Ugley Business

by Kate Johnson

  “You didn’t think they were sadistic last week,” he murmured.

  “No,” I said, “not them. You, maybe.”

  Maria had one hand to her mouth and the other on her flat stomach, trying not to laugh. Karen Hanson’s eyes swung between me and Luke like a blue searchlight.

  “I’m not going to ask,” she said, the very tiniest hint of a smile touching her lips.

  “We’re not going to tell,” Luke replied, his smile more overt.

  Maria turned her face away, shoulders shaking.

  Thankfully, at that moment the outside door opened, we heard voices, then the inner office door swung open and Macbeth walked in, immediately filling the room.

  “Agent Five,” Hanson nodded. “Did you have any problems?”

  “Yeah. Had to go back for sunglasses,” he said, voice deep and rumbling, barely betraying a smile. Macbeth seems big and scary, but underneath he’s a bit of a pussycat. A pussycat with claws, mind. Maybe what Tammy wants to be when she grows up.

  “This,” Hanson said to us all, “is our new client. Angelique Winter,” she added, as Macbeth stepped aside, Angel appeared, looking pale and fragile, and I felt light-headed.

  Chapter Three

  Thoughts and shocks crowded into my head, everything from Angel knows we exist to Angel’s parents were agents?

  And then, maybe she really does have a stalker.

  And then, she knows I’ve been lying to her.

  Karen Hanson had started talking, but she stopped when it became clear no one was listening. I wasn’t paying attention to anything, my gaze rooted on Angel, my mind whirling.

  “Sophie?” someone said. “Soph? Are you all right?”

  It was Luke, touching my arm, lifting my chin and turning my face to his. I wrenched my gaze from Angel and let it linger on Luke.

  “I—I’m—”

  “You’re SO17?” Angel squeaked.

  “We are,” Luke said. “You know about SO17?”

  “My parents…” Angel began, and trailed off.

  “Her parents were both agents,” Karen Hanson supplied.

  “IC Winter was a government agent?” Luke said in disbelief.

  “You’re IC Winter’s daughter?” Maria stared.

  “IC and Greg Winter were both agents,” Karen repeated. People tend to forget Angel’s dad. He was a bigger earner than her mum, but not half as famous. “She in MI6, he in MI5. Both had a lot of useful contacts.”

  There was a long silence. We all stared at Angel.

  “Well,” Maria said eventually. “Bugger me.”

  Macbeth looked her up and down thoughtfully.

  “The stalker,” I said to Angel, recovering. “Is that why you’re here?”

  She nodded. “It’s been going on and on. That’s why I asked you to stay. I’m frightened to be alone. I—I didn’t tell you about the dropped calls, the letters, even e-mails. I got a call from someone who’s writing a biography of my mum the other day. She said she’s getting harassed by some guy—or it might even be guys. There’s something he wants, but he never says what.”

  “And you can’t think of anything it might be?” Maria asked. “No debts or anything?”

  Angel shook her head. “Not that I know. Everything was in the black when they—when I—it’s all clear.” She looked up at me. “How long have you been a secret agent?”

  “Two months.”

  “Since—oh my God, since you went to part time, since that thing with the baggage belt—” she clapped her hand to her mouth.

  “It’s okay.” Luke grinned. “The thing with the baggage belt was what got Sophie hired.”

  Angel shook her head. “Wow.”

  “So, what,” Maria asked, “are we supposed to be guarding her?”

  Hanson shot her blue gaze at Maria, who didn’t flinch. “You, Agent Two, are off active duty until I am satisfied that you are totally healed.” Maria opened her mouth and Karen held up a hand to head her off. “You will stay here and investigate possible perpetrators via the computer.”

  Maria glared at her mutinously and muttered something foreign under her breath. She has grandparents from all four corners of Europe, and speaks the languages accordingly. But apparently so did Karen Hanson, because she returned Maria’s glare with a cool glance, and replied in the same language. Maria burned, but said nothing.

  I was scared.

