Christen
Thursday, Singapore
“This is kind of unexpected.” Lula stepped out of the taxi and waited under the portico near the front of their hotel, Ruffles in Singapore. Turn-of-the-century British architecture, amidst older oriental designed architecture and futuristic modern skyscrapers.
Christen slid across the seat and reached her freshly pedicured foot, in the gold sandal Johnna had picked out, onto the pavement. She looked up at the white edifice with its embellishments that looked like piped icing. “What? That you’d be staying in a hotel that looks like wedding cake?”
True to what Johnna and Lula had threatened, a team of women had tsk-tsked and scrunched their noses as they had whipped off her towel, leaving her standing naked and under their scrutiny in the Sri Lankan spa. They had looked her over and made notes on their pad. Then she was hustled from one room to another. They smoothed on their hot wax, then ripped with abandon — her underarms, her legs, her bikini area was almost child-like now, and Christen didn’t like it. She thought she looked like a plucked chicken. Even though she understood the necessity of the procedure after she saw the tiny bikini Lula had bought for her, she still imagined the discomfort of regrowth when she was under the hundred-plus-degree sun back with her unit in Iraq. She’d be back soon. And then she’d know how the Grey mission had ended. That mission clawed at her insides.
Christen couldn’t say the spa had been completely awful. They’d cooled her skin with tonics and soothed and buffed her until she glowed. They polished her toe nails and her finger nails. They dyed her brows that had bleached in the sun and tinted her eyelashes black, so she would look made up even if she was swimming with no makeup at all—which was what she preferred anyway—and would make the spy lenses easier to deal with without mascara flakes to worry about. Her hair was even styled and highlighted so that her pixie “whatever, just get it out of my eyes” cut, looked fun, feminine, and flattering. Then they had gone after her with the makeup that she hated. Light, natural, but ultra-feminine. A pale rosy pink for her lips that looked nice with her tanned and freckled skin and her auburn hair. Alright, being feminine felt nice. Feeling attractive was an okay change of pace.
She wore a loose muumuu-styled dress. Its white color and filmy weight was comfortable in the heat and humidity of the Singapore early-morning sun. The three women had purchased Indian flower garlands after they’d made their way through customs at the airport. The ropes of petals draped to their waists, smelled headily of the flowers’ perfume. “Lula this is so ridiculous.” She squeezed her friends elbow as a stab of guilt hit her. “You all don’t really need me here. I could have just called my dad and said you wanted to come. I can’t be here feasting and drinking while my unit’s in harm’s way. This is so wrong.”
“No drinking. You can enjoy the food though,” Lula said.
Christen sent her a death glare.
“I’m sure that phone call would have gotten me in, your dad loves me.” She gave Christen a nudge. “It might even have gotten Johnna a ticket to the party. But we wouldn’t have been able to get the others in.”
“You said that before. What others?” A bee had found her flower garland. “Look at me, you’ve got me done up like a freaking arranged-marriage bride, like you’re leading me in to meet my groom for the first time. I feel like an idiot.” Christen frowned. “And unexpectedly nervous,” she said under her breath.
“Are you really nervous?” Johnna asked as she watched the bellboys gathering their luggage from the back of their limo. Christen’s cases were new and filled with clothes that still had their tags on them. She couldn’t very well go in and be the trust fund socialite with an army duffel, camo BDUs, and flight boots.
“I’ve got an eye twitch,” Christen said. “Now, what others?”
“Helpers. We’re a team of five,” Lula whispered into her ear as she pretended to rearrange Christen’s garland. She ran her hand down Christen’s arm and checked that she was wearing her recording device hidden under a dozen cloisonné bangles. “You’re all set. All we do is look around. Hang out near deep conversations. And pretend like we’re on vacation.”
“From folding origami,” Johnna grinned. “Let your poor fingers heal from the paper cuts.” Johnna wore auburn and gold. She had gleaming black hair that fell in soft waves just past her boobs, and moss-green eyes that tilted up at the corners reminding Christen of a book cover she once saw of a woman who shape-shifted into a wolf. Or maybe Christen was just picking up wolf-energy around Johnna. “Here we go.” Johnna nudged her. “I see your dad, come on.”
The bellboy pulled his trolley politely behind the women. The doorman held the door wide as he welcomed them. Christen’s dad turned a broad smile her way. “Here’s my little fire fly.”
Huh, he hadn’t called her that since she was like five.
“Hi, Dad.” Christen gave her father a hug. And leaned in to give her step-mother an air kiss on each cheek. They were probably the same age. It was weird.
“Dad you know Lula LaRoe,” Christen gestured and Lula finger waved. “This is our friend Johnna Red. My dad, William, my step-mom, London.”
“I’m glad you arrived when you did. London wants to go shopping.” He sent a doting smile toward his wife before turning back to Christen. “Our other guests are doing as they wish today. I had left a word for you with the concierge had we missed you. We’ll have cocktails and a formal dinner tonight. Do you girls have what you need? Shall London pick up evening wear while we’re out?”
The concierge sidled over and handed each of the women a key card for rooms that were side by side, bowing to each. “Please allow me to assist you, should you have any question or need.” And then he slid away. The bell hop waited patiently to the side, his white gloved hands on the luggage trolley.
“We have what we need, thanks, Dad. See you tonight.” Christen waggled her card. She was obviously being disinvited from joining them, so no sleuthing there. She wondered if she couldn’t devise a way to learn the names and whereabouts of the others in their party, ask the concierge for a list, maybe they could “happen on” some of them before that evening.
“Before I go—now, bug, I know you’re going to groan, but please, be an adult about this—here is your security team.” Her dad opened his hand and two of the four men who stood in the shadows in dark suits stepped forward.
