Trusting A Sheikh (Playgrounds of Power 1)

by Rosie Pike

  "What I'm suggesting is that on the one hand, you invite him over to discuss your concerns – that way the public sees that you're taking this seriously. On the other hand, you invite the right people from government to dinners and breakfasts and lunches and butter them up, pointing out everything you're doing to address Rashid's issues.

  "You do it that way, the government will be eating out of your hand," Chloe finished to a room filled with silence. She looked around nervously for a couple of seconds, wondering if perhaps she'd misread the mood in the room, and was relieved to see Omar and Tariq nodding slowly in approval.

  "That's a damn good plan," Omar agreed, slapping his thigh. "What are we paying all those monkeys back at the embassy for, eh, if you can do it all? Where did you find her, Tariq?"

  Chloe resented the fact that Omar felt that Tariq had found her anywhere, as she certainly didn't approve of the suggestion that Tariq deserved any of the credit for her idea – no matter how good he might be between her legs. Nevertheless, it felt good to get some external validation from time to time. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Abdul peering at Khalid, and realized that he was looking for a cue to know which position he should take. Unfortunately, his master, or so it seemed, was just sitting in his chair and smoldering.

  "Well, if you've got him convinced," Tariq smiled. "then that's good enough for me. Abdul," he barked, interrupting the man's own attempts to interrupt Khalid.

  "Yes, boss?" Abdul whimpered, his head snapping around in surprise.

  "Get in touch with the embassy. I want to set up a meeting with the ambassador, this Rashid character and myself on embassy grounds. Press outside, but not in. You got that?"

  Abdul looked caught between two minds, as though he wanted to stay and find out Khalid's opinion, but knew that ultimately he reported to Prince Tariq. Chloe filed that piece of information away for future reference – he might not be as unpleasant on the surface, but if his behavior was anything to go by, then Abdul was no more than Khalid's lapdog.

  "Yes, boss."

  "What are you waiting for?" Tariq questioned. "Hop to it." Abdul fled, clearly unwilling to be on the receiving end of another tongue lashing. "As for the rest of you – Omar, I just need you on the Eurofighter deal. Khalid – I want everything you have on this Rashid. No holding back, do you understand?"

  Khalid nodded sullenly in a manner that gave Chloe the distinct impression that trusting his agreement even as far as she could throw it would be a significant mistake.

  "Okay. We've all got work to do, let's get to it."

  Everyone began filing out the room, Chloe politely waiting her turn. Just as she was about to leave, Tariq called out to her. "Chloe – do you have a second?"

  For half a second, she considered pretending as though she hadn't heard his request, but dismissed the urge just as quickly as it had come. Whether this was about business, or pleasure – if it could be called that, she decided to face it head on.

  She allowed the automatic doors to close in front of her and turned. "Yes?" she asked quietly.

  "Chloe…" Tariq began, crossing the space in between them.

  Pleasure…

  14

  The text was short, sweet, and signed with a capital R. It read: Monmouth Coffee Shop, Soho – 10 a.m.

  Chloe was no stranger to these messages, but it had been a while. She knew not to be late, and that was how she ended up sitting in a stylish Soho coffee shop at ten minutes to ten, watching as an intensely varied sample of humanity flowed like a river past the shop window, someone occasionally breaking off from the main pack like a tributary stream and entering.

  "Just a double espresso for me, please," she asked the smiling barista squeezed uncomfortably behind the tiny counter.

  "That'll be £2, please," the girl replied, and Chloe dipped into her bulging, heavy handbag to fish out the change.

  "You're looking pretty squeezed back there." Chloe smiled, making a bit of small talk. "Couldn't they find you guys a bigger premises?"

  "I wish." The girl grinned, turning her head to look at Chloe while, with a long practiced motion, operating the espresso machine. "You should see what this place is like during rush hour – there's three of us behind this tiny little counter, and it gets absolutely manic."

