Page 114 of Breaking the Rules
“Brad, there’s no way you’re walking away from this. You can’t just get rid of all the loose ends.”
He laughed harshly in her ear. “Don’t try to talk your way out of this. This isn’t some contract negotiation. Your usefulness ends the second you deliver Petra, yet you’re still following orders. Who’s the idiot in this situation?”
“The bus is stopping,” she told him evenly. They had entered a movie studio lot. Not just any studio’s lot. It was Target Studios’ gated lot with its fifteen huge warehouses and soundstages. The tour guide’s disembodied voice was asking everyone to disembark and choose a tram car.
“Stay where you are,” he instructed.
They waited until the upper deck was mostly clear. “You’re going to stand up and take off your gun.”
Waverly glanced at her seatmate, her eyes unreadable behind Petra’s huge sunglasses.
“Just how am I going to keep her from running if I don’t have a gun?” she gritted out the words.
“Be creative. Now do it.”
They both stood, and Waverly reached under her shirt to pull out her .38. There were three men left on the bus, all staring at her.
“There’s a good little starlet. Now put your gun on the seat and walk off the bus.”
Waverly glowered at the men as she carefully set the handgun on the vinyl cushion. Keeping her hands in plain sight, she gestured toward the staircase, and together they climbed down. The brass railing was sticky under her hand. The lower level was completely empty, and Waverly chose the rear exit of the bus over the front. They skirted the crowd of tourists waiting to be assigned a seat on the tram car, and Waverly led the way, jogging down the side of one of the huge steel buildings.
She wanted to get them out of sight of the henchmen so she didn’t have to worry about a bullet in her back. Thankfully, it was clear that Brad wanted one last villain speech with her before ending her life because they rounded the back of the sound stage with no interference.
“Let’s get this over with, Brad. Where are you?”
“I made it easy for you,” he said. Open the door on your left.
Waverly glanced over her shoulder and spotted the thick metal door. The handle moved under her grip.
She looked into Petra’s gigantic sunglasses and mouthed, “Show time.”
The brunette nodded, and Waverly opened the door. Sound stages all smelled the same. It was a musky scent of old props, fresh paint, and bad ventilation. The glow in the dark tape on the floor directed them forward, and Waverly could make out light ahead. They pushed through heavy black curtains and stepped into a literal scene out of a movie.
“Isn’t this a little melodramatic?” Waverly asked, glancing around the dimly lit set. It was the graveyard set for the sequel to a popular zombie comedy.
“The world loves the perception of drama, even when there is none,” Brad said smugly, holding a pistol loosely in his left hand.
Waverly’s gaze flew to her mother. Sylvia was tied to the same chair as the picture, but she was awake now. Her blue eyes widened as she tried to process the scene before her.
“Is that why you’re doing all this? The backdoor deals, blackmail, murder? For the drama?” Waverly demanded.
“Do you know how sick I am of dealing with your righteous, spoiled, delicate egos?” Brad snapped. “I don’t give a flying fuck about your set trailers or who gets top billing. You make me more money by playing spy than you ever could onscreen. But when lover boy started making noise about his assignments, I had to cut him loose before he screwed me out of billions. Do you get that?Billions.”
Brad was pacing over fake graveyard grass, ranting now. “I make things happen for the right people, and I’m rewarded. It could have been the same for you, but you couldn’t just do your job and keep your mouth shut.”
“We were working for the government, and then you decided to start dipping into other streams of income. It’s not what I signed up for.”
“You think every government operation was so pure and good? Wake up, Waverly. Wake up from the delusion. You actors think you’re so much better than everyone else because you play dress up and you read words that other people wrote. You think you’re important and special.” He threw up lopsided air quotes with the pistol still in his hand. Gone was the smooth and genial man who’d promised to make Target Productions the biggest studio in Hollywood history. In his place was a raving maniac, sweaty and righteous in his fury.
“You think you have power because you get attention. How much power do you have right now, standing in front of me with no weapons, no help, no bargaining chips?” he gestured wildly with the gun.
“You were never going to let me walk out of here alive,” Waverly shot back.
“And yet you still brought me what I wanted,” Brad said, finally acknowledging the key to his billions. “Hello, Petra.”
Waverly felt the woman tense next to her and gave the nod.
She pulled a nine-millimeter from her back and yanked off her hat, wig, and glasses.
