Chapter 51: Before I Go to Sleep — Rough Cut
Anthony's visit to Luna had not been a social call.
His objective was simple: use her to make contact with someone inside William's crew and find out where William's new actresses were coming from.
There was no need to dwell on the details.
Time moved quickly. Before long, William had completed the rough cut of Before I Go to Sleep.
---
A few days later, in a private screening room in Hollywood.
Dark gray soundproof panels sealed out the noise of the outside world. The air carried the faint aftertaste of cigars and expensive leather.
William sat in the center single-seat sofa. On either side of him were Nicole Kidman and Catherine Zeta-Jones.
The core members of the crew were all present. In the dimness, small sparks from cigarette tips flickered on and off, while every pair of eyes remained glued to the massive screen.
The rough cut of Before I Go to Sleep was playing.
From a director's perspective, William noted with quiet satisfaction that this version had preserved more than ninety percent of the original film's oppressive atmosphere.
On screen, Nicole Kidman was at the height of her beauty. Her porcelain skin, rendered under a cool-toned filter, took on an almost sickly pallor. The particular vulnerability and fragmentation of a middle-aged woman—fear, confusion, suppressed hysteria—were amplified to the extreme through meticulous makeup work and the depth of her expressive eyes.
Catherine, by contrast, appeared slightly green. Acting opposite Nicole, she occasionally struggled to match the emotional weight of the scenes.
Fortunately, William's editing choices minimized the imbalance. Most of Catherine's moments were framed through side angles or brief inserts. The effect created a subtle sense of emotional distance—almost fitting for her character's position in the narrative.
In the end, that faint immaturity became texture rather than flaw.
Nearly two hours passed in near silence, broken only by the faint mechanical hum of the projector.
When the final frame dissolved into black and the end credits began to roll, the screening room fell into a brief, stunned stillness.
Then applause erupted—spontaneous and thunderous.
Everyone present was an industry professional. They understood that what they had just watched was more than a film. It was a masterclass in psychological suspense.
The layered reversals, the carefully planted misdirections—some crew members who had been involved from day one admitted that only now, seeing the completed cut, did they fully grasp the intricacy of the story.
Yet amid the fervent applause, William remained unnervingly calm.
He knew Hollywood's unwritten rules too well.
Films drenched in artistic gravitas often underperformed at the box office—sometimes earning less than low-budget B-movies that relied on gore and shock value.
But he didn't care.
For someone with no pedigree, who had clawed his way out of the mud of the Valley's adult-film underbelly, reputation was the true currency.
Without a name, you remained trapped in third-tier circles.
As for making serious money from filmmaking—this wasn't the future era of short-form streaming content. That world hadn't arrived yet.
Only once you had prestige would the studio magnates—the men casually signing checks worth hundreds of millions—lower their gaze long enough to notice you.
Before I Go to Sleep wasn't meant to be a cash cow.
It was a battering ram.
A heavy brick he intended to hurl at Hollywood's gilded gates.
As for survival?
Far across the Pacific, the Nikkei Index was surging exactly along the trajectory etched into his memory. That was his real ATM.
The applause gradually faded.
Beside him, Nicole Kidman turned her head. A trace of her perfume drifted toward him.
She looked at him with an expression that was equal parts admiration and something more complicated.
"Congratulations, William."
Her voice trembled slightly.
"Starting tomorrow, your name is going to echo through Beverly Hills like thunder."
As the lead actress, she understood what this film meant for her career. It could very well mark her transition from ornamental beauty to serious dramatic contender.
And the man who had handed her that opportunity had been an unknown director not long ago.
"It's too early to say that, Nicole."
William shook his head gently, refusing to sink into the warmth of flattery.
Two lifetimes of perspective had taught him this: beneath Hollywood's red carpets lay layers of arrogance and prejudice. Until a trophy was physically in your hands, optimism was little more than an illusion.
---
After the private screening dispersed, in a quiet corner of the theater—
As the crowd filtered out and both Nicole and Catherine lingered, each clearly hoping to secure William's time—
Katya shot him a look that unmistakably said: We need to talk.
She gestured for him to follow her into an adjacent private lounge.
The heavy door closed. The laughter and chatter in the hallway vanished, replaced by a near-clinical silence.
Katya handed him a folder.
His latest financial statement.
William flipped it open.
A moment later, he looked up.
"So you're telling me… my investment account's net value has reached five million dollars?"
He had anticipated it.
Still, seeing the cold number printed in black ink made his heartbeat skip.
This had been an audacious tightrope walk.
In recent months, he had funneled nearly every dollar squeezed out of Vivid Entertainment—after covering Umbrella's operating costs and the shoestring production budget of Before I Go to Sleep—straight into the Tokyo Stock Exchange.
Like a gambler intoxicated by momentum, he had ridden the Nikkei's meteoric rise, compounding returns, increasing leverage, rolling profits forward again and again.
"To be precise," Katya said coolly, leaning against the desk, her black leather jacket outlining sharp, disciplined lines, "five million and forty-seven thousand dollars, boss."
Even in her typically detached gaze, there was a flicker—like someone witnessing a controlled explosion.
"Congratulations, William. Even in Hollywood, where money evaporates like champagne, you've officially crossed into the ranks of the minor wealthy."
As the daughter of a Russian mafia patriarch, Katya had seen cash stacks ten, even a hundred times larger—piled in warehouses, heavy with the scent of gunpowder and blood.
But those fortunes were volatile. One gang war. One FBI raid. Gone.
William's money was different.
Clean.
Washed in legitimacy.
And accumulated in mere months through an almost prophetic reading of macroeconomic tides.
Even Katya, hardened by experience, felt a faint chill at the speed of it.
"Five million…"
Nearby, Galina inhaled sharply, unable to hide her reaction. The number slipped out of her mouth under her breath.
Katya glanced sideways at her.
Another Russian. Yet unlike herself, this one shadowed William day and night as his personal protector.
Katya remembered something.
When Galina first arrived, she didn't even know how to apply makeup.
Now?
She showed up every day with subtle, deliberate cosmetics.
Katya's eyes narrowed slightly.
Did makeup improve her protective efficiency?
Or was something else changing?
The question lingered in the quiet room.