by Storm Chase
Xavier paused and then shrugged. “Watch,” he said as he clicked open a folder listing a dozen or so video files. Xavier clicked on one marked Elizabeth. It opened in a box, showing Richard undressing a stunningly pretty girl.
“That’s Elizabeth Darcy,” Pandora said amazed. “She’s a model. I never knew Richard knew her!”
Xavier clicked open another file.
“Oh my God! That’s Sue Fleetwood! Richard’s boss!” Pandora stared open mouthed at the video. “You mean he recorded everything? With everyone?”
“Yup.”
“I can’t believe it!” Pandora said horrified. “I thought it was just a mistake!”
“You must have walked in on him when he was having a quiet gloat,” Xavier said. “I’ve read his email and there’s nothing about sex tapes from any of his women except for a few jokes from you.”
“I thought it was funny,” Pandora said appalled. “Richard said he’d deleted it and I believed him. I mean, he’s so stuffy and correct. He didn’t even like me joking about it!”
“Because he didn’t want anyone else asking questions,” Xavier said coolly.
Watching Sue Fleetwood laughing, clearly totally unaware that she was on tape, Pandora felt sick. She put her hand on Xavier’s arm. “Please, Xav, can you delete them? If this ever gets out, those girls will be so humiliated.”
“All right but first we’ll do this,” Xavier said. He pulled up an email icon, addressed it to Sue, typed the subject line Gotcha! attached the video clip and pressed Send.
“What are you doing?” Pandora asked horrified.
“I’m sending each girl her own video,” Xavier said tersely. “I don’t know them all but I’ve traced enough to do the trick. They’ll tell their friends in secret so it will be all over London by the end of business tomorrow. Between them, they’ll make his life hell. He’ll never have another girl again.”
He pulled up some other folders marked Fun, Asian and Variety, revealing Richard’s online porn stash. Xavier attached some of the most disgusting pictures and sent them to Richard’s entire email address book with the subject line: Now this is something I would advocate!
“That’s enough, Xavier,” Pandora said in awe as the x-rated attachments started flying to his bosses and clients. “He’s going to get into serious trouble.”
“That’s his job gone,” Xavier said tersely. “One more thing.” He tapped a few keys and sent off an email titled, crime does pay. He attached a folder called Baxter and Sons.
“What was that?” Pandora asked.
“Richard had a client, Baxter and Sons,” Xavier said quietly. “They lost the opportunity to get some lucrative overseas contracts because of a bad credit rating. As it turns out, the bank fucked up. The company asked the bank to change the rating but they refused to admit to their error. Richard took on the case, said he’d investigate and finally advised Baxters not to sue. What he forgot to mention is that the bank is his client too.”
“Oh my God,” Pandora whispered. “He hid a conflict of interest? That is so illegal!”
“Yup. And he kept very careful notes detailing exactly how he milked Baxters for the so-called investigation and how he got the bank to pay him a fee for burying the case.”
Pandora was flabbergasted. “I can’t believe it! Richard is always banging on about ethics.”
“Now he can discuss his ethics with Sue Fleetwood, the directors at his company, the client he screwed over, the bar council and the fraud squad,” Xavier said coldly.
She was speechless. She looked at the file again. Leaning forward, she clicked it open and started reading. Xavier was right. Richard had robbed the Baxters and carefully kept notes of what he’d said and when so that he wouldn’t trip up.
Xavier sat back, allowing Pandora to flip through Richard’s other files. Any guilt about snooping had gone out of her head. Digging deep, Pandora found a Fitchett Construction folder. It was her father’s company. She vaguely noted Xavier’s phone ringing and his moving away to answer it.
“I think the leak is fixed,” he was saying, “but let me go and make sure.”
Xavier disappeared into the kitchen, still talking.
Engrossed, Pandora kept reading Richard’s files. From the creation dates it looked like Richard had done his homework before going to that party where they’d first met.