  “Agent Four,” Hanson said, and Luke had to nudge me. “You will guard Angel at work. Be her shadow. Notice everyone who notices her.”

  I couldn’t help an eye roll.

  “Is there a problem with that?” Hanson asked me crisply.

  My main problem was that I didn’t want to work Angel’s twelve hour shifts. “Well, have you seen Angel lately? Everyone notices her.”

  Angel blushed prettily. Karen Hanson gave me a glacial smile. “Then you will have to be vigilant.”

  I made a face at Luke, who grinned. Vigilance is not my strong point.

  “Agent Three,” Luke looked up at the summons, “your time will be divided between personal protection at Angel’s home when she is there, and background work at the airport if it is needed. You still have your green pass?”

  Luke nodded and took it out of his pocket to show her. All airport workers have a security pass, mostly for purposes of identification and to get in and out of the car park, but if you work airside you need it for access. The pass, along with its individual PIN code, can get you in and out of all the doors that your specific job requires. Passenger service agents like Angel and myself have green passes, which access most areas. Police, and by extension Luke and me, have red security passes, which access all areas.

  When I got involved with SO17, it was through Luke, who was working undercover for Ace as a PSA using the alias of Luca, a flirtatious Italian. He’d dyed his hair brown and wore contact lenses, and his accent was authentic enough to confuse genuine Italians.

  I saw Angel looking at Luke curiously, and when he showed her the pass, her mouth dropped open.

  “You’re Luca?”

  He nodded.

  “The whole time and that was you? Sophie, did you know?”

  I nodded.

  “Wait—you are really Sophie, aren’t you?”

  I laughed. “As far as I know.”

  “Agent Five,” Hanson turned to Macbeth. “I understand that security is one of your specialities.”

  Huh. Wish I had a speciality.

  Macbeth nodded, smiling widely, and Hanson went on, “You will be responsible for securing Angel’s property and guarding it when she is absent. Be discreet, this goes for all of you.”

  I closed my eyes for a second. Macbeth, as big as at least two normal people with the demeanour of someone who’s going to cause you immense physical pain; me, five foot ten with my blonde hair and big boobs (I’m sorry, but I get noticed); and Luke, who is basically one giant pheromone. Not exactly what you might call covert.

  “You will all need copies of this,” Karen Hanson gave us each copies of Angel’s roster. “Four, your schedule has been changed accordingly. You will be on check-in when she is, and at the gate when she is.”

  I nodded.

  “Let’s recap. Two?”

  “I’ll be here doing Internet searches,” Maria said gloomily.

  “Three?”

  “At home when Angel’s at home. Maybe sometimes at the airport too.” Luke looked pissed off at this, and no wonder—he’d got the longest hours. But then he was the most highly qualified.

  “Four?”

  “Angel’s slightly larger shadow.”

  Karen cracked a smile at that. “Five?”

  “At home when she ain’t there.”

  “Right. There is to be a firm crossover. She doesn’t escape your sight. Understood?” We all nodded. “Then off you go. Mission starts immediately.”

  She picked up her pen and started writing again and we all turned to go like dismissed schoolchildren. Then something occurred to me.

>   “What if Angel wants to go out? Shopping, or to the pub or something? Is she going to be quarantined?”

  Karen Hanson smiled. “Well done, Four. And since you’re so observant, you can escort her whenever she leaves the house.”

  Luke grinned and pulled me out of the room before I could complain.

  “And that’s what you get for being concerned,” I grumbled as he shut the door.

  “It’s very sweet of you,” he kissed my forehead. “Well. Angel. Where do you want to go?”

  “What am I, a Sim?” Angel said. “I need to go home. And think about all of this.”

  “So I guess I’m coming with you,” Luke said.

  “And I need to do some shopping later,” Angel said.

  “So that’s me, too.”

  “And I need to come and secure that chapel of yours,” Macbeth said. “Who has air-con?”

