Leah Lemonnier, Josiane Balasko, a 35-year-old secretary, leads a dreary and depressing life split between a dentist who spends his days reprimanding her, a harsh analyst who treats her as little more than a source of income, a neighbor named Mr. Chpil who is a sexually obsessed party animal, and a mother who is a nymphomaniac, selfish, greedy, narcissistic and contemptuous figure. But one day she unwittingly invokes the devil, a striking force with the face of a handsome stranger, Abargadon, Daniel Auteuil. He offers a stark deal: he will be at her service until her death in exchange for her soul.
Leah signs the pact and becomes a dream-like figure capable of seduction, using her new powers to try and charm her shrink. The pact is not allowed to stand for long, though, as the archangel Gabriel, moved by Leah’s naivety, steps in and tells Abargadon that he has the wrong prey—Leah’s mother—and rescinds the agreement, stripping Abargadon of his power. The intervention is decisive, yet it does not erase Leah’s growing fascination with Abargadon, and she begins to see something redeemable in him and to fight for his soul. Gabriel, Michael Lonsdale, cautions that salvation must come through restraint and time, not through a simple reversal of power.
Leah pleads for mercy and a second chance, and Gabriel agrees to a fragile compromise: Abargadon, now bound to behave, may remain mortal if he can refrain from sin for a period of several weeks. With that precarious permission, Leah and Abargadon move into a rough, dimly lit hotel, where the boundaries between desire and danger blur beneath flickering signs and smoky ceilings. A hotel fire tests their fragile truce; Abargadon saves a child, while Leah is nearly crushed by smoke. In a dramatic turn, Abargadon saves her with a blood transfusion, an act that convinces Gabriel to grant him humanity, letting the devil-turned-being step into the world as a real person.
Months pass, and Leah, now something of a demon cast in the guise of corporate power, rises to the helm of a pharmaceutical company. She encounters Abargadon again, this time mortal, as he robs the business to steal patents. She offers him a contract—an arrangement built on the memory of their complicated past—where a long life of carnal love could be secured in exchange for his soul. Using what he already knows and the stretched patience of a newly human life, he negotiates a favorable deal, trading a future of unending love for a tenuous hold on his soul.
This tale unfolds like a dark fable about power, temptation, and the possibility of redemption, where desire and consequence intertwine in a world that blends the uncanny with the everyday. The result is a strange, morally charged romance that stays true to its mythic premise while expanding the emotional stakes through Leah’s loneliness, Abargadon’s struggle for humanity, and the archangel’s guarded mercy.