  "Three! How do you all fit back there? You must be packed in like sardines…"

  "Oh, we are," the girl replied, raising her voice to be heard over the loud, white-noise-like sound of the percolating coffee. "Well, to be honest, it's usually only two of us at a time – we usually get Jake here," she grinned and pointed at a bearded hipster in a blue apron with his feet up on a wooden crate, who was reading a comic, "to go around and pick up the empties."

  Jake looked over his comic book and gave the pair of them a baleful glance. "Keep it down, will you. Some of us are trying to read here."

  "He gets a little bit cranky when he hasn't eaten," Chloe's barista said in a stage whisper.

  Jake didn't bother breaking away from his comic book this time, simply calling out – "I heard that!"

  "Oh, please sit down," the girl said. "I'll bring this over, don't worry about it."

  "Are you sure? I don't mind waiting…"

  "Of course, don't worry about it – I need to head up there anyway to pick up some cups, since it looks like Jake here isn't going to bother…"

  Jake certainly didn't bother replying this time.

  "Thanks," Chloe mouthed, and went to bag one of the comfortable looking, lived-in, brown leather sofas that sat at the edges of the room. She checked her watch and saw that it was still five minutes to ten. If she knew Rachel Hayes, and she'd been around her for a long time, then the woman would turn up at precisely ten o'clock – not a moment early, not a moment late.

  Chloe sank back into the sofa and began to daydream, letting the aroma of roasting coffee, the rustic smell of the old oak bookshelves that sat in every corner, and the scent of the leather sofas themselves all meld into one. She could have sat like that for hours, and would have, had the dark thoughts she'd been having over the last couple of days not once again begun to intrude into her mind.

  Was this the right job?

  What would her father think if he could see what she was doing?

  For that matter – was she okay with it herself?

  The thoughts ran around and around in her mind as though she was stuck on a racetrack with no off-ramp – just condemned to drive around and around forever. And she would have gone on like that for God knows how long, had she not been interrupted by the clinking of her coffee cup on its saucer as it was being placed on the heavy hardwood coffee table in front of her.

  "Here you go," her barista said in a smiley voice. "Is there anything else I can do for you?"

  "What?" Chloe said, startled. "Oh – no, that's great – thank you so much." She checked her watch once again and was equally startled to realize that only two minutes had passed. If she had been asked, she'd have said it had been almost an hour.

  "Great," the girl said, turning on her heel and hurrying back to serve the next customer. Jake, Chloe could see, was still ensconced in his comic book – and didn't seem to be a whole lot of help.

  It certainly wouldn't do, she thought, to be half asleep in another sordid daydream when Rachel arrived, so Chloe decided instead to fill the last couple of minutes with a little bit of people watching – and this little coffee shop seemed to be the perfect place to do that.

  The cross-section of society that frequented the place was extraordinary only in how varied it was. For such a hip area as Soho, which was usually the haunt of various different London communities – from the gay scene to young creatives in the media industry – there was also a healthy sprinkling of the perfectly turned out elderly, as well as the usual handful of writers and authors pecking away on the keyboards of their MacBooks, desperately nursing a coffee and abusing the free Wi-Fi.

  The cafe doubled up as a proper coffee shop selling all types of coffee beans and c
offee paraphernalia – and Chloe noted with interest that her coffee had come with a little card: tasting notes.

  Dominican Arabica – beautiful high notes of roasted caramel, with a long blackberry finish.

  She watched the steam dancing and shimmering up from her tiny cup of coffee until she was satisfied that it had reached the perfect drinking temperature, and tested the shop's assertions for herself. Chloe had always been susceptible to trying out new trends and hobbies – and for a short time she had become slightly obsessed with pulling the perfect espresso. Unfortunately, that habit was the exact reason she needed such a well-paid job – it turned out that coffee equipment didn't come cheap.

  First, you needed a grinder, and a cheap one just wouldn't do… After a while, Chloe had jokingly half begun to suspect that online coffee forums were part of a giant global conspiracy to con unsuspecting coffee drinkers out of vast sums of money – that there were thousands of people paid by Big Coffee to sit and write forum posts all day about how cheap grinders would burn the coffee grounds and make it taste unpalatable. And then there was the choice of what brewing technique to use – again more forum posts pointing poor, unsuspecting hobbyists towards expensive Italian espresso machines.

