Bodyguard: Target (12 page)

‘Was this hidden message your idea
of a joke?’ Kay demanded, her green eyes blazing at the producer.
‘Because it
wasn’t
funny!’

‘Of course not,’ replied
Don, visibly wilting under her
ferocious glare.

The other record company personnel sat
rigid and mute round the conference table in Dauntless Records’ headquarters,
watching the producer’s mauling with a combination of fearful fascination and
evident relief that it wasn’t them.

‘Then exactly how did it get on to
Ash’s song?’ enquired Kay.

Don swallowed nervously.
‘I’ve no idea –’

‘You’re
the producer,
goddammit! You oversaw the recording process.’

Running a hand through his greasy locks,
he replied, ‘Play anything backwards and you’ll likely find something.
People thought Led Zeppelin had inserted
Here’s to my sweet Satan
into “Stairway To Heaven”, but they hadn’t.
The message in Ash’s song is just a coincidence – a phonetic
reversal.’

‘That’s hard
to
believe,’ said Kay.

‘If you’re suggesting the
message was backmasked on to the track, then I certainly didn’t do
it.’

‘Could anyone else have tampered
with the recording?’ asked Harvey, the vice president of Dauntless Records, a
slick-suited man with a preened moustache and tight-knit hair.

Don shrugged. ‘It’s possible
but unlikely. They’d need access to
the studio, and advanced knowledge of the
recording process.’

‘Some zealous fan could have
hacked into the system for a joke,’ suggested Joel, Ash’s sharp A&R
manager.

‘The media believe it’s a
publicity stunt,’ said Zoe, the PR executive, immediately regretting
she’d spoken at all as Kay turned on her.

‘Is it?’ she demanded.

‘No, of course not,’ Zoe
replied.
‘But it has rocketed pre-orders for the album. Whoever did this has
done us a massive favour.’

‘
Favour?
This is a
serious death threat to my client.’

‘Kay, might you be overreacting
just a little?’ interjected Harvey. ‘It seems an extravagant way to send
that sort of threat.’

‘Well, explain the text message
… and
this
.’ Kay laid a sheet of pink paper on the table.
Glued
to it was Ash’s face sparkling with stars and glitter, the words
NO MORE ENCORES
! scrawled in red across his features.
‘You think
I’m overreacting, Harvey? This was
written in blood.
Pig’s blood
according to the police
report.’

‘Aww, that’s creepy.’
Zoe grimaced.

Joel leant forward to inspect the
letter. ‘What sort of sicko slaughters a pig for ink?’

‘Possibly the same one that sends
hoax letter bombs and subliminal song messages,’ stated Kay.

‘Has Ash seen this?’ asked
Harvey, jutting his chin at the letter but not making any move to touch it.

Kay shook her head. ‘No. I’m
having all his mail intercepted. He’s got trouble enough focusing as it
is.’

‘Do you think he’s actually
in danger then?’ asked Zoe.

Kay nodded. ‘The threat against
him is very real.’

Joel coughed hesitantly.
‘You’re not thinking of cancelling Ash’s US tour, are
you?’

‘Certainly not,’ replied
Kay. ‘Pulling Ash out of the limelight at this point would kill his career.
And I will not be dictated to by some maniac.’

‘Good,’ Harvey chimed in.
‘Besides, there’s far too much money at stake to cancel.’

‘The tour security needs to be
airtight,’ Kay declared, producing a document from a leather-bound folder and
passing it to the vice president. ‘Here are Ash’s protection
requirements.’

Harvey scanned the document. He looked
shocked. ‘You don’t expect us to foot the bill for this, do you?
He’s not royalty, you know.’

Kay resolutely held his gaze.
‘Considering
how much money Ash makes for your record company, he’s
royalty to
you. And, as per the contract I negotiated,
it’s part of tour support.’

Frowning, Harvey studied the document
again, then pointed to a particular line. ‘What’s this extra cost here
for?’

‘It’s for a company that
deals in specialized close protection,’ explained Kay. ‘They come highly
recommended by
my inside source on the military security circuit.’

‘Look who’s back!’ said
Jason, ditching his dumbbells and towelling the perspiration from his face.

The rest of the team stopped their
fitness training and turned to see Charley standing
in the gym doorway. She was
dressed in a running top and jogging pants, her hair bunched behind in a ponytail,
face drawn and eyes ringed with tiredness.

‘How was Colombia?’ asked
Blake, leaving the treadmill to greet her with a sweaty hug.

‘Tough.’ Charley sighed. She
was exhausted after the long flight but glad to be back among the team again. It
seemed as if she’d
been away on missions forever. Each time she’d
returned, Colonel Black had another lined up. Having completed five assignments in
as many months, Charley was looking forward to a break – especially after the
trouble she’d encountered in Colombia.

