Then he stepped slightly closer and made his position unmistakable.“So now that this is clear—now that we all understand you are acting, that you are trying to play husband as part of some role, as part of this so-called performancethen stop this nonsense and know your place.”There was a pause around those words, no one interrupted him.“There is nobody here that you are above,” James continued. “Nobody. In fact, everybody in this room is above you. Every single one. You are new to this industry. You have no standing here. If not for the fact that Megan is trying to be lenient, if not for the fact that she is clearly showing you mercy because of her grandfather’s instruction, you would not even be good enough to stand beside her in a project, let alone act alongside her.”That drew a few subtle reactions from nearby listeners some approving, some uncomfortable, some merely entertained.James, however, had fully committed now.“You are not in your place,” he said coldly. “And right no

Rebecca especially felt a private rush of victory. The night had nearly slipped into disaster, yes, but in the end the outcome had aligned with what she wanted most: Marcus had been isolated, mocked, challenged, denied credibility, and publicly removed. Better still, James now had a reason to hate him. That, to her, was valuable. Very valuable.Megan’s relief was of a different kind. She was not thinking long-term yet. She was simply grateful that Marcus had stopped talking and that the room, despite all the confusion, still seemed ready to believe the official version of events over anything he had tried to suggest. If the situation settled quickly enough, perhaps the incident could still be absorbed into the chaos of a party and reduced to a strange confrontation with an overcommitted upcoming actor.So while the guards led Marcus away, the atmosphere inside VIP One slowly began trying to restore itself.Music rose again.People resumed holding drinks properly instead of forgetting t

For one suspended moment after the director’s furious threat came through the line, the woman at the front desk could not even answer. It was as though the words had not merely entered her ear but struck straight through her, freezing her thoughts and scattering them all at once. Her fingers tightened around the receiver. Her throat went dry. Her face, which only moments before had been arranged in practiced contempt, now drained into something pale and strained and visibly terrified.She was shaking.Her hand trembled against the phone. Her shoulders stiffened. Even the rhythm of her breathing changed. She could not believe what she was hearing, and if not for one very important fact—if not for the fact that she knew this number, knew that this line was not accessible to ordinary people, knew that only senior personnel and a handful of highly placed members could ever have the means to connect to this level of authority so directly—she might have convinced herself it was some kind of

That earned laughter, cheers, and approving noises from several corners of the room.Some took it lightly, some heard the deeper implication. some of the women exchanged glances, some of the men smirked into their drinks.Megan gave a small laugh and tried not to let her eyes harden. Rebecca, standing nearby, also laughed and said with the others, “We hope so too.”Yet not everyone in the room was pleased.Because in gatherings like that, every public celebration had private resentments hiding under it, and one of the strongest resentments present that night belonged to Veronica.Veronica was also among the lead actresses under the broader entertainment structure connected to James’s family. She had status, beauty, visibility, and enough success to expect more from any project of this size. But despite all of that, she had not gotten the lead role in this movie. She had not even secured the supporting role she felt she deserved. Instead, she had been assigned a side character—importa

At that moment, when James gave the order again with all the force of entitlement, fury, and wounded pride behind it, expecting instant obedience simply because he had spoken, both security guards looked at one another for the briefest second, and that glance alone revealed how uncomfortable the situation had already become for them, because they knew exactly what James represented in a place like that—wealth, influence, family backing, and the kind of membership status that usually made ordinary staff fall in line without asking questions—but they also knew something James did not, something that had rearranged their fear, their caution, and their understanding of whose anger was now more dangerous.So they shook their heads.One of them spoke first.“Sorry to say,” he said carefully, “but we cannot do that.”The second guard followed immediately, reinforcing the refusal before James could dismiss the first one as merely hesitant.“We wouldn’t be able to grant you that request,” he sa