With wonder she saw pages and pages of notes listing the value of their family home, her father’s current contracts and the potential income that Richard might get from taking over the company’s legal work. He must have planned to woo her father from the very beginning.
Notes made after their first date detailed pros and cons of marriage versus bachelordom. Richard had even included tax breaks.
He went to bed with me for the same reason he bedded his boss, Pandora thought, it was purely business. He’d make money and get free cooking, cleaning and sex services too. No wonder Richard was pissed off. Fitchett Construction is a five star outfit and I didn’t match up. I couldn’t replace restaurant, laundry and housecleaning services at a competitive rate.
With trembling fingers she opened up Richard’s current email. There were several messages from her father. With a sinking heart, she saw the latest of the messages had been sent the day before. Before she could think about it, she clicked it open.
The first paragraph was enough. Sad as Pandora’s death was for us, it should not stand in our way, she read. Why don’t you join us at the funeral tomorrow? We can discuss your taking up a directorship afterwards over lunch. Pricilla says she will make your favourite lemon meringue pie. We’ve missed you so why not stay the night and make a weekend of it? We’ll have some golf.
Pandora moaned with shock. Instantly Xavier came rushing back. He read the message and swore. Leaning over her, he closed the message window.
“Don’t look, Panda,” he said. “It will only upset you.”
“Well, at least I know they’ve moved on,” Pandora said shakily. “My father is celebrating my death with a business venture and my mum’s happy because it means she can see Richard again.”
“Oh Panda!” Xavier said looking at her with concern. “I shouldn’t have let you see.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Pandora said bravely. “Now I’ve seen how they really are, I’ll never trust in anyone again. I believe it’s what they call a life lesson.”
And then she burst into tears.
Chapter Nine
Xavier might say he was blind to emotion but after she broke down, he bundled her into bed and just lay there holding her until she cried herself to sleep.
Admitting that her parents really didn’t care for her and discovering that Richard was a thief with a penchant for taking sneaky sex videos really rocked Pandora. Added to the other horrific events she’d witnessed in last few days she truly felt her world had fallen apart.
She felt numb, as if something had died inside her. The toxic relationship book had made her depressed; looking at her life in the light of what she’d discovered was like surgery without anaesthetic.
Pandora cried, slept, woke up, cried again and went back to sleep. Forty-eight hours later she finally got out of bed, tottered to the bathroom, caught sight of herself in the mirror and almost fainted. Her hair was a tangled mess and her skin looked grey where it wasn’t blotchy.
Disgusted with herself, she took a hot shower, washed her hair until it squeaked and then ruthlessly scrubbed herself with the loofah. Finally clean and dressed again, she realised how kind Xavier had been. Vaguely she remembered him lying next to her for hours, just holding her.
She waited until the setting sun shooed out the guns and went to find him. Predictably he was sitting at his computer. Seeing her, he smiled and stood up to give her a hug.
“You’re all right again,” he said. “I was getting worried about you, Panda.”
“I’m sorry to have been such a drag,” Pandora said muffled into his shoulder. “I feel like I’ve been in a daze. You’ve been
so good to me, Xav. Thanks.”
“That’s all right,” he said to her gently. “You’ve got a lot to think about. Just take it easy, okay?” He looked at her carefully. “Your eyes are focussed again,” he said. “Good. You’re definitely back.”
“Is it okay if we talk?” Pandora asked him.
“Sure. Give me ten minutes to finish this.”
“I’ll get you a beer.”
Ten minutes later, nose to nose on the squashy sofa, Pandora looked for the right words. Xavier just sat and waited.
“I feel like I’ve died in some way,” Pandora said eventually. “I’ve thought about what you’ve told me and I accept that what you said is true. This is a new life. A new beginning. I don’t like it but I have to accept it. I’m looking at myself in a new way too. I don’t like who I was. I don’t want to be that Pandora anymore.”
Xavier stirred and looked uncomfortable. “I like you as you are, Panda. Why do you want to change?”
