Fifth Victim

by Zoe Sharp

  ‘He records his parents’ infidelities,’ Caroline Willner said, as if reporting on a mildly inferior play. ‘Dreadful habit. One can’t be seen to disapprove of him, of course, but it might be wise if you were to warn Dina that if she really must sleep with the boy, then to do it at a place of her choosing, otherwise she might find herself somewhat exposed on YouTube.’

  I nearly choked at that and had to put my glass down quickly, reaching for a napkin to blot my mouth. When I could speak again, I grinned at her, wondering if my mother had ever remotely considered handing out such practical and down-to-earth advice. ‘You wouldn’t care to adopt me, by any chance?’

  She gave me a slight smile. ‘You’re very good for Dina,’ she said. ‘You’ve given her focus, confidence, shown her what’s important.’

  My eyebrows went up again. ‘I’ve known her a matter of days.’

  ‘Nevertheless. You took her to see your young man – Sean, is it?’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ I admitted. ‘Yes I did.’ Parker had not approved, citing a variety of reasons from scaring my principal to involving her in my private life, neither of which he recommended. These people, he’d reminded me, were not my friends. I should not take them into my confidence and expect them to care. ‘I’m sorry if you disapprove—’

  ‘Quite the contrary,’ she said briskly. ‘It demonstrated beyond all doubt that the matter of her personal safety is not a game, and should not be treated as such, however lightly her friends seem to take their own experiences.’

  ‘I would have thought that Benedict’s missing finger would be a permanent reminder,’ I said.

  Over to my left, the Korean guitarist was engrossed in the piece she was playing, head down and eyes closed as her fingers caressed the strings of her instrument. I wondered if she was the cause of Benedict’s enduring bad mood this evening. Or part of it, at least.

  Caroline Willner followed my gaze and passed me a shrewd look. ‘Benedict Benelli was never as keen on becoming a classical musician as his family were on pushing him in that direction,’ she said. ‘And he could still pursue that path, if he so chose.’

  ‘With a missing finger?’ I queried. ‘Wouldn’t that be a little difficult?’

  ‘He lost the little finger of his right hand,’ Caroline Willner said, dismissive. ‘Unless he was planning to take up flamenco, that’s the one finger a classical guitarist does not use.’ She gestured towards the stage. ‘If you watch the girl’s hands carefully, you’ll see for yourself.’

  For a few moments I did, and although it was sometimes hard to tell, with the angle the Korean girl held her wrist, and the incredible dexterity of her fingers, I realised that Caroline Willner was entirely correct. I’d watched classical guitarists play before and it had always seemed like they had about ten extra fingers on each hand, never mind failing to utilise all the ones they had. It was the kind of snippet Sean would find interesting. I suppressed the instant twinge of associated thoughts and simply made a mental note to tell him about it, the next time I visited.

  Out on the dance floor, Hunt had managed to disentangle himself from Orlando and cut in on Parker, although with great courtesy. If Dina showed a faint flicker of disappointment to have her dance with my boss cut short, Hunt soon proved adequate compensation. Parker headed back to the table and gave me a slight bow.

  ‘I’ve been rejected,’ he said gravely. ‘Can I rely on you to bolster my flagging ego, Charlie?’

  I knew he was only asking in order for us to be nearer to Dina, but it was a nice way of asking. I glanced at Caroline, feeling rude to abandon her in mid conversation, but she waved me up. As we walked back towards the other dancers, though, I could feel her watching the pair of us with that astute gaze.

  I had learnt the basics of not treading on my partner’s toes to music while I was still at school, at the urging of my mother. I think she had more or less despaired of me turning into a young lady by then, but that didn’t mean I had to entirely lack the social graces.

  Ironically, I’d brushed up my rusty skills more since going into close protection than I ever had before. Nothing allows you to stick close to a principal at a formal party than being able to dance right next to them, I’d found. Particularly if you can do it without looking like an elephant in evening dress. I caught sight of Torquil’s bodyguard blundering around the floor with a long-suffering Gleason in tow, and was suddenly thankful for my mother’s stubborn insistence.

  Parker caught the direction of my gaze and smiled. ‘Yeah, it’s not hard to see why Eisenberg offered you a job.’

