Page 100 of Bad Situation

I stand and look at Dean. This can’t be good. We both move into the main hall toward the commotion from the corner office.

“Calm down, Newman,” Larry seethes as he storms out of his office after Bree.

She’s a mess. Tears streak her face, her hair’s a wreck, and she’s more agitated than a cat in a bucket of water.

“Don’t touch me. You lost the right to touch me or fuck me the day you threw me under the bus.” Bree looks from Larry to me and throws her arm in my direction. “You! None of this would’ve happened if you hadn’t shown up. I’m going to lose everything because of you.”

I still haven’t spilled the beans to anyone about her and Larry, so whatever she’s spouting is on her. Jen is sure to be dismissed as it is—I’m holding the rest as insurance.

She’s garnered the attention of the whole office and I hold my hands up. “Whoa. I’ve earned my own OPR case—do not try to pin your shit on me.”

“Fuck you,” she spits and turns to Dean. “And you. You never did a thing to have my back. I thought we were partners!”

“Dude,” Dean mutters and shakes his head. It’s been easy to see Dean has done everything he can to distance himself from her professionally. No one wants to get mixed up in shit like hers if they can avoid it.

Larry moves closer and lowers his voice. “Come back to my office and let’s talk about the process. This is not worth all the drama. They’re only coming here to interview you, not burn you at the stake.”

I guess Bree got her phone call from headquarters, too.

“Stay away from me!” She brings her trembling hands up and fists her own hair. Shaking her head, her eyes are jumpy—wrong. “This can’t happen,” she cries. “This can’t happen.”

Larry approaches her again but the moment he does, she twirls. Damn, she’s faster than I thought she’d be and the whole place goes wired. Every person who’s come out of their hole to watch the scene unfold in melodramatic fashion, tenses.

Bree has drawn her gun—her hands shaking, her finger trembling on the trigger. Screams fill the office and those who have their weapons on them draw as well. There’re at least four weapons trained on Bree and Bree is aiming at Larry.

Her voice hitches. “You’re a son-of-a-bitch. You made me promises. Promises I counted on and needed to come true. You said you’d leave your wife. You said you’d help me get promoted. You didn’t do any of that.”

Fucking Larry has the nerve to look embarrassed even when an emotionally-off-kilter agent has a gun pointed at his chest.

He shakes his head. “I didn’t promise you anything.”

I’m positioned at her side and take two steps. She swings her arm my way—I see nothing but the barrel of a gun and her finger on the trigger.

“Don’t.” She shakes the gun at me as she cries. “He might’ve started it, but you came in here and finished it. You and your rich new girlfriend, who’s a spoiled ass and should be rotting in a jail cell right now. You’ll probably come out of this smelling fresh as a daisy and I’ll be stuck cleaning the shitter.”

I hold my hand up to Dean who has his gun out but don’t take my eyes off Bree. “Let’s talk this through.”

“I don’t want to talk,” she screams and turns her gun back on Larry. “I tried to talk to you. I did everything I could until you cut me out. There’s nothing left for me. Everything is closing in. Even that old guy and the PI—they were following me. They knew. I was going to lose every-fucking-thing.”

If the room was tense before, now it’s about to combust.

Fuck. It was her?

“You killed Moss and the private investigator?” I utter.

“The PI tried to interrogate me, like I’m not the fucking law. They figured out everything and were headed to the U.S. Attorney’s office,” she cries, her voice shaking. She turns her back to me with a grip on her gun that sends my blood into overdrive. Her face turns red and a vein appears at her temple when she screams, “I was backed into a corner—you people gave me no choice!”

“Bree,” Larry calls for her again and when she shifts her head just a fraction his way, I move.

Her gun discharges.

Commotion fills the space—agents scramble and shout commands.

When we hit the ground, I land on top of Bree with a humph and she screams, writhing below me. Someone’s at my back, pinning her arm to the floor with their knee.

“Got it,” Dean says in a rush and I hear metal scrape across the floor as he disarms her. “Someone restrain her. He’s been hit.”

I’m pulled off and fall back on my ass.

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