“I’m a coward. I never tell people what I really feel or want because I worry they won’t like it. That stops now,” Pandora said firmly.
Xavier smiled at her. “You tell me what you think. You’ve lectured me quite a few times.”
“Only after I’ve had a few drinks. From now on I won’t be needing any Dutch courage.”
“That sounds all right.”
“And I’m not trusting anyone anymore, ever,” Pandora said defiantly. “Everyone’s on the make. Everyone’s a liar. I know that now.”
“You can trust me,” Xavier said mildly.
Pandora looked at him and wavered. “I think you are the only person I know who’s been totally honest with me,” she said.
“You’ve had a shock,” Xavier said thoughtfully. “You’ll get over it.”
“Maybe. But I have to ditch my past and accept the present,” Pandora said. “I have to accept the new normal.”
“I read that book,” Xavier said. “The one about recovering from broken relationships.” He frowned. “I didn’t like it. The theory wasn’t very consistent.”
“Consistent or not, the new me is cautious and cynical,” Pandora said firmly. “As your people think murder and kidnapping is perfectly acceptable, I’m going to have to toughen up.”
Xavier grinned at her. “Well, it’s good to see you’re back in the present,” he said noncommittally. “Want to see what I’ve been doing? It’s been really cool. Just like playing chess.”
Her heart said it was wrong to think of people as things but the new Pandora told herself she didn’t care. “Show me.”
The maps that detailed how the rebels were being lured and pushed away from the mine were fascinating. Xavier was right. It quickly became a mental exercise. Before she knew it, Pandora forgot the dots represented people.
“I should be done in about a week or ten days,” Xavier said. “Unless it rains. If it does, we’re stuck because nobody moves when it’s wet. We should be all right, though. The forecast is clear.”
Thinking of hiding in the jungle brought it home to Pandora that there were hundreds if not thousands of people who didn’t know that they were being pushed about: some lured into battle and others frightened away from their homes.
She knew she could do nothing for them; she couldn’t persuade those guns to give up. But she could make a difference in another way.
As the thoughts raced through her mind, Pandora was horrified at herself. She’d been so caught up in her own story that she’d pushed Ramon and his videos out of her head. Now she could at least make an effort to do something.
“I want you to let those girls downstairs go,” she said to Xavier.
He blinked and looked surprised. “What girls?”
“The ones Ramon showed me on his phone,” Pandora said tersely. “Your downstairs entertainment. Mac told me you’d organised it. A raft of hookers, he said. I want them to go home. You got them here, so you can send them back.”
Xavier was staring at her in surprise. “But Panda, those girls have families to keep. This job will feed, clothe and house them for a whole year.”
Pandora hesitated. This didn’t sound right. “It’s a job?” she asked. “I thought...The girl I saw looked like she was being raped.”
For a moment Xavier looked really angry. “You thought I would allow girls to be raped? For entertainment?”
“No!” Pandora squeaked. Then she breathed again and admitted to the truth. “Yes.”
“Pandora, how on earth...?” Xavier was running his hands through his hair. He looked totally horrified. “Is that why you’ve been so afraid?”
“Partly,” Pandora admitted. She saw his mouth was thinned with temper and quailed. “Sorry,” she whispered.
Xavier sighed. “It’s all right. I suppose you weren’t to know.” He picked up his beer and took a sip. She could see he was deliberately controlling his temper and she was grateful for it.
“Do you remember I told you I had some trouble in Minsk?” Xavier finally asked her.
Pandora nodded. “When you were sixteen. You called your dad.”
“Right. Well, at the time I got a job stealing credit card profiles,” he gave Pandora a hard look, “Yes, I know, it’s very bad. You can lecture me later if you like. Anyway, the gang I was working for were so pleased with my work that they sent me this girl.”
Pandora gasped. She thought she knew what was coming.
“She was my age and she’d been on the streets since she was thirteen,” Xavier said quietly. “They’d beaten her until she did whatever they told her.”
