Heller

by JD Nixon

  Mr Hayek was a small, self-important man with clever black eyes, a thin mouth and matching moustache, dressed in a beautifully tailored suit. I didn’t care for the way he stared at me during our introduction though, his eyes lingering on my boobs and legs. His wife sat demurely by his side on the brocaded eighteenth-century sofa, her eyes modestly downcast. She was dressed more traditionally than him, her hair covered by a black scarf and her entire body covered by a long shapeless black smock and loose pants. She looked very young, no older than twenty I would have guessed, which made her perhaps half the age of her husband. I watched her carefully as the men discussed business and was relieved to see her dare to peek up at Heller a few times – she was human after all! She glanced at me through her eyelashes and when I gave her a friendly smile, she smiled back shyly.

  She leaned over and whispered in her husband’s ear. He turned back to speak to Heller.

  “My wife would like to know if it would be this young lady here,” indicating me, “who would be her escort if your business was successful?”

  “Yes,” Heller confirmed.

  “And I would be very pleased to take Mrs Hayek to some of the city’s attractions or shopping during the week. As she prefers,” I added, in my most persuasive and charming manner, smiling nicely at her again.

  She leaned over to her husband and again whispered in his ear.

  “My wife has indicated that she would like me to offer the job to you, Mr Heller. We are both very pleased that you are able to provide her with a female escort at all times during her stay. Unfortunately neither of the other firms was able to guarantee that for us, and it would not be acceptable to me for my wife to be in the care of another man. Please have a contract delivered to me at noon for signing. We are going to rest now, but it would be appreciated if the young lady would return in the early afternoon, as I have meetings today that will continue well into the evening.”

  I nodded agreement and we all stood up and shook hands.

  Mr Hayek faced Heller again. “I almost forgot to ask, but I assume the young lady has security training? I wish to ensure my wife’s safety during this visit as well as her entertainment.”

  “Oh yes,” I lied blithely, before Heller had an opportunity to open his mouth. “Rest assured, Mr Hayek, I’m fully-trained in all aspects of security.”

  I felt Heller stiffen beside me as Mr Hayek nodded in satisfaction and his wife gave me another shy smile. We made our farewells and left. I deliberately avoided Heller’s livid eyes in the lift and while we waited for the valet to bring around our car. His anger crackled in the air like lightning. When we were safely alone inside his Mercedes and driving away, he turned to me, enraged.

  “You shouldn’t lie to clients! It’s unethical.”

  “It was only a little white lie and if I hadn’t, he might have changed his mind,” I argued. “I mean, how hard is it going to be? I’ll take her to the zoo and for a harbour cruise or something and we’ll do some shopping. There’s nothing dangerous about that. There’s no need to be so uptight about it.”

  He closed his eyes briefly as if he was marshalling his temper and gave a sharp shake of his head in exasperation.

  “Besides,” I cajoled, “you can give me some quick training this morning. I’m a fast learner.”

  “I’ll have to, won’t I?” he flung back through gritted teeth. We drove in silence for a while.

  “Can I have a gun?” I asked.

  “No!”

  “Just a little one? For my handbag? It’ll give me some street cred with the client.”

  “No! No! No!” His clenched fists pounded the steering wheel with each word.

  “Geez, take a chill pill,” I sulked, slouching in my seat.

  We screeched down the driveway of the Warehouse and into the basement. He slammed the door of the Mercedes when he got out and bolted up the stairs. I followed, scurrying to catch up to him in my high heels. At the ground floor, he detoured to the security section and flung the door back. Even at that early hour, several security staff were at work and glanced up startled as the Boss burst angrily into the room.

  “Where’s Clive?” he barked. One of them pointed to the far corner where Clive was talking to a small group of men. He noticed us with surprise and Heller gestured him over. He pulled Clive to one side to speak in private.

  “This idiotic woman has just told a client that she is a fully-trained security officer,” he spat out, looking at me with disgust. I noted that his accent became more pronounced when he was angry, which he certainly was at that moment. Clive stared at me in disbelief.

