Break Point: BookShots

by James Patterson

  ‘What are you doing here?’ she asked, without bothering to say hello.

  ‘I’m watching my client,’ he said. ‘Shouldn’t you be coaching her?’

  ‘I’ll coach her when I’m ready,’ Rosario said, as Foster twisted in his seat to face her.

  ‘And I’ll watch her when I like,’ he said, ‘which at the moment is every minute of the day. So at least now we both know where we stand.’

  ‘It’s my job to make sure she wins this tournament,’ Rosario said. ‘You’re a distraction. She doesn’t need men staring at her from the side of the court. She needs focus. She needs to be in a bubble. You’re bursting it.’

  ‘She’s not going to win anything with a knife in her back,’ Foster said, shaking his head and turning back to the court.

  The finer points of Rosario and Foster’s argument had to be put on hold because suddenly Kirsten Keller was walking over to meet them.

  ‘Everything okay?’ she asked in a voice that made it clear she knew perfectly well everything was not okay. ‘You two getting along?’

  ‘Like a house on fire,’ Foster said.

  Rosario glared at him for a moment and then walked onto the court to pack away Keller’s kit.

  ‘I’d like to tell you she’s a pussycat underneath it all,’ Keller said, watching Rosario go.

  ‘But you can’t?’

  ‘Nope,’ Keller smiled. ‘She’s hard as nails, vindictive, aggressive and unreasonable. And she never backs down about anything. That’s why I hired her.’

  Keller threw herself into the seat next to Foster. She was entirely comfortable in her own skin and seemed not to notice the warm flesh of her tanned thighs pressing against Foster’s forearm as she sat close to him.

  ‘So, is this how it’s going to work? You just turn up and watch me wherever I go?’

  Foster shrugged.

  ‘If that’s what you want, sure.’

  ‘Of course it’s what I want. Don’t worry about Rosario. Like you said, I’m the boss. And I want you on board. So do you need anything?’

  Foster leaned forward and pulled a black plastic watch from his jacket pocket.

  ‘I need you to wear this.’

  Keller took it from him and turned it over in her hands.

  ‘Wow,’ she said sarcastically, ‘this looks like the height of fashion.’

  ‘It’s called a StrayStar. It’s got a built-in GPS tracker, and a panic button. If anything happens and I’m not with you, press the button and I’ll find you. I won’t be far away.’

  Keller slipped it on.

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Not much,’ Foster said. ‘Just a couple of ground rules. Wear the watch. Stay around people you know. Don’t get caught on your own, if you can help it. And don’t trust anyone until we work out what’s going on. Can you live with that?’

  ‘Absolutely. If that’s what it takes.’

  ‘Have you had any thoughts about who might want to threaten you?’ Foster asked. ‘Sometimes people have a gut feeling, so if anything or anyone comes to mind, don’t keep it to yourself.’

  ‘I’ve thought about it over and over, but I’ve no idea who would do this. If anything comes to me, though, you’ll be the first person I tell.’

  Keller stood up and headed off to the locker room to shower. Foster smiled and shook his head as he watched her walk away. On her own. Breaking one of his rules already.

  CHAPTER 6

  PEOPLE LIKE KELLER rarely liked a guy in a suit telling them what to do. Even though that was exactly what she had hired Foster for. He wondered how well the tennis star would take to his rules over the coming days. It was too hot to stay in the sun, so he used the fifteen minutes while Keller took a shower to get familiar with the layout of the place. Just in case. Foster was a just in case sort of guy. Wimbledon was roughly the shape of a teardrop, nestled between a couple of tree-lined avenues that curved around Centre Court, a boxy green fortress of a place, with ivy climbing up the sides and the world’s most expensive front lawn in the middle. In its shadow was No. 1 Court, a royal green doughnut built of similar proportions. The two stadia were surrounded by a further seventeen Championship courts and twenty-two practice courts, including the one Keller had recently vacated.