Holy shit!
Holy shit!
Holy shit!
As her eyes caught and held on the taller of the two, the ground seemed to shift under her feet. Christen had to reach out and grab Lula’s elbow. Energy snapped and sizzled as it arched between them, leaving her feeling weirdly effervescent like bubbles from a children’s wand or the seeds being blown from a dandelion. Like she’d lost the substance of her body. There she was floating in space. This was almost the same feeling as when her helicopter suddenly plunged in the turbulence and she was momentarily weightless, hanging in space, only it sustained as the seconds ticked by. She stared into the deep brown eyes of the blond-headed guy in his perfectly tailored suit. This was, by far, the weirdest sensation of her life.
She thought about her last mission, when she desperately wanted to look over and see Grey being pulled from the window like a baby emerging into the hands of three very gruff midwives, but she’d found a way to abstain, to keep her focus on the dials. That’s what she needed to do now, get her focus on the dials, away from the brown eyes. The brown eyes were absorbing her. No wrong word. There were no words. Beyond weird. This was…breathtaking in its strangeness.
Christen had, in fact, stopped breathing. She was the beat of her heart and nothing else.
Is this what it was like – love at first sight?
No. This was not what it was like. This wasn’t love at first sight, Christen chided herself. This was the heat and the overwhelming scent of her flower garland. It was her strange video-taking contact lens messing with her brain stem, and probably something she ate in Sri Lanka. The elements were all converging on her at once. And her mind was trying to interpret the outcome. Christen brushed her free hand over her forehead. Maybe if she laid down for a few minutes…
“As you and Lula already know, and Johnna may or may not. Money makes for targets, and I protect my own. It happens, believe me, in the blink of an eye. I had one very close shave just recently. If it hadn’t been for these two gentlemen, you may not have a dad to hug today.”
“What?” Christen forced her head to turn toward her dad. Now that eye contact was broken with blond-guy, Christen was a whole body again. Solid. “What happened?”
“Bit of a scuffle over in Tanzania. But, all is well.” He turned to the two men who stepped forward. Christen allowed herself to look at the second of the two men on her close protection detail. Whatever swamped her system had abated, but she wasn’t willing to test the water again with the blond guy, yet. This guy was a little shorter, six feet plus, with copper red hair, that tried to curl despite the close-cut style. His face and stance reminded Christen of a Hyland warrior from the covers of Lula’s romance novels.
Okay, she’d take a little peek. Try out her sea legs.
She allowed her gaze to drift to the left and rest on the blond.
Yes, she was fine. This was fine. Her reaction earlier was just a response to all that had been happening. Crazy unfinished missions. Time zones changes. Adrenaline. And being on unsure footing. It was a little acid-trippy, but it was over now.
This guy was six-feet-three or so. He looked like home. Like football and apple pie. He was obviously happy outdoors with his sun-bleached hair—cut very short. He was as all-American as they came. And suddenly Christen felt homesick and wished she could give him a hug. Yes, that would be like a little taste of home. It had been a long time since she was in the US. Almost seven months of deployment. Christen shook off the desire to walk into his arms and rest her cheek on his chest.
“As long as you ladies are my guests, Gator and Blaze are charged with your security.” His voice was stern as if warding off the argument that Christen normally raised. “As I was saying, I’ve seen these men in action when I was in Tanzania. Quite spectacular, though I hope you never need to see it yourself. I’m leaving you in capable hands.” Davidson looked at the men with a special something in his eyes, more than just a compliment, this was his look of high regard and was reserved for a privileged few, like her oldest brother Karl. This was rather remarkable. These must be some of her dad’s trusted staff. If that was true, then they were in the “enemy camp” so to speak. Shoot. How were they going to dodge these guys?
Christen had had her share of trying to thwart her dad’s security, especially as a teen, but none of those men ever received this level of approbation. She wondered what had happened in Africa. Maybe later today she could wrangle the story out of them. If she asked, would they tell?
Her dad headed out the door with London. The other two body guards followed along.
Christen turned back to their close protection team. Her head back in the game, she had full control of her body. Full control of the situation. She was a damned Night Stalker, after all. “Christen,” she said. “Lula and Johnna.” She gestured toward the others.
“Glad to meet you,” the blond said. “I’m Gator and my partner there is Blaze.”
Gator and Blaze had military stamped across their foreheads. From their build to the look of readiness in their eyes—that high level of comfort that only came with understanding you possessed lethal skillsets. Christen presumed these guys retired from special forces roles. She had been working with various customers for the last decade and could spot them a mile away – unless of course they were hidden under a ghillie suit or some new-fangled camouflage fabric that made them disappear from sight. That thought brought back the unease Christen felt for leaving her unit. She looked around the luxe and splendor. How dare she be here when others might be in harm’s way? She wriggled her knees back and forth to burn off the buzz travelling through her system. This felt so wrong.
“Have you made plans for your day?” Blaze asked.
“I didn’t get my exercise in yesterday, I think I’ll go for a run,” Christen said. Pounding down the street and working up a good sweat might just be what she needed to let go of her last mission and get focused on this one.
“Are you just jogging or are you going for the full body workout?” Lula asked. “I need to know what to put on.”
Christen tipped her head to the side.
“Go big or go home,” Lula raised her eyebrows with a conspiratorial wriggle.
Christen smiled and smacked Lula’s high-five. Hehehe, they were about to give the boys a taste of girl power.
“Why don’t you get settled and changed,” Blaze said. “Gator and I will be waiting outside of your suites when you’re ready to run.”
Christen caught Blaze’s gaze. Not “meet you in the lobby.” Her dad had probably told them how much she hated having a shadow. She smiled. “Only if you think you can keep up.”