  “It was just a little white lie . . .” I began again, rolling my eyes at their over-reaction. Heller held up his hand to silence me, his eyes sparking with fury. He turned back to Clive.

  “I hate to do this, Clive, but you’re going to have to give her a crash course this morning. She starts working this afternoon. Just the basics so she doesn’t look even more like a fool than she is. And do not let her talk you into giving her a gun.” And with that said, he stalked off slamming the door behind him.

  I pulled a face after him, once he was safely out of sight. “He’s got a real temper on him, hasn’t he?” I marvelled. I was looking forward to this – Clive would actually have to speak to me! But I was to be disappointed. He called over one of the men he had been conferring with and they murmured together quietly. The man looked over at me with incredulity.

  Oh great! I thought angrily, why don’t you just bloody well tell everybody? Let’s just put an ad in the paper while we’re at it: ‘Tilly Chalmers is a moron!’

  Clive walked back to his office and the man came over to me. He was a big beefy black guy, with closely shaven tightly curled black hair, a square head and no neck.

  “I’m Tysen,” he said in a gruff voice. “Clive said I’m to give you some basic training. You’ve got five minutes to change and we’ll regroup down here in our gym.”

  Nice to meet you too, I thought sarcastically, as I virtually sprinted upstairs in my heels to be ready in time. He didn’t look like the kind of guy you kept waiting.

  We spent the next four hours in that smelly, testosterone-laden room going through the fundamentals of his job – scanning, securing, negotiating, protecting. He taught me a couple of easy self-defence moves and some quick tricks for disarming and disabling attackers. Despite what I’d initially thought, he was a good teacher – patient and methodical.

  “These moves will come in handy at the mid-year sales,” I joked as I ran through them for the fifth time. Tysen stared at me dourly.

  “Security’s no laughing matter, Miss.” I rolled my eyes again. Everyone in the place appeared to have had a humour bypass. “You could get the Boss in trouble telling people you’re a security officer when you’re not. You have to have a licence with the government to be one, you know.”

  And no, I didn’t know that and felt myself suitably reproached. I hoped my thoughtless actions wouldn’t cause Heller any trouble. Especially with the government. He might change his mind about keeping me on otherwise.

  By the end of our session, my mind was spinning and I had a headache. Tysen finished by asking Clive to unlock a cabinet in his office and handing me a canister of capsicum spray. “Put this in your handbag, Miss. Remember how I told you to use it, and only use it if you really need to. It’s quite dangerous.”

  I thanked Tysen sincerely and raced up to my flat. I barely had time to shower, change clothes and bolt down a sandwich and diet soft drink before Rumbles knocked on my door, ready to drive me back to start work for Mrs Hayek.

  When he dropped me at the hotel, I said with grave courtesy, “Thank you, Mr Rumbles.”

  He laughed hugely. “It tickles me when you say that, Miss. Mr Rumbles indeed! Nobody’s called me that for years.”

  I promised to ring him when I needed to be picked up again and gave him a friendly wave goodbye.

  Chapter 11

  I caught the lift to the top floor and was ad
mitted into the Hayek’s suite by the same respectful servant who greeted us this morning.

  “Madam won’t be long,” he told me politely and led me over to a chair to wait, advising me that Mr Hayek had left already for his business meetings. I didn’t have to wait very long before she appeared and stood up to shake hands with her. She was tiny, very petite, and I felt like a half-back on steroids standing next to her. She had bathed, but was dressed similarly to the morning with a scarf covering her hair and modestly attired in long loose dark clothing.

  “What would you like to do first?” I queried. “We could take a cruise of the harbour or would you like me to take you to the art gallery? There are some beautiful impressionist paintings on show at the moment.”

  “That sounds lovely,” she said. The servant handed her an oversized handbag that completely dwarfed her.

  In the lift she smiled shyly. “Have you worked for Mr Heller long, Miss Chalmers?”