  I stared. There hadn’t yet been an opportunity to give my boss the gist of that conversation when I hadn’t been able to feel Brandon Eisenberg’s eyes boring into the back of my neck. ‘Did he hire a skywriter?’ I demanded sourly. ‘How the hell did you know that?’

  ‘Because when I came back to the table after that dance with Mrs Willner, you looked like you wanted to rip off his head and spit down his neck,’ Parker said wryly. ‘And it’s what I would have done.’

  And I thought I’d hidden it so well. ‘What – ripped his head off?’

  Another smile, one that crinkled his eyes. ‘No, offered you a job.’

  ‘You wouldn’t have been quite so crass about it.’

  ‘Thank you – I guess,’ he said. He paused. ‘Mrs Willner thinks you’re a positive influence on her daughter, by the way.’

  ‘I’m doing my best,’ I said. ‘According to Dina, her mother’s the one trying to hustle her over to Europe.’

  Parker nodded. ‘Uh-huh, and did she say why she’s refusing?’

  ‘Pig-headedness, mainly. Disguised as not wanting to give in and run away from danger.’

  He sighed. ‘It’s never the cowards who get us killed,’ he said, then seemed to realise the implications of that. I felt his back stiffen under my resting hand.

  ‘Don’t say it,’ I said lightly. ‘You’ll lose concentration and trample on me.’

  His muscles eased a fraction. ‘Just be careful. In a lot of ways, Dina’s younger than she looks. Don’t let her put you on a pedestal.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I keep putting my foot in it too frequently for that.’

  ‘I don’t know – you seem pretty light on your feet to me.’ He smiled again. ‘You dance well. Another of your talents.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, and recalled his earlier compliment, and my reaction to it. ‘Look, Parker, back at the Willners’ place, you said—’

  ‘That I was sorry?’ he said. ‘I … embarrassed you, in front of a client. That was out of line.’

  ‘Embarrassed me?’ I shrugged, eyes over his shoulder to keep a watch on Dina, but her body language was perfectly relaxed. ‘All you did was tell me I looked nice.’

  ‘No, I said you looked wonderful. There’s a difference.’

  My gaze snapped back to his. ‘Yes, you did,’ I murmured, feeling my skin heat, my mouth dry. Almost with shock, I recognised the signs of my own arousal. ‘Parker, I’m—’

  ‘I know,’ he said softly. ‘I know. Just dance, Charlie.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  It was a while before either of us spoke after that. Why Parker kept his own counsel, I can only guess. Me, because I couldn’t think of a damn thing to say that wouldn’t make things ten times worse – for both of us.

  Parker was my boss, Sean’s partner, our friend. He’d been a shoulder to lean on. More than that, he’d been a rock in a storm-lashed sea, and I’d clung to the support he’d offered since Sean’s injury. But I’d never expected for a moment that I’d start to fall for him, with all the emotional turmoil that entailed.

  The music eventually segued into another number and Hunt, with gallant reluctance, led Dina back to her table. Parker and I followed suit. Torquil, laughing, declined to release Manda and swept her into another dance. He’d lost his miserable air, but I think that had more to do with making Gleason stay on the floor with Lurch. Torquil’s bodyguard had long since exhausted his repertoire of da
nce steps and the pair of them were looking increasingly uncomfortable.

  If Torquil wasn’t careful, I thought, his own team would knock him off just to be rid of him.

  He only tortured them for a few minutes longer, however, then handed Manda back to Benedict and swaggered off towards the restrooms. I saw Lurch move to follow him, leaving Gleason to finally hurry back to our table and plonk herself down next to Eisenberg like she was determined not to get up again.

  Torquil, however, had no intention of being followed everywhere by his bodyguard. I saw him whirl and plant a determined finger in the guy’s chest. He was close enough for me to hear the exchange, which basically ran along the lines that Torquil felt he was old enough to take a leak unaided.

  Lurch glanced over at Torquil’s father for guidance, which only served to infuriate the son even more. He gave the bodyguard’s face a light slap to bring it back to face him. I sucked in an involuntary breath, but Lurch had heroic self-control and didn’t punch the little brat’s lights out.