  Foster walked between all of them, getting a feel for distances and lines of sight. He scoped the kiosks and the souvenir stores, and the pinch-points where thousands of bodies would make it impossible to pass. He looked for shortcuts through buildings and across the courts, so that if they needed to move quickly he’d know where to go. He was almost done when his phone buzzed. An alert from Keller’s new alarm. Most likely she was testing it, but Foster wasn’t going to take any chances.

  He ran directly for the locker rooms, vaulting the security barrier and barrelling down the players’ corridor, before slamming through the entrance to the women’s locker room.

  ‘Kirsten?’

  No answer.

  The locker room was a modern facility: clean white walls and a maze of stained-pine benches and lockers. Plenty of corners that he couldn’t see. Plenty of places to hide. Apparently Keller had taken a while in the shower, because the room was steamy and humid. She answered on his second call.

  ‘Over here.’

  He followed the voice into the labyrinth and found her in an alcove surrounded on three sides by square pine lockers and directly under a set of impossibly bright halogens, which sent tunnels of light through the misty air.

  ‘What happened?’

  She looked back over his shoulder and he turned to follow her stare. Between two banks of lockers was a mirror, which stretched from the floor to the ceiling. Written in tall letters in the condensation were the words ANY TIME I WANT. The writing was fresh. The bottom edges of the letters were just beginning to run, the way blood trickles from the movie titles on old horror billboards.

  Foster moved through the room methodically. He checked every corner and every alcove. He ducked in and out of the showers. When he was certain they were alone, he came back to her and they sat down in the steam.

  ‘Do you think it’s a woman?’ Keller asked. ‘Considering where we are, I mean.’

  Foster looked around the locker room.

  ‘I’m in here,’ he said.

  She couldn’t argue with that.

  ‘Can you tell anything from the writing? You know, like whether they’re left-handed or how tall they are?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Foster said. ‘Not for sure.’

  ‘Jesus Christ!’ she whispered. ‘He could have grabbed me. He could have done anything.’

  She shuddered and pulled her towel a little closer around her.

  ‘Try not to get scared until there’s something to get scared about,’ Foster said, his eyes calm as they looked into hers. ‘Someone drew in the steam. Nothing more, nothing less.’

  She looked sceptical.

  ‘Take a breath. You said it yourself: whoever was in here had the perfect chance to hurt you. And they didn’t take it. This is good news.’

  He smiled and she smiled back, and he felt guilty because he wasn’t sure he believed what he was saying.

  ‘I’ve got to get out of here,’ Keller said suddenly, hunching her shoulders as a shiver crossed her back. She slipped out of her towel without warning and reached forward for her underwear. Foster shifted his gaze to protect her modesty. He turned his back and watched the message in the mirror slowly evaporate. In its place came the reflection of Kirsten Keller, her eyes seeking out his; a little bit coy perhaps, but not embarrassed.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘I’m glad you’ve got my back.’

  She stood there for a moment in the mirror, Foster staring at her half-dressed reflection, and then she broke into a girlish smile. In his mind, Foster steamed the mirror back up until Kirsten Keller’s soft tan curves were all hidden, and then he imagined leaning forward and writing two words on the glass.

  STAY PROFESSIONAL.

  Good luck with th
at, he told himself.

  CHAPTER 7

  TWENTY MINUTES AFTER the fog lifted in the locker room, Kirsten Keller was fully dressed and sitting in the passenger seat of Foster’s slate-grey Range Rover as they headed north through Battersea and then east along the banks of the River Thames. The car was supercharged, with a five-litre engine and an exhaust that growled and rattled and echoed off everything they passed.

  ‘Where are we going?’ Keller asked, glancing over at Foster in the driving seat, his sharp eyes scanning the road ahead.

  They were a long way north of the rented house she had been sharing with Rosario in Wimbledon.

  ‘Someone knows a lot about your schedule,’ Foster said. ‘I think it makes sense to change things up. I’m going to find you a hotel. Do you have a preference?’

  Keller scanned the skyline, the city of London framed in the windscreen and growing by the minute.

  ‘Somewhere high up,’ she said. ‘So we can see people coming from a long way off.’

  It was irrational, but Foster understood. He called ahead to the Shangri-La at the top of the Shard and booked a suite overlooking the river.