  She grinned to herself at the memory, and remembered why she'd given up in the end: her palate simply wasn't good enough to tell the difference between a good cup of coffee, and a cup from a local diner. What a waste of money…

  "Something funny, my dear?"

  Dammit, she'd drifted off into a daydream again.

  "Rachel! So good to see you, sorry – I was in a world of my own…" Chloe cried out, the word stumbling over her leaden tongue in their desire to be said.

  "That's quite plain, my dear," her boss replied in the oh-so-cultured upper-class tones that Chloe knew so well. "How are you?"

  Much as Chloe liked Rachel, there was something about the woman that always left her sitting on the edge of her seat – the woman was smarter than anyone else she had ever met, and sharper too, nothing passing her by unnoticed.

  "Oh, I'm great, thanks. I never had the chance to thank you for the opportunity at the Gloucester Hotel, you know. I really am grateful…" She paused, alive to the fact that she was rabbiting on, and uncomfortably aware that Rachel was observing her with the keen eye of a bird of prey.

  "Are you really?" Rachel asked sharply, no beating around the bush. "Are you really happy?"

  Chloe opened her mouth to assure her perspicacious boss that she was indeed ecstatic to have been given the opportunity to be the Kingsland concierge at the Gloucester Hotel. And then she closed it, her own quick mind looking at the expression on Rachel's face and examining it closely, all within a millisecond. The beautiful – though perhaps beautiful wasn't the right word – no, elegant woman now seated opposite Chloe was in her mid to late forties, and Chloe knew she'd seen it all before. Chloe looked deeply at Rachel's face, noticing her parsimonious use of makeup, and yet, nonetheless, how impressive the results were, and knew that it spoke to something deeper about the woman's character.

  This was a woman who'd made it to the top of her profession without ever relying on just her good looks, or her charm. She was a sharp, assertive businesswoman who, Chloe had no doubt, would know she wasn't telling the truth.

  So she decided to be honest. But that didn't mean she couldn't first ask a couple of questions of her own.

  "Why are you here, Rachel?" Chloe asked, her eyes half lidded with interest. "Why today?"

  Rachel raised her hands, which Chloe noticed were entirely unadorned by any evidence of a ring, smiling in mock surrender and said. "You got me, okay?"

  Chloe held her tongue, waiting for the real answer, and she didn't have to wait long.

  "I happened to see the Gloucester Hotel on the news today," Rachel said with a slight smile dancing around her face – a smile that gave Chloe some hope, at least, that she wasn't into much trouble.

  "I can explain…" Chloe rushed, with not a clue what she was about to say. Luckily, Rachel cut her off before she could place her foot any further into her mouth.

  "Explain what?" Her boss grinned. "Much as I'd prefer that it were different, the media is one area I've never had much control over. I didn't ask to see you to give you a talking to, my dear – I wanted to check you were okay.

  "Are you?" The smile on Rachel's face made way for a genuine look of concern.

  I –." Chloe stopped herself, gathering her thoughts and composing herself before replying. "I didn't expect that it would be so –." She paused, trying to pick out the right word.

  "Difficult?"

  "Exactly."

  "There's nothing that can prepare you for it, not really. You just have to start and see what happens. Some people are cut out for this industry, and some aren't. I happen to believe in you, Chloe. I think you're one of the people who could thrive in this business."

  Chloe was almost bowled over by the completely unexpected praise – she'd spent most of the last few days wallowing in confusion as the stress of her new job began piling up, and as she'd found herself deeper and deeper under a mountain of tension, she'd begun to question whether she even wanted to continue.

  "Really?" she croaked, holding herself together, but on the verge of tears. "It doesn't feel like that…"

  "Let me guess," Rachel said, a broad grin plastered onto her face. "You feel like there's a million tons of bricks weighing you down? Like you just want to pack it all in and give up? Sound about right?"

  Chloe nodded, not trusting her voice not to betray her.

  "I thought so. Want me to let you in on a little secret?"