  Ted didn’t, so I drove him back to Angel’s alone, trying to think, while Macbeth took his latest motor, an Alfa 159, and Luke drove his undercovermobile, a silver Vectra. Angel got in Luke’s car, judging it to be the safest, but not by a huge margin. I think she was more shaken than she let on. She had said once before how she hated guns. Now she knew she’d be travelling with one wherever she went—or if she was with Macbeth, with half a dozen.

  And she wasn’t the only one who needed to think. I had to fit into my head not only the global knowledge that IC and Greg Winter were spies—not an actress and a songwriter, but spies, like me (well sort of)—but that Angel knew about SO17. I didn’t have to lie any more. I could tell her about me and Luke. I could talk to someone about it all.

  Despite the hot, still air inside the car, I felt myself breathe easier.

  Back at Angel’s house, all was chaos. Macbeth had driven off somewhere unknown to gather some security equipment of dubious legality, and was now drilling holes in the ancient stone of the church, fitting enough microphones and cameras to cover a talk show. The electric drill droned on and on and there were wires everywhere as he connected everything up.

  Luke went around checking locks on doors and windows and told Angel to get metal shutters fitted to them all. Angel protested loudly that this was a fifteenth century church and that she wouldn’t be allowed because of its Grade I listing, but Luke paid no attention.

  “Do you want someone to break into your house?” he asked, and Angel made a face.

  “Well, no, but—”

  “Get the shutters. They’ll roll back into the wall—”

  “But the walls are ancient!”

  The argument was stopped by Macbeth, who came in and said to Angel, “You should get some shutters on these windows. Fifteenth century glass ain’t cheap to replace.”

  Angel then got into a conversation with Macbeth about fifteenth century glass, about which he appeared to know an astonishing amount, and Luke stretched back on the sofa and looked up at where I was leaning over the balcony of the baron’s gallery, watching it all.

  “You okay up there?”

  I shrugged and nodded.

  “Bored?”

  More shrugging. More nodding. I was too polite to say, “Yes, out of my mind.”

  “Want me to come and keep you company?”

  Before I could shrug and nod again, he’d disappeared under the gallery and started up the narrow stone staircase that winds up to the gallery. It’s a big space, twelve feet by nearly thirty and open to the room below, although there are heavy drapes that can be pulled across for privacy.

  Luke straightened up as he came through the low doorway and regarded me with his head on one side as I sat on one of the guest beds.

  “What?” I said.

  “You look hot.”

  “Hot as in sweaty and exhausted, or hot as in—”

  “Hot as in,” Luke said, smiling lazily. “Although I could make it sweaty and exhausted, if you want.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Angel and Macbeth are down there.”

  “So? We’re up here.” He started towards me slowly. “We could be quiet.”

  “The hell.”

  “Okay, they could listen in.”

  I smiled. “No, Luke.”

  He put on a hurt face. “No last night, no this morning. Come on.”

  “Tonight?”

  He nodded. “You’d better—”

  Oh, shit. “No, bugger, I’m going home for tea. I promised.”

  Luke scowled. He pulled me to my feet and kissed me, long and hard, the sort of kiss that didn’t usually end with me still being clothed. And this was no exception: Luke already had my shoulder straps pushed down to the point of indecency.

  He only stopped when Angel belted out a dirty whistle, to the accompaniment of Macbeth laughing.

  “Get a room,” she called up, and I blushed.

  “We’ve got one,” Luke called back. “Your guest quarters aren’t very private, Angel.”

  “You shouldn’t be standing by the edge.”

  He looked back at me. “She’s right, you know.” He pulled me back over to the bed. “Over here’s better.”

  “I am not having sex with you while there are other people listening in!”

  He made a face. “Spoilsport.” He glanced back at the door to the stairs. “What’s upstairs?”

  “Upstairs?”

  “Yeah. The stairs go up as well as down. Angel?”

  “We can still hear you.”

  “What’s upstairs?”

  “Delicate things.”

  “I think it’s storage,” I said.

  “Storage is good.” To Angel, he said, “We’re going to have a look around.”

  “Okay, but don’t break or, you know, stain anything.”