  “I’ve worked there for quite a while,” I answered vaguely. I didn’t want her to think I was an inexperienced newbie. “And Mrs Hayek, please call me Tilly.”

  “Then you must call me Lily.” We smiled at each other.

  When the lift hit the ground floor, we walked across the foyer and I was about to ask the concierge to call us a cab, when she clutched my arm and said that she really would prefer to walk – to stretch her legs. She exited the hotel and started walking up the street at a cracking pace.

  “Lily!” I chased after her. “You’re going the wrong way. The art gallery is in the other direction.”

  She shouted over her shoulder, “I need to make a detour first, if you don’t mind.”

  I shrugged. You’re the boss, I thought, scrambling to keep up with her. Damn heels. She kept walking for a while, randomly crossing streets, until she suddenly stopped in front of one of the city’s many business hotels, well-appointed but busy and impersonal.

  “I want you to go in to that hotel and book a small suite for me. From now until I leave. In your name though. Pay for it with your credit card and you can add the cost to your final bill.”

  I stared at her.

  “Go on,” she urged impatiently and gave me a little push. So I went in and did what she requested. She sat quietly in the foyer while I booked the suite. When I had been given the access swipe card, she stood up and led me to the lifts. We travelled up in silence and it wasn’t until we were inside the suite that she spoke.

  “Thank you, Tilly,” she said, smiling broadly. She reached up, ripped off her headscarf and unplaited her hair. It fell in a soft cloud down to the middle of her back. She fluffed it out and took off her long-sleeved smock to reveal a tight, low-cut red designer blouse that half-exposed her small breasts. I watched on in surprise. She removed her long pants and rummaged in her gigantic handbag retrieving a black leather miniskirt, quickly pulling it over her narrow hips and lacy panties. Her sensible flat shoes went flying across the room as she kicked them off, in their place slipping on bejewelled stilettos that would have cost more than my entire outfit.

  She took a makeup case from her handbag and spent ten minutes liberally applying it to her face. The final touch was to exchange the modest sleepers piercing her lobes for a set of enormous gold hoops. She was transformed. I wouldn’t have recognised her as the modest married woman I had met that morning. She stood in front of the mirror, ogling herself.

  “Ta-da!” she exclaimed to me, twirling around.

  “Spectacular,” I said, clapping in approval. Privately I thought she looked like a hooker, but I wasn’t being paid to sit in judgement on her fashion taste.

  “You still want to go to the art gallery?” I asked doubtfully. She wasn’t really dressed for it anymore.

  “Screw the art gallery! I couldn’t give a shit about art.” She had a strong English accent that seemed incongruous with her looks. I commented on it.

  “I am English. From North London. Arranged marriage,” she confided. “I’ve been married to that boring shithead for a year now. He and his bitch of a mother keep a close watch on me all the time. I haven’t had any fun for ages!”

  I suddenly felt sorry for her. She was only young and should have been out with her girlfriends meeting lots of boys, not stuck in an arranged marriage with a much older man.

  “He is very rich though, which is nice. I can buy whatever I want. Almost makes up for all the cocksucking I have to do,” she told me. I was lost for words as to how to respond to that. She looked at me questioningly. “I chose you because you looked bold. I thought you seemed the kind of person who would let me have some fun and not go telling my husband. I hope I was right?”

  “I’m here to help you have as much fun as you like, Lily. I’ll give your husband very detailed and dull reports on the shopping we did and the art we viewed, if you like.” She smiled and nodded her head mischievously.

  “And I’ll bore him to death every night telling him the same. He won’t even ask after the first time.” We smiled conspiratorially. This will be fun, I told myself. I can’t believe I get paid to do this.

  She made some adjustments to her makeup, asking casually, “Are you packing?”

  I was studying my nails and said distractedly, “Why? Are we going somewhere?”

  “No, dummy! Are you packing? You know – carrying a gun?”

  “Not today,” I said truthfully, then was slightly less truthful. “Usually, but not today. It’s a bit awkward to explain when you’re going to art galleries and shopping,” I embellished. “I only take it with me when there might be some danger.”