  More nods.

  "It happens to everyone at first – you're nothing special. Not in a bad way, just, well – I've seen it all before. Want me to tell you another thing?"

  Chloe nodded again, beginning to feel the faintest ray of hope unfurling inside of her and shining its light on the solid ball of stress in her stomach.

  "All this press coverage your client's having? It's nothing to do with you. Look, in this business, sometimes we deal with the nicest people you'll ever meet – there's a guy staying with his new wife in the Northampton this week, know what he does?"

  Chloe shook her head.

  "Buys thousands, tens of thousands, of cheap laptops and sends them to poor kids all over the world. We had another guy last month who donates billions of dollars every year to charity. But you know what?"

  Chloe didn't, so she shook her head again.

  "Not everyone is like them. In this business, some people aren't going to be whiter than white, and that's fine. For us, at least. You've got to take the rough with the smooth sometimes, but when you do that you need to remember that none of this is your fault.

  "It's not your fault that this Prince Tariq of yours is plastered all over the news at the moment, and it's not your job to fix that – it's his team's. Sure, if you can be helpful, then by all means – but what I'm trying to say is, don't panic over it. When you go to bed at night, just fall asleep – because they will. You know what the new cycle is like – in a week no one will remember this little drama, so you shouldn't either. Okay?"

  Chloe nodded, the tight feeling in her throat beginning to relax, and she realized that she was no longer on the verge of crying. "Yes. But Rachel…"

  "What is it, dear?" the woman asked, kindly.

  "I'm not sure –." Chloe cut herself off before she could say anything she would regret.

  "You're not sure that you want to keep doing this? That's fine – it would be a real shame, because I think you're amazing at it, and I've had my eye on you for a long time now. But if your heart's not in it, then you'll be hurting both of us by continuing. Can I tell you another thing?"

  "Please…" Chloe croaked, still not in complete control of her emotions.

  "Sometimes I don't enjoy this job either. Did you know that?"

  "No, really?" Chloe actually was shocked this time – she never had so much as an inkling that that m
ight be the case, since Rachel always carried herself around as the model professional.

  "Yep. But do you know why I do it?" Rachel asked rhetorically, not waiting for a response this time. "It's because it gives me the freedom to do the things I really enjoy life. What do you want to do, Chloe?"

  Chloe pondered her answer for a second, then decided to answer truthfully. She knew Rachel was unlike most bosses, and wouldn't hold it against her.

  "The truth? I want to work in charity. I just want to help people, you know? And I think it's something my parents would approve of as well…"

  "Can I give you a piece of advice, Chloe? It's up to you what you do with it, but I got a very similar piece of advice when I was first setting out into the world."

  "Please. I'd love anything that you can give me," Chloe said eagerly.

  "I think you should stay doing what you're doing – not forever, but for a few years. The connections that you get in this business – well, you won't find them anywhere else. I've had girls leave here by marrying billionaires, and I've had others who set up billion dollar businesses. You've got this far – why not wait a little longer? If you do, I promise you'll be a million times more useful where you end up if you do. Okay?"

  "Yes." Chloe nodded. "Rachel?"

  "Yes, my dear?"

  "Thank you."

  "No problem. Oh gosh, is that the time? Listen, I've got to be off – you think about what I've said, won't you?"

  Chloe nodded. "I will, I promise. I've got an awful lot to think about…"

  15

  The embassy was a grand place, as befitted a nation with as much oil wealth as Saudi Arabia. It was a white, Georgian style building – about two hundred years old – and stood in the heart of Mayfair. If Chloe had been forced to speculate how much the magnificent place was worth, she'd have struggled to suggest the land value alone would be anything less than £100 million. The driveway alone screamed grandeur and wealth – a crescent shaped gravel drive that curved around a small, immaculately manicured lawn, upon which stood a flagpole, led up to and away from the imposing, white colonnaded front door. A heavy green flag fluttered lazily in the gentle breeze, and Chloe couldn't help but wonder whether the curved white scimitar represented on the green background was in fact reflected in the way the embassy's driveway was laid out.