  ‘Don’t you look to him for orders!’ Torquil growled. ‘You work for me, OK?’

  Surreptitiously, I leant closer to Parker and, with minimal movement of my lips, murmured, ‘When you said Eisenberg had all kinds of influence I did not want to tangle with, did you mean he was connected to the Mob?’

  Parker’s lips quirked. ‘We don’t think so. Why?’

  ‘I just wondered why Torquil’s behaving like something out of a bad junior version of The Godfather,’ I said, still keeping my voice low. ‘Perhaps this might be a good chance to find out?’

  ‘Just be careful,’ he warned, almost into my hair. ‘After all, the Willners have horses – you do not want to wake up in bed with part of one of them.’

  I pulled a face and got to my feet as casually as I could manage, collecting my evening bag to add a touch of authenticity to the exercise. And just when Torquil’s bodyguard might have overridden his principal’s wishes, I heard Parker’s voice behind me ask him some seemingly loaded question about his experience in the business.

  I glanced behind me long enough to see Lurch torn between a possible job opportunity and disobeying a direct order. I think Gleason’s scowl finally swayed him, like she thought he’d been chosen over her. Lurch hesitated a moment, then turned back and took the seat I’d just vacated next to my boss. I could have told him that – by doing so – he’d just lost any chance he might have had of being offered employment with Armstrong-Meyer.

  Beyond Torquil’s obvious charms, what was it about working for the Eisenbergs, I wondered as I headed for the restrooms, that made people so desperate to get away from them? But Brandon Eisenberg had offered to find a place for Sean in the best neurological rehab centre in the world. Despite the obvious drawbacks, was that temptation enough?

  No, I decided. It wasn’t. Because if Sean came out of his coma and discovered what I’d done, there would be hell to pay.

  Not ‘if’, dammit – ‘when’!

  I excuse-me’d my way out of the ballroom, through a set of double doors and down a plushly carpeted hallway, punctuated by spotlit marble busts of what I think were supposed to be Greek gods, although one bore an uncanny resemblance to Brad Pitt in laurel wreath and artfully draped toga.

  I paused by the door to the men’s room, undecided. The music was more muted here, so that the piercing notes of the Mission: Impossible theme ringtone was easily recognisable from within. It hadn’t taken Torquil long, I realised, to reboot his phone once he was out of his father’s earshot.

  I hesitated a moment longer. Parker had told me to tread carefully around Torquil, so I pushed open the outer door to the men’s room with great care. Like the ladies’, it had a little vestibule which I assumed was supposed to operate as a kind of airlock as well as a modesty screen.

  Not that it smelt in there. The country club did not permit that kind of thing. When I cracked the inner door a fraction and peered through the gap, the overwhelming odour was of expensive perfumed hand soap. It could have been a lot worse.

  Inside was an extravagance of marble tiles and subdued lighting, which made the usual row of urinals seem more out of place than usual. Torquil was the only occupant, something he had evidently been told to verify, judging by the way he was nudging each of the cubicle doors open with his foot, the phone tucked against his shoulder as he did so.

  ‘Yeah, yeah, so there’s no one here,’ he said into it then, his voice impatient. ‘Why the cloak-and-dagger stuff? Why couldn’t you just …? Oh, OK, I get it …’ Then his voice rose, almost jubilant. ‘Cool, man!’ And then he seemed to realise how gauche he sounded and made an attempt to play it down. ‘Hey, listen. Just make sure they make a better job of it this time, OK? I’m not fooling around—’

  Suddenly, the outer door behind me swung open and I was faced with a startled man in a tuxedo.

  Unable to think of any reasonable explanation, I beamed stupidly at him and lurched against the nearest wall, putting as much slur into my voice as I could manage. ‘Hey, buddy, I guess one of ush ish inda wrong placesh, huh?’

  ‘Yeah, lady, and I think maybe it’s you.’ He gave a nervous laugh and steered me towards the outer door, edging around me. ‘Try down the hall.’

  ‘Oh, OK,’ I said with false brightness. ‘’Cause I need to pee-pee real bad.’

