Total pages in book: 132
Estimated words: 126564 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 633(@200wpm)___ 506(@250wpm)___ 422(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 126564 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 633(@200wpm)___ 506(@250wpm)___ 422(@300wpm)
His insistence on validating our shared past only encouraged me to spend less time with him. We’d already spent our youth together. And neither of us enjoyed it.
“It’s work.” He grabbed a stress ball from my desk, crushing it in his palm.
I tore my gaze from the screen reluctantly, taking a break from emailing a client to notify him that he was three seconds away from getting violently robbed if he continued flaunting his Rolex collection on Instagram.
I was the co-owner of Lockwood and Whitfield Protection Group. As such, I spent my day explaining to dumb, rich people why they needed to stop doing dumb, stupid shit that could land them in danger. In this case, the heir in question was not complying with my company’s contract. The agent I’d appointed to protect him complained that Vasily informed his 2.3 million followers in which New York hotel he was staying, including what floor.
The man did not deserve his wealth, not to mention the oxygen he consumed.
Babysitting rich morons wasn’t a dream come true. It paid well, though, and it sure beat everything else a man of my skill could do for employment. The other option was a hitman. Although I disliked humans, I did not particularly yearn for prison time.
Tom dumped the magazine onto the desk between us.
“What am I looking at?” I grabbed the tabloid. A shit-faced young woman with hair like a Disney mermaid was staring back at me. Her tit was spilling out of her torn dress. Her nipple was covered with a tiny yellow star. The headline read: Hallion in Trouble! Party Girl Suffers a Nip Slip.
“Never mind.” I threw the magazine back in Tom’s lap. “I got my answer—a fucking mess.”
“A hot fucking mess,” Tom corrected, grinning. “Uncensored pictures appear inside.”
“Great news for my thirteen-year-old self. Grown up me wants to know what she has to do with us?”
“Hallie Thorne.” Tom boomeranged the magazine back into my hands. “Ring a bell?”
“Should it?” I sat back, already bored with the conversation. I never watched TV. It was full of people, and as established before, I hated them. Television also reminded me other people had shit I didn’t—friends, family, hobbies. This woman looked like the type to give someone a mediocre makeover on a cable show.
“President Anthony Thorne’s daughter.”
I spared the magazine another disinterested look. “Must’ve taken after the pool boy.”
She looked nothing like her father. Then again, her father didn’t look like an OnlyFans pin-up girl.
“Anyway,” Tom continued, “I just got off the phone with Thorne’s former chief security officer, Robert McAfee. He knows me from a hole in the wall. Thorne wants to hire security for her after this incident.”
“You mean public indecency.”
“Tomayto, to-ma-to.” He laughed. “McAfee recommended us based on our experience with oligarchs, actors, and political personas. Thorne seems interested, provided we sign all the paperwork to ensure confidentiality.”
“Couldn’t he pull a few strings to get her someone from D.C.?” I frowned.
Technically, only living former presidents and their spouses were entitled to a lifetime of security from the government. But ways around it existed. For instance, if this Thorne chick lived at home, which she must, since she looked seventeen, she could “borrow” her parents’ security while they were in their premises.
Also, showing your tits in public did not put you at security risk, which told me that Daddy Thorne mainly needed someone to nanny his troubled child.
I wasn’t in the diaper-changing business.
“He seems hell-bent on going the private sector route. He wants to be real discreet about it,” Tom explained.
“Good luck with making this woman do anything discreetly.” I ran a hand over my hair. It was growing out too long. I probably should’ve already cut it.
“McAfee is still the chief security officer at the White House.” Tom stroked his chin.
“His medal’s on its way.” I popped two mint gums into my mouth.
“They’re serious, Ran. This is an immediate post. For the princely sum of 250k a month.”
“It’s a babysitting gig,” I retorted.
“Exactly. Zero work. All the glory.”
I understood why Tom had a hard-on for this assignment. If we played our cards right with Anthony Thorne and Robert McAfee, it could earn us D.C. clientele, and that was an interesting prospect.
Though both Tom and I were former counterintelligence officers, it was near impossible to get a foot in the federal door. Washington didn’t like to outsource security. They preferred to train their own, then put them on a government payroll, the cheap bastards. But once you found your way in, you were looking at fat salaries, ongoing contracts, and a lot of prestige, all from the comfort of running your own business.
Not to mention, Tom and I were about to launch a cybersecurity department next year. We could use governmental ties.
“She in Texas?” I remembered President Thorne’s Dallas drawl, which had won him the suburban housewife vote and flipped a few purple states during his reelection.