It was almost overwhelming.

And how did one keep this white furniture so bright and clean without a full-time staff?

Brianna went deeper into the house, but she didn’t know why. She didn’t know why she kept going. Why she kept looking. Why she kept—

Brianna looked behind her, but there was nothing. Nothing behind her.

She crept down the hallway until she reached the ballroom. She pressed her back against the door and leaned in, craning her neck, trying to look into the enormous room. It was dark in there, the windows blocked off by long, thick, dark curtains.

Brianna closed her eyes. She was being stupid. She had to go. She had to run. She’d just have to tell Betty she’d failed and deal with the repercussions. Shouldn’t be too bad. Her doctor had told her he had a new anti-anxiety drug he was going to prescribe for her.

Her mind made up, Brianna turned and took a step—

“Are you leaving us?” a woman asked from inside that ballroom.

Brianna stopped moving. She stopped breathing.

“Brianna . . . ?”

Brianna took in a startled gasp. Her name. The woman knew her name!

“Do not be afraid. She told us you would be coming. We’ve been waiting for you.”

Brianna still thought about making a run for it, but now she saw two males at the end of the dark hallway. They wore robes with hoods that covered their faces. She knew she couldn’t get past them.

“Brianna?”

Hands shaking, Brianna stepped into the ballroom. The group stood in a semicircle. All of them waiting. For her.

“Um . . . hello. I . . . um . . . was sent to give you these papers.”

A woman walked toward Brianna and took the papers out of her hand. She opened the manila envelope and looked inside—grinned.

“It’s working beautifully,” the woman said to those behind her. “They’re doing just what we need them to do.”

“You’re in a legal fight with Giant Strides just to get me here?”

The woman blinked, then laughed. They all laughed.

“No, of course not. That’s ridiculous. We’re simply tormenting them. Distracting them from the obvious.”

“Oh.”

“What’s happening with you is that you were sent to us by a god.”

“O . . . kay.”

The woman put her arm around Brianna’s waist. “You don’t understand, child. You were chosen for a very special purpose.”

“Is this some kind of weird . . . sex cult?”

“Don’t worry, sweetheart. You’re not going to have to fuck anyone here. Instead,” she said, leading Brianna toward the group, “we’re going to offer you the world.”

They arrived at the studio lot and a small entourage of people met their limo. A cupof hot, perfectly made coffee was handed to Yardley, and the director came out to greet her with hugs and air kisses. The whole thing had Kera frowning, which she didn’t realize until Erin jabbed her in the ribs.

“Ow!”

“You’re acting like you’re seconds away from storming the beach at Normandy. Take it down a notch.”

“Oh. Yeah. Sorry.” She tried to relax her face, but that only made Erin laugh.

“Devon,” Yardley said to the director, “these are my friends from the sober house. I was wondering if you can get them some passes for the day. They’re raising money for a very important charity that’s important to me, and I want to help them.”

“Sure. Of course.” He snapped his fingers at some poor underling and sent the kid off running. “We’ll have those passes in a few minutes.”

“Great. Thanks, babe.”

“Sober house?” Kera asked when the director turned and began to bark orders at everyone.

“Oh, just tell them you work there. No offense, gorgeous, but no one would believe for a second you can afford to reside at Giant Strides.”

“Told ya,” Erin tossed in.

“Yes. I’m well aware how poor I look.”

“Not poor. With the right makeup, wardrobe, and sex tape you, too, could be part of a wealthy reality TV family. But there’s an air of clean living about you that makes you seem very . . .”

“Poor?”

“Human. Like you care about people other than yourself, which is totally uninteresting to the media world.”

“Don’t you care about other people?”

Yardley smiled. “I didn’t use to. But death has a sobering effect.” She kissed Kera on the cheek. “Now you go out there, gorgeous, and you get your charity off the ground. And you help her, mentor.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

Yardley walked away, and a gang of people swarmed her.

“That many people around me would make me crazed,” Kera whispered.

“She loves it. They all do.” Erin smirked. “But I’d start cutting people, too, if anyone I didn’t know got that close to me.”

The intern ran up to them with two passes to wear around their necks. “Here you go.”

“Thank you,” Kera and Erin said together.

The boy stared at them as if they’d given him a million dollars. “You’re welcome,” he said, as if he’d never been thanked before. “You’re very, very welcome.”

“Well . . . that was heartbreaking,” Kera muttered as she put the pass on, noticing that the kid, as he walked away, kept looking back at her and Erin like they glowed.