  ‘I bet you’ve handled a lot of stalkers in your job,’ Keller said after a while. ‘Why do they do it?’

  He glanced at her, then let his eyes go back to the road.

  ‘Various reasons,’ he said. ‘But sometimes they just melt away after a while.’

  ‘And sometimes they don’t?’

  ‘No. Not always.’

  The Shard came into view. It was taller than anything else in London, dominating the skyline, razor-straight metal and glass tapering off into the ether. Kirsten Keller watched the sunlight glinting off it for a minute and then turned back towards Foster.

  ‘I don’t think Maria’s happy about the new set-up.’

  ‘Not my job to make her happy,’ Foster said bluntly. ‘I’ll try not to lose sleep over it.’

  Keller punched him in the thigh as he drove. Hard.

  ‘Don’t be mean,’ she said. ‘She’s a good person. She just wants me to focus on my tennis. I haven’t got for ever.’

  Foster felt the age in his bones and smiled.

  ‘You’re twenty-three.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  He said nothing. Just drove the car until they arrived five minutes later. He handed the keys of the Range Rover to the valet and they headed inside, through the airport-standard security at the base of the tower. They stepped through the metal detectors and Foster set off the alarms, as always.

  ‘It’s more metal than bone,’ he said as the security guard waved his electronic wand over his left arm.

  ‘Car crash?’ the guard asked as the machine whistled wildly.

  ‘Explosion,’ Foster said and instantly regretted it, as he saw recognition dawn on the guy’s face. He shook Foster’s hand and told him he was a hero. Foster thanked him without elaborating, and avoided Kirsten Keller’s inquisitive gaze as they passed through security and took the lift to Reception on the thirty-fourth floor.

  ‘Explosion?’

  ‘Long story.’

  They checked in and were told that the room was ready, but they stopped off at the bar because it was too early to be cooped up in a hotel suite. The entire outer wall of the bar was made of glass. Beyond the glass was London. All of it stretched out in front of them: the river and the roads and the train tracks. The churn of humanity going about its afternoon business. Landmarks jutted from the broil: Tower Bridge, the London Eye and the Houses of Parliament. The whole view was mesmerising. Eventually they turned away and settled into plush velvet seats facing a screen showing the build-up to Wimbledon. A young reporter was linking clips of recent matches with gossip and speculation.

  Keller said, ‘How’s your drink?’

  They had ordered cocktails. It was a cocktails kind of place. Except that Keller had a tournament to win and Foster had a long drive home, so both of them had chosen alcohol-free options and neither felt entirely satisfied with the result.

  ‘Not too shabby,’ Foster said. ‘By the way, you’re on TV.’

  And there she was on the screen, going through her paces on the training court earlier that day. Then inevitably the screen came back to the reporter, who started gesturing to the camera, before he was replaced by shots of Keller at the French Open, throwing herself to the floor and running from the court in tears. Then back to the reporter at Wimbledon, who looked partly concerned and partly amused by Keller’s behaviour. Then he was gone again, replaced by the pictures of Keller on the practice court. Across the court Foster could see himself, leaning back in the green chair and watching Keller serve.

  Suddenly he leaned forward, because he noticed someone else in the shot. On the walkway between the courts a man in a baseball cap was filming on his phone. That wouldn’t be unusual, but the strange thing was that he wasn’t filming Keller on the court; he was filming Foster as he sat on his own at the side. In the bar, Foster pulled out his phone and took a photo of the TV screen.

  A few seconds later the scene from the practice courts was gone and the programme ended altogether, replaced by coverage of another disastrous one-day test match for England’s cricketers. Keller decided to head up to her room.

  ‘I’ve got a match tomorrow,’ she said. ‘And I’ve got a feeling Maria’s going to push me hard in the warm-up.’

  He went up with her, just to check the place out.

  ‘Not bad,’ Foster said as they walked through the solid wooden door. ‘Not bad at all.’