  Blushing hard as Luke laughed, I let him pull me up the tiny spiral staircase and into Angel’s attic.

  Jesus, it was like a treasure trove. All of IC’s dresses were stored here in garment bags, the windows totally blacked out so the fabrics wouldn’t fade in the sun. Greg’s guitars were all here, too—the Gibson Les Paul, the Fender Strat, the Hoffner violin bass, the Simon & Patrick—boxes of music, sheet and vinyl; memorabilia, movie posters and concert tickets; boxes and boxes of photos.

  “Jesus,” Luke said.

  “I know.”

  “We can’t have sex here.”

  “We can’t?”

  “It’d be sacrilege.”

  I stared. “Sex in a church doesn’t bother you, but sex in full view of Greg Winter’s Gibson is sacrilege?”

  “Hey,” Luke said severely, “he wrote ‘Heartswings’ on that guitar.”

  Men.

  Instead of getting sweaty, we got dusty instead, looking through all the boxes for something that Angel’s stalker might want. But we didn’t find anything. Or rather, we found lots of things. The guitars alone were worth about the same amount as my flat. The piano downstairs in the south aisle, the one Greg had used to write the mega-famous “I Don’t Know Why”, had been valued in the millions. Looking under some old cardboard boxes, I found a safe.

  “That could be interesting,” Luke looked at it.

  “You going to break into it?”

  “No,” he went to the stairs and yelled down, “Angel, can we look in your safe?”

  She didn’t answer and he went farther down to yell over the gallery. She called something back up and he re-emerged in the doorway, shaking his head.

  “Women.”

  “What?”

  “The combination is her birthday.” He frowned. “Do you know it?”

  “Do I know my best friend’s birthday? No.”

  He gave me a look, and I rolled my eyes. “Of course I bloody know.” I gave him the full eight digit number and the safe rolled open.

  We stared.

  “Jesus,” Luke said.

  “I know.”

  “Fuck me.”

  “Later.” I reached in and took out a velvet case. “Recognise this?”

  He frowned at the diamond bracelet. “Should I?”

  �
��And this?” I took out a necklace that probably had about the same worth as the entire village.

  “That looks familiar…”

  “I wore it to the Buckman Ball. Had to get it professionally cleaned before I could give it back.”

  Luke looked impressed. “You wore IC Winter’s diamonds to the Buckman Ball?”

  “I did indeed.” I stroked the huge pear-shaped, brilliant cut central diamond. We’d had some good times together. Maybe not at the ball, but certainly afterwards…

  “Sophie?” Angel’s voice drifted up the stairs, and I blinked. Luke blinked too and I wondered if he’d been remembering after the Buckman Ball too. Hard to forget.

  Very hard.

  “Sophie?” Angel was in the little arched doorway now. “I did tell you about tonight, didn’t I?”

  Still thinking about the night of the ball, I gave her a blank stare.

  “I’m working.”

  Beside me, Luke groaned. “You are?” I said.

  “Six through six.”

  “All night?”

  “That’s the shift I usually do. First of four.”

  I closed my eyes. Twelve hours at the airport. It just might kill me.

  “What time is it now?”

  “Five,” Luke said. “Just gone.”

  We’d been up here that long? That has to be the longest me and Luke have ever spent alone together without taking our clothes off.

  Looking at him, I could tell he was thinking the same thing.

  “No,” I said. “I have to go home and take a shower and get changed and go.” I stood up, dusting myself off. It was so hot up in the tower, the backs of my knees were pooled with sweat and my clothes were sticking to me.

  I glanced at Luke, who never seemed to get sticky and sweaty, just moist and dishevelled and, in both senses of the word, really hot.

  Definitely a shower. A cold one.

  I went home, took the coward’s way out and texted my brother that I wouldn’t be home for tea, and got in the shower. When I got out, no cooler, my mobile was ringing. My old mobile. My mother.

  “Hi,” I said, dripping onto the carpet, “did you get the message I sent Chalker?”

  “Yes,” she said, “but I thought I’d ring and check.”