Page 57 of Bad Reputation

Maggie crossed over to Cole. “Everything good?”

For a second, his eyes were on her, and Maggie felt an urge to fiddle with her hair, to straighten her top. She had no idea what he wanted from her, but it felt—ridiculously—as if he were looking for something.

But then the moment was over.

“Yeah, I’m ready,” he said.

“I’ll be here the whole time.”

“Yeah.”

It felt as if he was mad at her, but she couldn’t have guessed why, and anyhow, that was asinine. He wasn’t mad; he was focused.

Which he ought to be.

“Let’s get started!” Zoya called.

They shot several takes of the first bit: Geordie and Effie climbing the ladder; the characters stumbling into the hay, kissing; Geordie fumbling with the buttons on Effie’s dress. But when they reached the portion of the sequence when things got more intense, filming imploded.

“It’s looking good, Zoya.” The voice came from the ladder up to the hayloft. Vincent Minna emerged from the aperture, followed immediately by an apologetic-looking Esme.

Vincent Minna. Here. On set.

For an instant, it was hard to believe that this was happening. That it wasn’t the wax figure of him from Madame Tussauds, sentient and walking.

But when the shock had made a circuit around her body, Maggie realized this was real. Real and terrible.

Zoya was obviously processing the same shock. She left David, the camera, and the monitor and stumbled toward him. “Vincent, what the hell are you doing here?”

“It’s my money, isn’t it?” He looked around as if he expected to get a rousing laugh or cheer of approval.

The crew only gawked at him. Even they appeared to be starstruck—star-paralyzed, more like—and they didn’t even know what Maggie knew. This man was a monster.

“It’s Silverlight’s money,” Zoya said.

Maggie had recovered her ability to move, and she turned toward the actors. Cole appeared to be bored, even slightly annoyed, by the interruption. But Tasha resembled a corpse. Her skin was ashen. Her eyes dull.

A grenade might as well have detonated in Maggie’s chest.

No.This couldn’t happen. It was actually, literally her job to prevent this from happening.

“This is a closed set.” Maggie positioned her body between Vincent and Tasha, and she began marching toward him.

“Excuse me?” Vincent shot a glance at Zoya.

“She’s right,” the director said, though her tone was soft, accommodating. “And—”

“You need to leave,” Maggie said. “Immediately.”

“Who’s this?” Vincent still wasn’t talking to Maggie at all.

He probably had a list of who it was worth interacting with, and Maggie was certain that she wasn’t on it. But that couldn’t have mattered less.

“I’m Maggie Niven. I’m the intimacy coordinator.”

“Oh, ofcourse.” It was obvious he thought that was a ridiculous notion.

The disgusting condescension of this man. Tasha was right: it was incredible that no one had knocked out his teeth. But they’d have to debatethatridiculous situation later. For now, Maggie had to get him out of here. She’d promised Tasha that she would keep her safe, and she was going to keep that promise.

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