  She was disappointed. “We could have gone somewhere and fired off a few rounds. Scared a few tourists. That would have been fun.”

  Thank God I don’t have a gun, I thought gratefully.

  “What’s the deal with that guy Heller? He is hot! I’d do him in an instant. Have you done him?”

  “No, I haven’t done him.” Well, only in my dreams. “He’s my boss, Lily. And it’s not a good idea to do your boss.”

  She spun from examining herself in the mirror to look at me in surprise. “Isn’t it? I wouldn’t know ‘cause I’ve never had a job, but why not? I bet loads of women do their bosses every day.” She turned back to her reflection and added another layer of mascara. “When my disgusting husband was fucking me this morning after you left, I pretended it was Heller instead,” she confided. I didn’t know what to say to that either. I didn’t know if Heller would have been flattered. Maybe? She finished her makeup. “Let’s go to the casino. I’m feeling lucky today. Especially lucky now that I’ve got you to have some fun with.” She hooked her arm through mine and we headed off to the casino.

  She was an enthusiastic but reckless gambler, betting thousands of dollars at a time, winning and losing equally. I could hardly bear to watch all that money being risked so casually. My phone rang. It was Heller. I walked away from the table.

  “How’s everything going?” he asked, seemingly much calmer since I last saw him.

  “Okay, so far,” I said, straining to hear him over the general noise.

  “What are you doing at the casino? I thought you were going shopping.”

  “How do you know where I am?”

  “Your handbag has an implanted tracking device. Primitive, but it’s doing the job for now. We’ll fix up something better later.”

  I didn’t know whether to feel pissed off or pleased.

  “Is Mrs Hayek enjoying herself?” he asked. I glanced over at the roulette table. She was drinking champagne and laughing up at a good-looking, but unctuous, young man standing on her left, who was cheering her on to higher and higher bets. She had her hand on his arm.

  “I think so. It was her idea to come to the casino. She’s not as demure as she first appears.”

  He gave a very sexy low chuckle that made my stomach feel funny. “Women seldom are, Matilda.”

  The shifty young man leaned down and kissed Lily lingeringly on the mouth. She wasn’t pushing him away. In fac
t, she had her hand on his butt.

  “Oops, looks as though she having a bit too much fun now. Gotta run. She needs rescuing from a lounge lizard.” I hung up and sauntered back slowly to the table, not wanting to cramp her style but not wanting anything untoward to happen either. She whispered something in Lizard’s ear and he nodded, laughing. She gulped the last of her champagne and grabbed his hand, pulling him away from the table.

  I followed at a discreet distance as they wove their way through the crowd. They stopped in front of a ladies bathroom and Lily went in. She came out immediately and said something to Lizard, smiling, pulling him through the door. I gave them a diplomatic minute before silently opening the door. All the cubicles were vacant, doors open, except the cubicle at the far end. I stealthily crept up. It was obvious from the repeated grunting and occasional moan what was going on inside. I didn’t want to hear any more, so quietly left, keeping watch out the front.

  I deterred one very drunk woman from entering by telling her that someone had thrown up all over the floor, it was currently being cleaned up and directed her to the conveniences at the other side of the room. She didn’t even blink, but staggered off obediently. I have authority! I thought exultantly, an emotion that died a quick death when I heard Lily’s very extravagant and noisy orgasm from where I was standing outside the bathroom. I glanced around nervously, hoping nobody else, especially the mountain-sized casino security men, could hear her ecstatic screaming over the constant clamour of the nearby pokie machines.

  Eventually, Lily poked her head out and ushered Lizard from the bathroom. She looked mussed, her lipstick smeared and her hair wild, but with a cat-with-the-cream satisfied expression on her face that frankly made me jealous, given my own current frustrated status. She favoured Lizard with a prolonged kiss and a final squeeze of his arse. He asked her something and she rummaged around in her handbag for a pen, writing on his hand. Another kiss, another squeeze, and they separated. She slinked over to me.