How to Choreograph an Action Scene
She jams her finger against the elevator button. I sprint down the hall, nearly colliding with a giant metal ladder. My tackling
knowledge comes exclusively from Friday Night Lights , and now I’m trying to remember if I duck my head or my shoulders or neither to avoid ending up in a wheelchair like Jason
Street. I hear the elevator moving through the walls, and so I press my feet into the floor, ready to leap.
Hartley whirls around and juts a pair of scissors at me. “Don’t come any closer.”
She looks deranged, feet bare, eyes darting wildly, a bird’s nest of hair on one side of her head from the banquette. She
bounces in place, brandishing the scissors. The handles are pink, Barbie emblazoned across the blades, and I stifle a laugh.
“This is funny to you?” She swishes the scissors above her head and nearly drops them.
“Hartley!” I shout, because this has turned decidedly not funny. “Careful!” She looks from me to the numbers above the elevator to the scissors to me in an unceasing cycle, and I force myself to remain calm. “Listen, the panel went well. People loved you. Them thinking you were sick was even—”
“Stop, just stop.” She gulps down a breath of air, as if relishing the lack of threat from tree nuts.
The elevator numbers tick down.
I inch toward her. “Just... Let’s talk about this rationally.”
“Rationally? You want to talk rationally? There’s nothing rational about someone who kidnaps another person and uses nuts
to hold them hostage!”
“Hartley, please. This will all be over soon. That’s what I was coming down here to say. I’ve talked to Max, and he sorted
everything out.”
She flinches at his name, and I wonder if she actually signed with him or if she was bluffing with Cooper-Brad or Max was
bluffing with me. If Max isn’t her agent, he has no leverage over her. I cannot have left Blaire for nothing.
Hartley senses my hesitation and snorts. “Oh, honey, you are too cute. You think any of this ends with you leaving here unscathed?
That you’ll still be taking that stage when this comes out?”
“It’s not going to come out.”
The elevator dings as it counts down.
She lifts an eyebrow. “It’s too late, Sofie.”
It can’t be. It can’t end like this. She cannot get on that elevator. Fear pumps through my veins. “I don’t think so.” I need
to stall, to keep her attention on me. “With what you said during the panel, your time here is done. You want to go out with
grace not—” I flick my finger at her unhinged appearance “—like Wile E Coyote.”
“I’m nuanced. People like nuance. I can turn what I said at the panel to my advantage like that.” She snips the air with the scissors, and the sound of metal scratching echoes off the walls. “I don’t need the keynote. I’ll use every social media platform that exists and maybe even invent my own. My message on the benefits of AI and how it turned a pathetically insecure author into a felon will go far and wide, and everyone will turn against you, this time for good.”
I underestimated her ability to spin a good story. “I’ll admit that this has escalated in a way neither of us could have anticipated.
But you’ve gotten attention, an agent...” I try to gauge her reaction to this, but she’s so keyed up that I can’t read
her. “I have my release, my tour, my keynote. We both have what we wanted. You’re on the way up, and I’m exactly where I was
before.” Just with a Sold! sticker slapped across my soul. I tentatively step forward.
She backs up. “Stop. I’m not going to say it again.”
Cooper-Brad comes up beside me, hands outstretched. “Let’s be adults about this. I found the storage closet for the bar setup.
Aperol spritzes, what do you say?”
The elevator arrives with a cheery ting.
Hartley issues a smug smile that demands to be wiped away. “I say arrest warrant .”
Cooper-Brad looks at me. “Sofie, tell me the plan here.”
He’s willing to help stop her—for me. Or so he doesn’t go to jail. But either way, I am a strong, intelligent, self-sufficient
woman. This is my problem to solve.
I place my hand on his forearm. “I’ve got this.”
My attention shifts back to Hartley. I wait until her eyes flicker to the opening elevator doors and then duck beneath the scissors raised in her hand. I plant myself between Hartley and her very real means of escape. “Go ahead. Do what you have to do. And I’ll do the same. I’ll prove just how little you care about stealing from your fellow authors.” Her smile falters ever so slightly at the accusation. “The candle analogy you used in the panel? You plagiarized it nearly verbatim from Transparent by Genevieve Lily.”
Her eyes widen in shock, and she hesitates. I take full advantage and lunge, wrapping myself around her torso and tackling
her to the ground with a strength I didn’t know I had. The scissors scatter beside a box of paintbrushes.
My heart rockets inside my chest as I scramble off her and reach for the scissors. I did it. I actually did it. I’m both impressed and truthfully a little nauseated. And I think I may have pulled a muscle in my groin.
I turn to enjoy this moment with Cooper-Brad, but he’s offering a hand to help Hartley up. She accepts, but then smacks him
away as he guides her back inside the speakeasy.
I try to stop my pulse from echoing in my ears as I send the empty elevator back up. Christ, how did this happen? I was one
elevator ride away from this all ending in a perp walk.
