Chapter 11: Dee Takes Control
The hum of The Ivy was a curated symphony of low laughter, clinking crystal, and the smooth jazz piped in just loud enough to mask secrets. Dee sat alone in the emerald velvet booth, her back to the wall, watching the door. She’d chosen the seat deliberately. She needed to see him enter, needed that extra second to compose herself. Her fingers traced the cool, pebbled leather of the folder on the table beside her untouched vodka tonic. Inside wasn’t a script. It was a guided missile.
Pryce arrived exactly on time, a man who believed punctuality was a power move. He slid into the booth opposite her, his bulk disrupting the careful ambiance. He wore a smug, wolfish grin that didn’t reach his cold eyes. He smelled of expensive cologne and cheaper ambition.
“Dee Waldorf,” he said, signaling a waiter without looking. “Scotch. Neat. The Macallan 25.” He leaned forward, elbows on the table. “I have to say, I’m intrigued. When you called, I expected tears. Negotiations. Not… a lunch invitation.”
She offered no smile. “This isn’t lunch, Alan.”
His name, spoken flatly, knocked a chip off his grin. “Okay. A conversation.”
“A transaction. You have something of mine. A photograph.”
He feigned innocence, shrugging. “Art is subjective. I found the composition compelling. The golden boy, vulnerable. The off-limits daughter, finally… available. It tells a story.”
“It’s a story you thought you could sell.” Dee’s voice was calm, a quiet knife in the din. “To the tabloids. To my father. To Matt’s next studio, to ensure his ‘good behavior’ on your soulless franchise. You miscalculated.”
Pryce’s scotch arrived. He took a slow sip, savoring it, buying time. “Did I? That picture, in the right hands, ends Bomer’s leading-man mystique. Turns him into a cautionary tabloid footnote. And you? You become the slut who derailed a decade-long professional partnership. Simon would never recover. The brand is… familial trust. This blows it to hell.”
Dee didn’t flinch. She opened the folder.
“I spent a year in Berlin, Alan. But I’ve been in this industry my whole life. You learn things. You hear whispers in edit bays, over craft services, in the back of limos after premieres.” She pulled out the first sheet, a printed list of names, dates, productions. “Like the whisper about Chloe Finch. Nineteen. Her first feature. Your production. A ‘poolside meeting’ at the Chateau Marmont that left her with a bruised wrist and a waived credit bonus.”
Pryce’s smile vanished. He set his glass down carefully.
“Or Jason Milo,” Dee continued, placing another page. “Twenty-two. You promised him a role in the Steel Frontier sequel if he was ‘more sociable’ at your Palm Springs house. He left the industry altogether. His therapist’s notes, corroborated by two former assistants, are surprisingly detailed.”
She laid them out one by one, a slow, methodical dismantling. Not tabloid gossip. Names. Dates. Specific NDAs with amounts circled. Blurred but recognizable photocopied pages from old check ledgers from a now-defunct production shell company, with memo lines that read ‘talent consultancy.’
“This is bullshit,” Pryce hissed, but his eyes were darting across the names, the evidence. A sheen of sweat glossed his temple. “Fabrications from disgruntled talent.”
“Are they?” Dee leaned forward, her voice dropping to a venomous murmur. “Because here’s my transaction. You release that photo—to anyone, in any form—and this entire dossier doesn’t go to the trades. It goes directly to the legal teams of the #MeToo activist groups. It goes to the Los Angeles Times investigative desk, who I met with last week for a completely different, on-the-record story about European co-productions. It goes to every single one of these individuals with a letter offering my full logistical and financial support, via several very discreet offshore trusts I manage, for any legal action they wish to pursue.”
She let that sink in. The jazz trilled obliviously.
“You’re bluffing.” His bravado was a cracking shell. “Your father would—”
“My father is irrelevant,” she cut him off, the words final and absolute. “This is mine. I built it. Just like you built your little empire of sweat and fear. I will burn yours to the ground to protect what’s mine.” She finally picked up her drink, took a small, icy sip. “The photo. Every digital copy. The van driver. The tech who processed it. You will scrub it. Then you will take your franchise and you will disappear from Matt Bomer’s creative path. Permanently.”
Pryce stared at the dossier. His hand, resting on the table, trembled minutely. The power had not just shifted; it had vaporized. He wasn’t looking at Simon’s daughter anymore. He was looking at a stone-cold operator who had quietly been building a deadlier weapon than he could ever conceive.
“And if I agree?” he finally muttered, not looking at her.
“Then these papers stay in this folder. And you get to keep pretending you’re a producer, not a predator.” She paused. “For now.”
The unspoken ‘for now’ hung in the air, more threatening than any shout. His fate was, from this moment forward, a leash she held.
He drained his scotch in one gulp, the expensive flavor lost on him. He gave a short, tight nod. “The material will be destroyed. My… interest in Bomer’s career path is concluded.”
“Smart.” Dee gathered the pages back into the folder, the sound crisp and final. She stood, placing a hundred-dollar bill under her glass. “Enjoy the rest of your lunch, Alan. The steak tartare is excellent. I hear it’s very raw.”
She walked out, the plush carpet muffling her steps. The sunlight on Robertson Boulevard was assaultively bright. She didn’t look back. Her heart was a frantic drum against her ribs, now that it was over. She fumbled for her phone, her thumb hovering over Matt’s name.
But she didn’t call. Not yet.