  The room was luxurious, occupying a corner of the building and framing the city behind floor-to-ceiling windows. There was a grand writing desk and a couple of sofas in the outer room, with a low-slung coffee table between them. The bedroom had built-in cupboards, deep, plush carpet and a stylish ottoman. The marble bathroom featured a walk-in shower next to the glass outer wall, so that residents could suffer vertigo while they washed.

  ‘You going to be alright?’ Foster asked.

  ‘I’ve got a Netflix subscription and a box set of Better Call Saul to work through,’ she smiled.

  ‘Perfect night in,’ Foster said.

  He was halfway into the corridor when he turned and said, ‘When you close this door, keep it shut.’

  ‘I promise,’ she said, and held up her wrist to show that she was still wearing the alarm watch. Then she waved her hand and he smiled, turned and left. He checked the door behind him and headed back to the bar. He ordered a beer and pulled out his phone to look at the photo of the guy in the baseball cap. He soaked him in, looking for clues. The shape of him. The way he stood. The way he held the phone. Because this was the start of it. The hunter was becoming the hunted.

  CHAPTER 8

  KELLER’S FIRST-ROUND MATCH was against a Bulgarian qualifier, and she dismissed her in straight sets. She was supreme, smashing her opponent in less than an hour.

  Keller and Rosario met Foster in the players’ café twenty minutes later. Keller rolled her eyes as Rosario debriefed her as if Foster were invisible.

  ‘And you need to be on the court,’ Rosario said, building to the crescendo of her argument. ‘Not driving through the traffic to a hotel room.’

  ‘I played well today. What’s the problem?’

  Rosario threw her hands in the air.

  ‘You need to make the quarter finals just to pay the hotel bill.’

  Foster said, ‘That’s a pretty good motivation.’

  Rosario glared at him as if she didn’t have words to describe her anger. She turned her shoulder, to make it apparent that Foster was overstepping his role as security advisor. She took a breath to speak, but Kirsten Keller leaned in and beat her to it.

  ‘I’m staying at the Shard,’ she told Rosario firmly. ‘And Chris is staying on the team. And you need to remember you’re my coach, not my mother.’

  Rosario stood up and stormed out without another word. Keller watched her coach go and rolled the stress out of her shoulders.

 
‘Dinner tonight?’ Foster asked, as if nothing had happened.

  ‘Good idea,’ she said. ‘Why the hell not.’

  CHAPTER 9

  THE IVY IS a quintessentially British restaurant, famed for its celebrity clientele. Foster had booked a table for eight o’clock, and he picked up Keller in good time to take a cab across the city. If he’d been alone he would have taken the Tube, but the Underground was no place for Kirsten Keller, especially as she had changed into a stunning black evening dress.

  ‘Good job it’s not a school night,’ Foster said, when he saw her designer outfit. It was sophisticated but sexy, cut tight to her waist and daring at the neck. He found it hard not to stare.

  ‘Every night’s a school night when you’re on the tour,’ she said wistfully.

  She wore the dress well, and the intoxicating vanilla smell of her perfume filled the cab as they drove. She wore a splash of colour on her lips and smoke around her eyes.

  ‘Walk slowly,’ Foster told her as they got out of the taxi. ‘And don’t stop.’

  There was a gathering of photographers outside The Ivy, waiting for the A-listers who usually ate there. They spotted Keller and began snapping their cameras and mobile phones.

  ‘Good game today,’ one of them said. ‘Can you beat Sam Miller?’

  Sam Miller was Keller’s next opponent. Foster had to hand it to the paparazzi – they were always well briefed. He held back a pace. He had no business being in Keller’s photographs, although a mischievous part of him wondered how Rosario would react to a photograph in tomorrow’s papers of both of them out on the town.

  Suddenly a young guy pierced the paparazzi like a hawk bursting through a flock of starlings. Foster saw him at once. He was shabby but not destitute, and leery without being entirely out of control. Your standard random nut-job. And he was going straight for Keller. He almost got his hand to Kirsten’s bare shoulder, but Foster stepped in between his client and the threat. The young guy had built up some momentum, probably enough to bowl Keller over, but he hit Foster like a fly hitting a windscreen.