dinner.
One mistake and the night would be shredded by their lenses.
“Let me guess,” I muttered, checking the mirror one last time. “Lip fillers, green juice, and soul-crushing loneliness?”
He laughed, already lighting another cigarette. “Coke, sex, and fairy tales that end in rehab.”
Coke. My chest went tight.
“I’ve never?…” The rest didn’t come out.
“I know,” he said softly. “That’s why I brought it.”
“I don’t know, Luke. Whatever the hell I smoked earlier was already too much. I just needed something to take the edge off. Two more hits and I’ll be fine.”
He dropped back onto the bed, shoes still on. Careless as always.
“You’re a superstar, Scarlett. Act like one. Weed’s for beginners. You want to give a show tonight? One people will talk about for years? The president’s coming. With his daughters. Just one night.”
Luke Conrad was America’s golden boy. Movie-poster smile, perfect dimples, a lullaby voice that made moms swoon and teenagers dream in glitter. We had sat next to each other at the Versace show in Milan last year.
Two borrowed lives in borrowed clothes.
We clicked between flashes and champagne. He said I looked like I hated everyone in the room. I told him he looked like he loved that about me. We’d been friends since.
Or something like it.
He’d sealed his legacy withThe Afterlife—a quiet, aching film where he’d played a man unraveling from grief. His dead wife haunted him, flickering in mirrors and dreams until he couldn’ttell if she was real or just guilt in heels. In the end, he followed her off a cliff.
He’d won the Oscar for Best Actor. Fame turned feral.
But I knew better.
I saw the pills on his nightstand. The shadows beneath the charm. The makeup that couldn’t hide the damage.
Luke didn’t flirt with the edge. He lived there.
He wore a saint’s smile, chased demons for fun, and hated himself with a quiet devotion I tried not to look at too long.
“What does Travis think about this?” I asked, even though I already knew.
The British cameraman hated anything tied to drugs or alcohol, anything that made our world look as rotten as it really was. Even though he worked in it too.
Luke shrugged. “I told him I’d go to therapy.” He took a drag. “But he’s not like us. He doesn’t get it.”
They had met on the set ofThe Afterlife. He always called Travis his friend, but I saw the way he looked at him.