  Any thoughts he might have had of lecturing me to be more careful where I headed in future died instantly. He shoved me back out into the corridor and disappeared towards the inner sanctum.

  I quickly nipped behind Brad Pitt’s marble effigy. The startled man reappeared shortly afterwards and headed back for the ballroom without checking the rest of the corridor. So, at least I knew he wasn’t security of any kind. I debated briefly on whether he’d had time to do what he needed to and wash his hands. On balance, probably not.

  Torquil emerged a minute or so later, still looking at the display on his phone. He looked up with a jerk as I fell into step alongside him.

  ‘Hey, Tor, who’s on the phone?’

  ‘That’s for me to know and you … not to know,’ he said, but his voice didn’t have its usual brusque edge. However the call had finished, it had done so to his liking.

  ‘If it concerns Dina’s safety,’ I said quietly, ‘it is my business.’

  He just stared at me oddly for a moment. ‘Why? So’s you can look good by “rescuing” her again, that it?’ he demanded, drawing little quote marks in the air with his fingers.

  ‘What is that supposed to mean?’ I put a hand on his arm when he would have brushed past me. He glanced down and I stepped in, speaking more urgently. ‘Talk to me. Please. You saw what happens when people get in the way – Raleigh’s going to need surgery to use that arm again.’

  It was a slight exaggeration, but it seemed appropriate under the circumstances. Encouraged by his silence, I tried again. ‘If someone gets killed next time, even your father’s money and power won’t be able to save you from the consequences.’

  But I’d overreached, and if the stubborn expression that stiffened his face was anything to go by, he knew it. His self-doubt collapsed and he yanked himself out of my grasp.

  One of the doors to the ballroom swung open and Lurch loomed in the gap.

  ‘You got trouble there, boss?’

  ‘No,’ Torquil said, stowing his cellphone into his pocket and putting all his superiority into a single dismissive glance. ‘No trouble at all.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  And, for three days after the charity auction, no trouble was exactly what we got.

  Despite her lack of actual employment, no one could accuse Dina of being inactive. Between her tennis lessons, and her lunches, and her personal shopper, and her personal trainer, there was barely a minute when her time wasn’t organised with something or other. And if I had my doubts about whether it was all worthwhile, I kept those opinions firmly to myself.

  But despite the trappings of wealth, the only time Dina seemed to be completely relaxed
and happy was when she was out with her horse. Cerdo was possibly the only one who didn’t make any allowances for how rich or influential his owner might be. He still tanked off with her along the beach if he was that way inclined, but equally he could behave like a gracious prince. I think his variable moods provided an area of rare uncertainty in Dina’s life that she genuinely looked forward to.

  Other areas of uncertainty were my concern. As soon as I’d got back to our table that night at the country club, I’d reported the content of Torquil’s eavesdropped phone call in the restroom to Parker.

  ‘But there was no concrete threat,’ he pointed out at last, keeping his voice low. ‘Not specific enough to warrant pulling her out of here.’

  ‘Still …’

  He sat back. ‘You’re the one in the hot seat, so it’s your call, Charlie, you know that.’ He paused. ‘But if Torquil is involved, do you think he’d be dumb enough to do anything here? Look around you – the close-protection teams outnumber the guests, and however many corners Brandon Eisenberg may have cut in order to make his money, these days he keeps his hands pristine.’

  ‘Whereas,’ I said slowly, ‘if I call in alternative transport and whisk Dina home separately – not in the limo with him – who knows what might happen en route.’

  Parker simply smiled.

  We stayed.

  But on the ride back to the Willners’ place in the stretch Cadillac, Torquil’s attitude towards Dina had definitely changed – and I didn’t think that was solely down to the amount of alcohol he’d consumed during the evening. He swayed in his seat as the limo rolled along, smirking like he was in on the world’s best private joke, and it was all on us.

  If I hadn’t known for a fact that Dina had never been alone with him anywhere private, I might even have suspected he’d got his leg over. He still might’ve, I conceded – just not with Dina.

  When we’d pulled up in the driveway, Torquil’s father politely declined Caroline Willner’s offer of a nightcap. Perhaps it was as clear to him as to me that she had not wanted him to accept. But they nodded to each other, honour satisfied.