Chapter 1: A Girl’s Gotta Eat
Copyright © 2025 by Sephora Inda
All rights reserved. This book is the original work of the author, an independent writer.
No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced, stored, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without prior written permission from the author. It is illegal to repost, upload, or distribute any portion of this work without consent.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. Names, characters, settings, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Sephora Inda asserts the moral right to be recognized as the sole and official author of this story. This is an ongoing, original work and remains the exclusive intellectual property of the author.
This book contains mature themes and is intended for readers 18 and older. It explores emotional trauma, addiction recovery, past experiences with sex work, and personal healing. It does not depict rape but includes references to sexual exploitation, substance abuse, and public shame. Reader discretion is advised.
Trigger Warning:
This story contains mature themes including emotional abuse, substance addiction, sex work, and image-based exploitation. It does not depict rape, but includes references to coercion and public shame. Mental health themes such as trauma, grief, and recovery are also explored. This is not an enemy to lovers book.
Reader discretion is advised.
-Prologue-
Fake It for the Cameras
by Sephora Inda
Sometimes, the prettiest lies come dressed in satin.
Sometimes, they taste like strawberry lip gloss and burn like cheap wine on an empty stomach. Sometimes, they sound like laughter through bathroom walls, or a kiss between scenes, or a name whispered in a voice not meant for it.
And sometimes? They feel like love. There’s a kind of loneliness that doesn’t come from being alone. It comes from being watched.
Followed. Expected to sparkle when your skin’s flaking off.
It comes from the flash of a camera in your face, before you’ve even had time to fix your mouth into a smile.
Before you’ve chosen who you want to be that day.
They call it fame.
They call it romance.
They call it a fairytale.
But the truth?
The truth is messier.
Uglier.
Sweeter.
Louder.
And this story, the one you’re about to read?
It isn’t clean.
It isn’t always kind.
It’s a girl with glitter on her knuckles and heartbreak in her laugh.
It’s a boy who stopped believing in happy endings but still memorized every line.
It’s red carpets and cracked ceilings.
A fake kiss and a real moan.
A contract.
And something no camera could ever catch. This isn’t about falling in love. It’s about what happens when you already did… and the whole world was watching.
❀˖°.𖦹 𝐿𝐼𝒪𝑅𝒜É 𝑅𝒪𝒮𝐸𝐿𝒱𝒜 𖦹.°˖❀
𝐋𝐎𝐒 𝐀𝐍𝐆𝐄𝐋𝐄𝐒, 𝐊-𝐓𝐎𝐖𝐍
⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯
The cameras are flashing outside my shitty little apartment.
Like flies on sugar. Like heat I didn’t ask for.
Paparazzi scream my name from the sidewalk. I’m in my Hello Kitty jumbo-sized slippers. The warm fuzzy kind that squeak when I walk. Still wearing last night’s face mask, cracked around the chin. I can taste the Sangria Roxana forced on me still sitting on my tongue. My stomach turns. I regret every damn sip.
There’s a knock. No—knocks.
One, then three more. Then a fist against the window.
“Miss Roselva! Are you really dating Mr. Silvain?”
“Lioraé, do you live here?”
“Are you two engaged?”
“Smile for us, baby!”
The window glass rattles under their desperation. If they crack it? I can’t afford that.
Not in this economy. Not in this zip code. Not in this life.
I slam the blinds shut.
The apartment looks like a storm passed through it.
Paint brushes on the floor. Half-finished canvases leaning against the walls. Pencils, receipts, a torn-up shirt, and glitter from God knows where.
And Alexis Rain.
Late thirties. Clean cut. Cool tones. A woman who looks like she only breathes filtered air and insults. She’s perched on my only decent chair in a designer trench and an ash-grey turtleneck with just a hint of beige.
Her hair’s slicked back like a ballerina who’s never cried.
And that ugly ass Birkin.
The kind of bag that costs a car. The kind of bag every girl in LA kills to post beside.
I hate it. Hate what it stands for. Hate that I want it.
One day though? I’ll get one. Just to sit on a glass shelf. Just to remind myself I made it.
Dust flakes from the ceiling and lands on her cashmere shoulder.
She flinches like the building sneezed on her.
Still, she speaks.
I barely hear her. I’m trying to read her lips, but my mind’s in ten places. I see the paper in her hand. The gold pen. The glint of a clause that could change my life.
“Eight months,” she repeats. “You follow the rules. No crossing lines. No falling in love. You walk away with two million.”
She smiles. Thin. Legal. Cutthroat.
“Just pretend.”
My breath catches.
