‘Well, who’s going to look afterher?’ At that comment,bothSam’s eyebrows travelled up nearly into his hairline and he blinked once.
‘Let me tell you a few things about Goodie,’ Sam said in a low voice laced with impatience. ‘She’s taken care of herself her whole life, she likes it that way, and she wouldn’t step inside a place like this if her life depended on it.’
Nick frowned. He didn’t like the sound of ‘her whole life,’, it made his chest hurt for some reason; and he really didn’t like the thought of Goodie out there on the streets, far away from her massive dog, watching and ready to take out any potential threat that might come into Nick’s vicinity. Yes, okay, maybe he’d already seen with his own eyes that she could indeed take care of herself, but there was still only one of her; she could be ambushed easily, she wasn’t exactly as intimidating as the big bastard in front of him, physically. Nick flicked a glance over to the three faces still watching him with avid curiosity and blew out a sigh.
‘Well … can you just check on her at least?’ He watched as Sam pressed his lips together, looking very much like he was suppressing a laugh.
‘Check on her?’ he asked in a strained voice, and Nick narrowed his eyes at him.
‘Yes, just fucking check on her. I do actually pay your salaries you know. I am your employer. Could you for once just show me some respect?’ Nick spun on his heel and stormed back to the table as he heard Sam radioing through to Goodie and her voice replying with two terse words in Russian, which Nick thought even he could make a fair attempt at translating.
‘Everything okay?’ asked Terry, the head of the large construction firm they were negotiating with to build the new plant.
‘Fine,’ Nick bit out.She wouldn’t step inside a place like this if her life depended on it. He frowned and scrubbed a hand down his face.
‘Right, let’s get the good stuff in shall we, boys?’ Clive said, slapping Nick on the back. ‘No reason we shouldn’t be able to quaff some fortifying liquids whilst we get down to business.’
Nick forced a smile. For some reason, Clive’s cut-glass accent, so similar to his own, was grating on his nerves today. He looked up at the men at the table, pushing out his worry over Goodie and his irritation with Clive to focus on the meeting.
Chapter5
A better solution
‘I don’t understandwhy I can’t take far guard tonight,’ Goodie snapped at Sam, who was slouched on her sofa, smirking at her.
‘No excuses, Goodie,’ Sam said smugly. ‘Thisplace will definitely be allowing birds in.’
Goodie put her hands on her hips and scowled at him. ‘Will take man like you second to put monkey suit on; for me is as complicated as finding and defusing an anti-personnel mine in a hurricane.’ Goodie’s irritation had thickened her Russian accent, proving to Sam that she was truly rattled.
‘Careful,myshka,* your Russian’s showing. You wouldn’t want me to think he was getting to you, would you?’
Goodie scowled across at him. ‘I wish I could wipe your memory of everything I told you in that bunker.’ Sam knew very well that if Goodie had not been convinced both of them were going to be executed when their mission failed and they were captured by a Colombian drug cartel eight years ago, that she wouldneverhave told him so much of her past. It was down to her that the worst long-term physical damage he’d come out of it with was his scarred cheek; she’d saved his life. He owed her; she could trust him to keep her secrets, she knew that; but that didn’t mean he couldn’t bait her when they were alone. ‘Don’t call me that again. Of course, the arrogant prick’s not getting to me; I just don’t want to be trussed up like a turkey. You guys never have to do this for work.’
‘You sure? Seems to me likeyoumight be getting tohim: wanting me to check on you, wanting to know who was protecting you. Took all I had to keep a straight face on in there. I was tempted to tell him what you did to those Colombians in the compound after we were captured; that would have shut him up quick smart.’
‘Bugger off,’ Goodie told him, then muttered a few choice insults in Russian.
‘Watch yourself or I’ll tell Katie you threw away those chocolate brownies she sent you.’
‘I was not risking another gastric assault from your wife,’ Goodie said, shuddering at the reminder of the last piece of Katie’s sponge cake she had shovelled unsuspectingly into her mouth and nearly choked on. It wasn’t as if Goodie was even fussy; she’d happily eaten the unidentifiable, foul-smelling ‘re-fried beans’ from the rat-infested establishments in deepest darkest Guatemala, and the raw baby octopus,sannakji, in Korea, which kept moving even after being chopped up. But anything produced by Sam’s wife, especially in the cake line, was likely to be worse. ‘Don’t you tell her that, you bastard,’ Goodie added quickly, and Sam smiled: there were very few people Goodie cared about but Katie was definitely one of them.
Goodie huffed and puffed but eventually, she did disappear to her room to get ready. When she came out half an hour later Sam blinked, rubbed his eyes, and blinked again.
‘Holy Christ,’ he muttered, and Goodie shot him a warning look.
‘You’ve seen me dressed up before,’ she told him, slipping on her heels and then searching around for her clutch bag. (Instead of the standard lipstick and mascara most women would carry, Goodie’s bag contained a knife and pepper spray.) Yes, Sam had seen her dressed up. However, she was normally posing as something less savoury than a woman attending a posh charity ball where each ticket was worth over five thousand pounds. So Sam had never seen Goodie wearing a dress like the long, black, elegant, backless one she was wearing now; never seen her face made up with care and to perfection; never seen her short hair swept back from her face and secured stylishly at the back of her head. She handed him a familiar pot of skin-coloured cream and he stood up to take it.
‘Where are your weapons?’ he asked after he’d started the process of covering up the scars on Goodie’s back and shoulders. She showed him the contents of her bag and then pulled the long slit at the side of her leg to the side to reveal a discreet holster on her upper thigh with a knife and a small handgun attached. Sam nodded, then watched as she stepped into four-inch heels that looked like some sort of torture device for feet. He almost felt sorry for that rich bastard now.
* * *
‘Ed, you look fine,’muttered Nick impatiently. ‘Seriously, we’ve got to go.’
‘Can’t you just potter off to this one without me?’ Ed said in a small voice. ‘There’s no way I’ll fit in somewhere proper posh like that.’
Nick sighed, eyeing Ed’s lanky form in his ill-fitting suit and his mass of uncontrollable chestnut hair. ‘Of course, you’ll fit in,’ he lied smoothly. ‘Anyway, you’re a bloody genius; who cares what you wear?’ Ed shifted uncomfortably whilst Nick adjusted the cufflink on his own tux; in contrast, his was perfectly fitted, as you would expect from Savile Row. On reflection he should have thought about taking Ed to a tailor himself, but how was he to know that Ed would opt for the Marks & Spencer disaster his mum had bought him a few years ago. Well, it was too late now. ‘Come on, mate, you can do this, okay? There’s going to be all sorts of people there interested in your advances and we need to get it out there – the time for lurking in the shadows is over, my friend.’ Nick herded him out the door and to the lift. He was so focused on making sure Ed actually made it out of the flat that he didn’t see her until she slipped into the lift after them, and that was when his brain shut down.
‘Oh, hi, Goodie,’ Ed mumbled, more intent on fiddling with his sleeves to try to get them to reach his wrists than taking in the woman standing next to them. Goodie gave him a curt nod (they were all now used to the non-verbal responses she employed wherever possible), and after a few more seconds she flicked a glance over to Nick.