I follow Cooper-Brad and Hartley down the hall and lean against the wall just outside the doorway to catch my breath. The
caution tape that had blocked the door curls on the floor.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. I pull it out, drawing back at the name on the screen: Clarice.
“Hey, you,” I say with full-on Sweet’N Low in my voice despite how she spoke about me earlier. “Quite the panel, wasn’t it?
What a way to kick off the dinner.”
“Which starts in fifteen minutes,” Clarice says hurriedly. “That’s why I’m calling. We’re trending. The convention along with
a new hashtag #MooreWildePlease. People can’t stop talking about it. We caught a half dozen fans trying to buy dinner tickets
off existing attendees.”
I can’t help but smile just the smallest bit. “Well, you know what they say about any press being good press.”
“That may have been true once, but not anymore,” Clarice says. “Not in this world of social media and crime podcasts and conspiracy theories. Everyone’s an amateur sleuth, poking around.”
I squeeze my eyes shut. “Looking for what?”
“Clues—answers. Any information about Hartley West. The way her screen went dark is apparently a sign on the dark web of nefarious
activity.”
“You’re joking.”
“I wish I were. But we need to find her before this gets out of hand. Which is why the conference director is having me contact
all our authors directly to see if they’ve seen her.”
“And has anyone?”
“You’re my first call. Since you two have a history.”
“That’s a polite way of putting it.”
“Which is why I said it that way.”
I grit my teeth. “Yes, well, couldn’t you just put out a statement building on her not feeling well? That should be enough.”
“Have you ever met a conspiracy theorist? Nothing but an appearance from Hartley herself will stop them. And even then...”
Clarice grumbles something I can’t quite make out, followed by, “Anyway, if you hear anything—anything at all—about Hartley,
call me ASAP.”
I hang up, tension giving me shoulders for earrings. I need to get to the dinner. I have to plant my banner somewhere a volunteer
can find it. I can’t let any more red flags sail up. But Hartley has upped the stakes. From what she just said, it’s clear—Max
or no Max—she’s not going to simply forget this little bout of kidnapping. (Honestly, bygones being bygones can be quite healing.)
Hair even more wild, eyes screaming with betrayal, Hartley falls into the banquette on the other side of the room. I quash the bit of guilt that’s creeping in and wave over Cooper-Brad. But he’s not quashing anything. The guilt on his face would get him picked out of any police lineup in a snap.
“Sofie, that was—”
“Intense, right?” I press my hand to my supersonic heart. “I know. All I could picture was winding up in the emergency room.”
“You winding up, not Hartley?”
I hesitate a beat too long. “Guess it could have been either of us. Both, even.”
“But in the moment you were only thinking about yourself.” He stares at me until I begin to feel uncomfortable—and judged.
“They were right, weren’t they?” he finally says.
I don’t ask “who.” I know he means Fiona and Grace and Rosie, and I don’t care what they think or don’t think. What I care
about is all of this ruining that perfectly distracting kiss.
Cooper-Brad releases a heavy sigh. “I get it, Sofie. Your career is important. I hoped to one day have a career I could feel
the same way about. But, really, Max Donner?”
“He’s the one securing my keynote. He’s a means to an end.”
“Or maybe he’s just mean,” Cooper-Brad says. “Look, I didn’t tell you this earlier, but before you clocked Hartley in the
broom closet—”
“I didn’t clock—”
“I ran into Max Donner in the bathroom.”
I still. “Tell me you didn’t pitch your book.”
“So, to be clear, you want me to lie?”
“I told you I’d handle it.”
“I know. But I wanted to see if I could handle it on my own. One last attempt. And after everything with Hartley and Harbor
Books, well, I didn’t want you to think I was using you. That you were just my means to an end.”
I hold myself still, embarrassed by how much I want to believe him. “Well, what did he say?”
“Not sure. He was laughing too hard for me to make out any actual words.”
Blaire would never laugh in the face of a writer. Blaire wouldn’t laugh behind a writer’s back. Blaire wouldn’t do a lot of
things Max Donner would do. That’s why I need him.
“I’ll talk to him,” I say.
“I was actually more interested in working with Blaire. She seems nurturing.”
She was. Is.
“Maybe it’s not my place,” he says, “but when Grace heard you left Blaire for Max Donner, she was livid.”
“And not Fiona?”
“She said sometimes you don’t understand how wrong something is until you do it.”
Maybe her morals aren’t so loose, after all.
Cooper-Brad adds, “But then she said you were too stubborn to ever admit being wrong.”
An angry scream lodges in my throat.
He looks at me, concern in his eyes. “Sofie, you do know it’s only a speech.”
“I know.” Except it’s not. It’s validation. And it being taken away is the opposite. “But it’s my speech. My chance to build on the momentum and end all that Hartley has started. I’ll be able to make that rant up to my
fans and prime them for all I hope to do. An expansion of my brand, did I tell you that I’m hoping to increase my readership
by—”
Cooper-Brad frowns, giving my feelings whiplash. “That’s still all this is for you? Your books? Your career?”
“I’m confused. Isn’t that what’s been at stake here all along? I thought I was crystal clear on what you signed up for.”