I don’t get things handed to me. Life never just slides the silver platter across the table and says: here, baby, eat.
But this? This feels like a whole bakery.
I stare at the contract. Then at her. Then at the chaos I call home.
And I know.
I’m going to take every bite.
I’m Lioraé Roselva.
And this? This is the beginning of how I became a fucking superstar.
Los Angeles, Koreatown (K-Town)
1 week ago
The day started like it always did in my barrio, loud, caliente, and already smelling like somebody was deep, frying last night’s dreams in motor oil.
The cars were honking like they were beefing with the sidewalk, the upstairs neighbors were already yelling about the damn electricity bill, otra vez, and the señora downstairs was out on the balcony cussing out her cat like he owed her rent.
The dogs across the alley were barking like they were in heat, and somebody had the audacity to blast bachata like it was a Saturday night in El Bronx. All before nine in the morning.
Honestly? I slept like a baby. Loud is my lullaby. Give me chaos and car alarms and some Romeo Santos in the distance, and I’ll drift off like I’m floating on a cloud made of chisme and repressed trauma.
I dragged myself to the kitchen in my oversized Selena T-shirt, one eye open, feet cold, hair doing its own novela.
I started making huevos alhorno—baked eggs with roasted tomatoes, chorizo, and just a little goat cheese, ’cause I was feeling bougie. The smell alone?
Baby, that scent could wake the dead and make ’em hungry. I heard the neighbor pause mid scream, small miracles.
I cracked open the window, well, tried to. The damn thing only opened halfway, like it was also tired of this life. And the view? Por favor.
All I saw were identical balconies, laundry lines, rusted AC units, and kids running up and down the corridor like it was a racetrack. Still, it was my day off, and I was determined to enjoy it.
If that counts as a view, then yeah, I was living the dream. Sometimes, just to keep myself from crying, I’d squint real hard and pretend I was looking out over the hills of Madrid. Or Florence. Or anywhere with less roaches and better lighting.
The first was for a guy named John, fifty, divorced, sweet voice, trying to impress his daughter with a portrait of the LA skyline at sunset. Soft pinks, dreamy blues.
The second was a single rose. A request from some college girl named Lola. Classy, minimal. A little cliché, but hey, it paid.
By the time I finished both pieces, my back was screaming, my curls smelled like turpentine, and my fingers looked like I’d fought a box of oil pastels. I lit some palo santo like I was trying to summon peace. Or at least cover up the smell of paint and regret.
Then my phone rang.
“Pink.Print,” I answered, flipping into my fake ass customer service voice like a light switch.
“Lioraé Roselva?” The voice was deep. Unfamiliar. Too calm.
“This is she.” My eyebrow went up like instinct. I leaned against the counter like a chola in a telenovela.
“I need my art to arrive in a few hours.”
I squinted. “What art? I make a lot of art, cariño. You’re gonna have to be more specific.”
“The rose,” he said.
“Ohhh, that was for a girl named Lola—”
“I’m her brother.”
I sucked my teeth. “Mmm… okay. Well, tell your sister that delivery’s scheduled for mañana. I’m not Amazon Prime, baby.”
“I’ll pay you five hundred dollars if you bring it today.”
I paused. Tilted my head. “¿Perdón?”
“Five hundred,” he repeated. “I’ll send it now.”
“…¿Y el catch? There’s always a catch.”
“No catch.”
“Papi, you’re offering five hundred dollars for a ten-by-twelve canvas. Either you’re really into roses, or something aquí huele raro.”
Silence.
Not awkward silence. Calculated silence. Like he was waiting for me to do the math, emotionally or otherwise.
That’s when I knew something was off. I hovered over the End Call button.
“Time’s up, my love,” I muttered, thumb ready to hit the red icon.
“Wait—wait.”
Ping.
My art account buzzed. I looked at the screen. Five hundred. Already there.
I smirked. “Well, shit. You rich boys don’t waste time, huh?”
“I’ll pay more when you bring it.”
Oh, now he was flirting. I wasn’t mad. Money’s my love language. Ain’t no shame in that.
“Send me the location.”
Another ping. A pin dropped. UCLA.
Of course.
“I need it now,” he said. “Can you make it?”
“You’re paying for the Uber, papi. I don’t have a delivery guy today. This was booked for tomorrow.”
“No problem.”
I rolled my eyes, but I was already reaching for my pink top and short jeans and airforces.
It was 9:12AM, the sun was hot enough to fry an arepa on the sidewalk, and I was about to deliver a rose to a stranger who was definitely not Lola’s brother.
But whatever. A girl’s gotta eat.