Jason eyeballed her. ‘Dislocate
anyone else’s fingers while you’ve been away?’ he growled.

Charley held his gaze. While the rest
of
the team’s respect for her had grown with each successive assignment –
as
Jody had predicted,
Prove yourself and you’ll earn
their respect
– Jason still hadn’t forgiven her for the
Gauntlet incident. ‘No, but I did break a man’s kneecap,’ she
replied.

José laughed. ‘You’re
one kick-ass bodyguard!’ he said, fist-bumping her.

Charley appreciated José’s
support,
but it had been no laughing matter at the time. She and her Principal
Sofia, the daughter of the Colombian Minister for Justice, had been in her
father’s car when it was attacked by hit-men from a notorious drug cartel.
Charley had barely escaped with her own life. Sofia hadn’t been so fortunate
– as they’d fled, a stray bullet had hit her in the abdomen and she was
now in
hospital in a critical condition.

Blake noticed the mournful look in
Charley’s eyes. ‘Are you all right?’

‘Yeah,’ she lied.
‘I’m just a bit jet-lagged.’

‘I bet you’re hungry after
the long journey too,’ he said, putting a comforting arm round her shoulder.
‘Let’s go for lunch. That’ll make you feel better.’

After freshening up, the whole team
headed to the dining
hall only to discover a queue.

‘Who are all these people?’
asked Charley, gaping at the unexpected line of kids.

‘New recruits,’ David
explained. ‘Buddyguard is expanding to meet demand.’

‘Yeah, fresh meat!’
sniggered Jason.

One of the new recruits, a petite Asian
girl with a bob of jet-black hair and a silver piercing through her left nostril,
glared over her
shoulder at him. ‘At least we don’t
smell like rotten meat,’ she said, wafting a hand in front of her
nose.

Jason bristled at the insult.
‘Hey, pipsqueak, we just showered.’

‘With soap or manure?’
retorted the girl, and everyone laughed. Charley took an instant liking to her.

Jason clenched his fist. ‘Zip it,
newbie, unless you want a fat lip.’

The girl turned on
him. ‘And how
are you going to do that with your broken arm?’

Jason furrowed his brow in confusion.
‘I haven’t got a broken arm.’

‘Not yet, you
haven’t.’ She squared up to him, even though she was half his
height.

Jason puffed out his chest.

‘OK, let’s chill,’
said Charley, stepping between them and smiling at the girl. ‘What’s
your name?’

‘Ling,’ she
replied, her
dark half-moon eyes still blazing at Jason.

‘Well, I’m Charley, and I
can’t tell you how glad I am not to be the only girl here any more.’

‘Of course you’re
not,’ said Ling, pointing to a small group of girls at a table beneath the
hall’s main window. ‘You should join us, instead of hanging with this
loser.’

Charley was amazed at the sudden influx
of female buddyguards at the school. Colonel Black had been true to his word after
all. ‘Thanks, I’d love to. I just need to catch up with my team
first.’

‘Sure,’ said Ling, flashing
Charley a smile before
narrowing her eyes once more at Jason.
‘Meathead here probably needs your help to eat.’

Jason scoffed. ‘Can I borrow your
bib and high chair then?’

Ling flipped
him the finger. ‘Eat
this,’ she said.

As Ling strolled away to join the other
girls, José and David exchanged astonished looks at the girl’s brazen
attitude.

‘She’s a fiery one,’
remarked Blake.

Jason surprised them all by grinning and
saying, ‘Yeah, I like her.’

‘Careful what you wish for,’
said José. ‘She might end up in your team.’

‘
Jason’s
team?’
exclaimed Charley as she chose her lunch. ‘What’s happened
to our team?’

‘Given the number of new recruits,
the colonel plans to split us into different squads – Alpha, Bravo, Charlie
and Delta,’ explained José.

Charley frowned. ‘That’s the
first I’ve heard about it.’

‘He wants us experienced
buddyguards to babysit the newbies,’ said David.

‘Yeah, and by the
looks of it
they’re gonna
need
babysitting,’ remarked Jason, nodding in the
direction of a skinny Indian boy. ‘Where did the colonel find that
beanpole?’

‘Bodyguarding’s not all
about muscle,’ Charley told him.

‘Well, let’s hope his brains
are bigger than his biceps, for his
and
his Principal’s sake,’
muttered Jason, filling his plate with a mountain of pasta and
sauce.

After lunch,
Charley chatted with the girls before jet lag finally caught up with her. Yawning,
she left the dining hall and headed up to her room. But she was stopped at her door
by Blake.

‘So, are you really OK?’ he
asked. ‘I heard from the colonel it was a pretty rough assignment.’

Charley responded with a tired smile.
‘Yeah, it didn’t exactly go according
to plan.’

‘But you did your job and
that’s what counts,’ he said, trying to reassure her. When she
didn’t reply, he took both her hands in his. ‘I was really worried about
you, Charley,’ he admitted.

