Chapter 1

The moment I stepped onto the red carpet for our tenth-anniversary premiere, my husband unclasped the gold film-reel brooch I had given him and pinned it to another woman’s chest.

The strap of Tessa Reed’s silver gown had slipped at the exact moment the cameras started flashing.

She pressed one hand to her neckline and caught Julian by the wrist with the other. “My leading man, save me.”

Her stylist stood two steps away, but Julian never called for her.

He gathered the loose fabric himself and fastened my brooch less than two inches from Tessa’s heart.

She kept hold of his hand until the shutters began firing on both sides of the carpet.

Ten years ago, I had bought that brooch with my first film paycheck. The words Make room for each other were engraved on the back.

Julian had worn it on his left lapel to every premiere since, telling reporters it brought him luck.

Tonight, he put that luck on his twenty-three-year-old leading lady.

“Julian, over here!” a reporter shouted. “You just rescued your leading lady. Is that the most romantic moment of the night?”

He did not look at me. His hand stayed at the small of Tessa’s back as he smiled for the cameras.

“She’s my only leading lady tonight.”

The crowd cheered. Every camera swung toward me, waiting to see how a wife ten months postpartum would react to her husband’s public declaration.

Tessa held out her hand. The brooch gleamed against her neckline.

“Come on, Mara. We should get one with all three of us. It’s your movie too.”

It was my movie too.

I had helped found the production company. I had spent three years on this project and was still revising the shooting plan when I was eight months pregnant. Three weeks ago, I had seen the final poster and discovered my name beneath Tessa’s. My role had also changed from co-lead to “special appearance.”

Julian had called it marketing.

Now he motioned for me to stand on Tessa’s other side, as if I were a difficult day player holding up the shoot.

“Mara, you already have a producer credit. Let Tessa have tonight. You’ve always been better in supporting roles anyway.”

Tessa pressed her lips together, hiding a smile, and ran one finger over my brooch.

I stayed where I was.

“Simone.” I called to my publicist. She looked up from behind the press line. “Cancel the anniversary interview. Back up every second of the raw carpet footage, and pull the group photo from tonight’s press package.”

Julian’s smile disappeared. He stepped toward me and closed his hand around my elbow, hard enough for me to feel it through my gown.

“Don’t do this here,” he said under his breath. “Two hundred people depend on this film. You don’t get to ruin their night because you feel left out.”

He did not even ask why I was angry.

I pulled free. “Keep posing. You’ve already chosen the picture you want.”

Tessa moved closer to him and turned her face toward the best light. The reporters started calling their names again. I left the carpet without throwing a glass or giving them the tears they were waiting for.

The backstage door had barely closed behind me when Evelyn, the costume supervisor, hurried over with a tablet clutched to her chest.

“Mara, there’s something you need to know.” She lowered her voice. “Tonight wasn’t the first time Tessa wore that brooch.”

She opened a private screen-test video dated three months earlier.

In the frozen frame, Tessa sat in my dressing room with the gold film-reel brooch pinned to her chest.

Julian stood behind her, arranging her hair.