“Oh Xav!” Pandora could feel hot tears spring into her eyes.
“Yeah well, I paid for her to stay with me but that’s no good, is it?” Xavier said. “Pity buying doesn’t fix anything; it just creates a market.” He took another sip of his beer. “I got enough on the gang to put them away forever, put Irina on a bus back home, and dumped all the information with the local cops.”
“Brilliant!” Pandora breathed.
“Stupid,” Xavier corrected her gloomily. “The cops knew perfectly well what was going on. They were taking backhanders to turn a blind eye. Everyone figured out immediately what had happened, so I had the gang and the authorities after me.”
Pandora put her hand on his knee. “You got away,” she said.
“Sheer good luck! Irina was from Moscow so they looked there first. I went in the other direction. I hitched lifts to Odessa and then I took a plane to Manila. Once I was in the Philippines I was too far away to bother with.”
“I don’t even know where Minsk is,” Pandora admitted. “Or Manila. I’m going to have to look at a map.”
“It’s a long way,” Xavier said dryly.
“What happened to Irina?”
“Not a clue! She could be reunited with her family and happily married with kids, dead in a ditch or back on the streets.”
Pandora didn’t know what to say. Xavier had done the right thing and suffered for it but he didn’t even know if it had made any difference.
“I may be a thief and many other things,” Xavier continued tersely, “but I don’t abuse women.”
“I’m sorry,” Pandora said again. “I should have known, Xav, I really should have.”
Xavier breathed again. “We focus on industrial espionage,” he admitted. “It’s big money and relatively low risk. I make my people rich so if I see something I don’t like, I can speak up. But I’m not superman. I don’t see everything and I can’t stop everything. But Panda, believe me, I don’t condone rape.”
Pandora nodded. She suddenly understood why he’d been so upset after she’d told him how she’d felt about the libido drug.
“I’ve been meaning to apologise to you,” she said. “About that coffee I threw over you. I don’t throw stuff at people, Xav. I really don’t know why I did it. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.”
He shrugged. “Forget it.”
“The girls downstairs can leave then if they want?”
“The girls downstairs can’t leave till the operation is over,” Xavier insisted. “That’s the deal for everyone. They knew that when they signed on.”
“Who are they?” Pandora asked curiously.
“They’re from a village about twenty miles away. The rebels attacked and killed all the men, even boys who were just 8 years old. The women were raped and their livestock and crops were taken. They have nothing left. This situation is not ideal but if they weren’t here, they’d be turning tricks in back alleys while their kids starved. At least we’re using condoms and we’re paying them a fortune. After this job they can quit and try to rebuild their lives.”
Pandora was appalled. Again she felt like she was in a horror movie. She’d seen Hotel Rwanda on HBO but being this close to such heartbreak was frightening. How could Xavier see all this and still be even remotely human?
“These last few days I was thinking that you were just like Irina,” Xavier was saying softly. “She could hardly talk when I first knew her. I can’t understand that type of fear, Pandora, but I know I don’t like seeing it. I certainly didn’t want you to feel it.”
Impulsively Pandora threw her arms around him. “It’s not your fault,” she said shakily. “Ramon showed me this horrible video clip of a girl being gangbanged and said it was my future. I freaked, that’s all.”
“Did he?” Xavier said calmly. “He can be an arsehole sometimes.” Xavier stood up and pulled her to her feet. “Let’s go downstairs and you can see what’s going on. Just ten minutes, Panda, because you won’t like it. It’s not your sort of party.”
Before she knew what was happening, he’d led her to the lift and put his palm and eye to the scanner. The doors instantly slid open. Two seconds later, the doors opened again, and Xavier was leading her into a living room identical to the one upstairs. Except that this one was the scene of the most sybaritic party Pandora had ever seen.
The air was blue with smoke. From its rich perfumed scent, Pandora realised it was cannabis. They must have smoked pounds of it because the haze came right down to the floor, even with the air conditioning.