‘That’s sweet of you, Blake.
But I’m fine. It was my Principal who got shot.’ Charley felt a
tightening in her throat. ‘I-I tried to give her body cover, but there were
just too many bullets flying …’

Blake wrapped his arms round her and
drew her to him. Charley closed her eyes and hugged him back.

After the smoke-bomb incident, their
relationship had stalled for a while. But Blake had been persistent and, against her
better judgement, the two of them had become an item. Charley had made it clear,
though, that they needed to keep it
low key. She had no intention of being judged by
their relationship rather than her ability as a bodyguard. Yet at moments like these
she was deeply glad of Blake. Assignments took their toll and it was comforting to
have someone she could talk to and rely on, even if they did barely see each other
between missions.

Blake lifted her chin with his finger
and stared into
her
eyes. ‘I missed you,’ he said.
Gently brushing aside a lock of her hair, he went to kiss her.

‘There you are, Charley!’
called Jody. Their instructor bounded up the stairs. ‘The colonel wants to see
you right now.’

The colonel’s office was a large
wooden-panelled affair furnished with high-back red leather chairs and a heavy
mahogany desk. The faint aroma of polished wood and rich leather gave the room
an
aristocratic air. Yet the antique design and old-world atmosphere contrasted sharply
with the state-of-the-art LED displays on the walls and the ultra-slim glass monitor
on the desk’s integrated computer system.

Charley stood to attention in the middle
of the room. It took all her willpower not to just collapse on to the carpet. Her
body was weary and stiff from the
long flight; her thoughts were chaotic and
strained from exhaustion, concern for Sofia and dread at what the colonel had to say
about the mission.

Colonel Black leant forward across his
desk. ‘It’s good news,’ he announced. ‘Your Principal
Sofia’s on course to make a full recovery.’

Surprised and relieved by the news,
Charley felt a huge weight lift from her shoulders.
‘I thought she was as good
as dead.’

‘Not at all
– your quick thinking and first-aid skills actually saved her life,’ he
explained. ‘Minister Valdez is deeply grateful for your bravery.’

Charley forced a smile.
‘That’s wonderful to hear, but I shouldn’t have let his daughter
get shot in the first place. I tried to give her full body cover, but there was
simply too
much crossfire –’

‘Don’t be so hard on
yourself,’ scolded the colonel. ‘Without you, Sofia would most certainly
have been kidnapped or killed.’

He pointed to the monitor where images
of the crime scene in question scrolled past.

‘I’ve the complete report
here,’ Colonel Black explained. ‘The bullet ricocheted off the
minister’s armoured car. You couldn’t have done
anything about it. We
just have to be thankful it was a ricochet and not a direct hit. That slowed the
bullet’s velocity and stopped it reaching her spinal cord. If you hadn’t
carried out emergency first aid at the scene, she’d have bled out. You acted
like a true professional.’

‘It should have been
me
that took the bullet,’ she insisted, still feeling guilty.

‘
Never
say that!’
snapped the colonel. ‘A bodyguard with a death wish is a danger to everyone.
Yes, we need to be willing to stand in the line of fire – but
only
if
absolutely necessary to protect the life of a Principal. Charley, you need to value
your own life as much as theirs. Remember, a dead bodyguard is no protection to
anyone.’

Colonel Black rose from his seat,
stepped
round his
desk and laid a paternal hand on her
shoulder. ‘I realize you’re trying to compensate for not being able to
save your friend, but you owe it to Kerry’s memory to forgive
yourself.’

Swallowing back the long-held grief for
her friend, Charley blinked away a tear. ‘I know how crazy it sounds, but I
felt that by saving others I could somehow bring Kerry back.’

The colonel shook his head. ‘You
don’t need to save everyone, Charley. Nobody could do that. You’ve
honoured Kerry a hundredfold with your commitment to bodyguard training and your
heroic actions in the field.’

The colonel pinned a silver shield with
guardian wings to her T-shirt.

‘What’s this?’ she
asked, staring at the badge in puzzlement.

‘For courage and outstanding
performance in the line of duty,’ replied Colonel Black. ‘I consider you
our top-ranking buddyguard, and you should be officially recognized for
that.’

Charley studied the shield, feeling a
small flush of pride. This acknowledgement was proof that she was indeed the best of
the best. She could almost picture her parents’ proud smiles, if they’d
still been around.

‘Which brings me to your next
assignment,’ announced the colonel, returning to his desk.

Charley blinked, her moment of glory
swept aside by the prospect of yet another mission. ‘My next? But I’ve
only just got back.’

‘Don’t
worry. You’ll have ten days to prepare. But I thought you’d like to know
who you’ll be protecting …’

‘Who?’ Charley prompted when
the colonel
seemed to be purposefully holding back on her.

‘Ash Wild.’