“But the panel and everything Rosie and even Riley said, that hasn’t changed anything for you? At all?”
“Of course, it did. Together they managed to get Hartley to practically admit that readers shouldn’t value what she did the
way they value what I do. Once I take that stage—”
He starts to turn away.
“I’m sorry, did I say something wrong?”
“No, not wrong. Grossly self-centered, but not intrinsically wrong.” Cooper-Brad exhales a frustration I’m still not understanding.
“It’s just, you haven’t been the one here. I’ve had a lot of time to think about how I ended up here, but I’ve also had time
to talk with these incredibly inspiring, brilliant people, all these authors—”
“Does that include Hartley?”
“Don’t say it like that. She’s not a villain. Or if she is, then so are the rest of us. That’s why Rosie and Fiona and Grace
gave you this last shot to realize it too. But you still don’t see it. You’ve been off doing what you love, and I’ve been
here following orders and watching my friend cower in the corner of a room full of nuts.”
“Your friend? Now she’s your friend, not your craft-fair friend ? How convenient.”
“She is a friend, and more than that, she’s a person.” He points to her. “It’s just the three of us now. Maybe if we talk
as equals, she’ll be more open to listening.”
“I just tried. You were there. You heard her response.”
“That wasn’t trying. You have to be willing to give something up.”
“Not yet.” Because we’re not equals. That’s the whole point. And I may have signed with Max in order to get him to rein Hartley in, but I don’t fully trust him. I need more than the plagiarized candle to ensure I have the upper hand with them both if I’m going to give my keynote in something other than an orange jumpsuit. “After the keynote.”
Cooper-Brad stares at me. “Which you’ll use to defend art, all art, not just your own.” I don’t respond quick enough, and
he shakes his head. “Maybe I could keep doing this if I thought you’d come to understand that.”
“I do understand that.” Logically.
“But you don’t give a shit. You’re in it for you.”
“News flash, Cooper-Brad, everyone’s in it for themselves.”
“No, not everyone. Not anymore.”
I don’t understand why he’s doing this. I step closer and try to look at him the way I did before, to get him to look at me
that same way, to go back to lips on lips and no judgment and no distance between us. But he won’t.
“I’m sorry,” I say, shaking it off, “but it’s too late for a crisis of conscious. We had a deal. I’ll live up to my end, but
you need to keep living up to yours. Through the fan dinner. Okay? It’s almost over. Just a little longer, and it will be
over.”
“But what does over mean? Please tell me you have a way out of this, even if it’s one you just don’t trust me enough to share.”
I’ve treated this like writing a novel, studying my character (Hartley), understanding her strengths (relatability to the
masses, arrogance) and weaknesses (nut allergy, arrogance), and formulating the major plot points (kidnapping) from the outset.
I’ve allowed the twists (goth vampire fans, #SweetSofie) to bubble up and have run with the ones that made sense. The way
out was to appear as we delved deeper. A road we’d pave into existence. But there’s no more “we.” There is just me. A great
author. Who’d very much like to stop being tortured and instead be drunk. Very drunk.
“You don’t have a plan, do you?” Cooper-Brad says with disappointment.
I want to tell him that I’ve plotted more than a dozen books. That I always stick the landing. The ending will come to me. It has to. But somehow, I can’t form the words.
He rubs the back of his neck. “Here’s the thing, Sofie, you can’t live up to your end of the deal. Blaire’s out. Max won’t
help me. Maybe this is the solution to my existential crisis about writing. That it’s not going to happen for me. Or rather,
there are some lengths I’m unwilling to go to in order to make it happen. So I’ll stay with her through dinner, but after
that, if you want to keep her here, you’ll have to do it without me.”
I want to argue with him, use my skill with words to get him to understand, but I have to get to the dinner. I can’t be late.
Actually, I can be. I just don’t want to be.
I turn from him, spinning toward the door. It is then that my eyes land on Hartley’s laptop—holding the potential for dirt
on her. This version of Cooper-Brad would never knowingly let me use it... but fortunately he doesn’t have to know.
“I have to go,” I say, fighting the unexpected spark of heat behind my eyes.
“Right,” he says.
I grab my tote off the floor and snatch a bottle of water that’s sitting beside the laptop. I hold it out to him. “She’s probably
thirsty.”
His lips form a tight thin line, but he accepts the water bottle and brings it to her. He whispers something to her, and I
wish Vance and his superpowered hearing were here.
As Hartley drinks and Cooper-Brad sits beside her, I use the distraction to silently grab Hartley’s laptop and shove it into
my tote underneath my copy of Love and Lawlessness . I close the door behind me and hurry to the elevators.
I feel a sharp pain in my chest, a betrayal of the life I’ve built, the one that’s suited me well for the past forty-nine years. I miss my blue recliner with its custom wineglass holder and my ocean views and my king-size bed and my walk-in closet that my slim wardrobe could never fill. I miss the version of me that would have never, not once, imagined that a simple kiss could mean something more. Or wanted it to.