Chapter 9
Close Protection
Clara
Skinny Pete was watching me again. This was a huge problem, seeing as I was taking Ozzie home today, and I had absolutely no doubt that Skinny Pete would watch that too.
I sighed and rubbed my wrist absently. The ache there was an ever-present reminder of what was at stake.
But I was becoming so, so tired of being afraid.
People were starting to notice how it affected me.
I jumped at the slightest noise – yesterday, I shrieked when Lily dropped a wooden box of crayons, and Margot felt the need to hold my hand and tell me that everything was okay.
A seven-year-old child reassuring a twenty-seven-year-old woman that a loud noise wasn’t going to hurt her?
It was ridiculous. I was becoming ridiculous.
In all honesty, I knew I needed to move away from London and the constant fear. Maybe even accept Grant’s offer. But I couldn’t do it without Zach. I couldn’t just take off without him like that.
Unfortunately, my living situation was becoming completely untenable.
Lily cared about me enough not to say anything, but there was only so long that two people could share a one-bedroom flat that had the square footage of most people’s bathrooms without being seriously uncomfortable – and we were coming up to the one-month mark now.
If I wasn’t going to leave London, I needed to woman up and move back to my own flat.
I knew my family were watching me whilst I was at Lily’s anyway.
I’d spotted Skinny Pete lurking behind the newsagent on her road only yesterday.
Staying with Lily wouldn’t put them off the scent.
They’d want to keep a close eye on me wherever I was.
My father wouldn’t trust me to keep my mouth shut about what happened without keeping a serious handle on my whereabouts and being relatively obvious about it as a constant reminder to me not to snitch.
It was all about control with my family.
Control, power, money and greed were all everyone cared about – everyone except for Zach, of course.
My beautiful, caring, kind, funny, intelligent Zach, whom my family viewed as weak like me, but also as another asset to exploit due to his natural intelligence.
It made my blood boil, but I was stuck. I was stuck in a halfway life where I was terrified all the time, where loud noises made me jump and where I was a shadow of the person I wanted to be.
“You okay, Miss Clara?” Ozzie asked, giving my skirt a couple of sharp tugs. I forced a smile as I looked down at him and ruffled his hair.
“Of course I am, Ozzie. Just doing a little bit of lollygagging.”
He nodded solemnly. “Ah, I know all about lollygagging, Miss Clara,” he said. “Miss Summerfield tells me I’m a world expert at lollygagging.”
I pressed my lips together to hold back laughter. Ozzie had staring out of the window down to a fine art now, which was great if you’re thinking up stories as he invariably did, but not so great if your teacher needed you to learn your times tables.
I turned back to where Skinny Pete had been standing, but, as was his way, he’d already faded into the shadows.
“Righty-ho,” I said in a fake bright tone, smiling down at Ozzie again. “Let’s get a wriggle on, shall we? Your dad texted me your address, and it’s only a couple of bus rides aways so we––”
“The bus?” Ozzie interrupted in a bemused voice. “I don’t get the bus.”
“Um… well, how do you...? It’s too far to walk, love.”
Ozzie laughed. “No silly. Dave takes me.”
I blinked down at him but followed him out of the classroom towards the school exit, waving goodbye to Lily on our way.
I was ashamed to say that the only days I consistently watched the kids leaving were the ones where I was guaranteed to get my ya-yas looking at Lord Sterling from a safe distance, so I wasn’t too sure how Ozzie got home on the other days.
I had seen his famous aunt pick him up before, though.
Everyone within a mile radius would have noticed Poppy Sterling sweeping in through the school gates with a cloud of glamour and disruption.
Her laugh alone could probably be heard clear across London.
But from my cowardly vantage point in the window, I couldn’t see the road, so I had no idea how the Sterlings made their way home on the school run.
As we walked through the school gates, a huge black car pulled up in front of us. Then, a grey-haired man in an immaculate suit sprang out of the front seat and grinned across at Ozzie.
“Hey, Davo!” Ozzie cried, running over to him.
“Hey, little lord,” Dave said through his smile, clapping Ozzie on the back and then ruffling his hair. “Good day with the other posh kids?”
Ozzie rolled his eyes dramatically and turned back to me as I approached the car with a hell of a lot more caution than my seven-year-old friend. “Dave thinks he’s so funny,” he complained.
“I’m bloody hilarious,” Dave said and then reached out his hand to me. “You must be the famous Miss Clara?”
“Yes, I, um…” I trailed off, not quite sure what to say or who this man was. I did manage to lift my hand though for a brief handshake.
“This one keeping you busy?” Dave put in as he pulled open the door to the backseat for Ozzie and me to climb in. I couldn’t actually remember the last time anyone had opened a car door for me. He shut the door after us and slid into the driver’s seat.
“I’m Miss Clara’s star pupil,” said Ozzie proudly, some of his father’s arrogance leaking into his tone. To be honest, this was pretty true. Ozzie was coming on in leaps and bounds now. His natural intelligence was finally shining through the mist of the dyslexia.
“Is that so?” Dave asked, catching my eye in the rearview mirror and giving me a warm look. I cleared my throat.
“Of course you’re a star, Oz,” I said, and Dave smiled. “Mr… um…”
“I’m Mr Parker, but you can call me Dave, love.”
“Dave. I’m sorry. Lord Sterling didn’t give me the specifics and I didn’t quite catch who you are in relation to Ozzie?”
“Dave drives me places, Miss Clara,” Ozzie told me, as if a seven-year-old having his own chauffeur was completely normal and to be expected. “He’s also a soldier.” The last was said in a breathy, seriously impressed tone.
“Oh really?” I said, feeling a little confused.
“I’m not a soldier now, little lord,” Dave corrected.
“I know that,” said Ozzie. “But you could be if you wanted to be. Daddy said that you could protect me from anything.”
Dave chuckled. “I can be pretty handy when it comes down to it,” he said. “But remember the first rule, little lord?”
“Ugh, you’re so boring,” grumped Ozzie. “Dave teaches me to fight, but he says the first rule is to run away.”
“That’s right,” Dave said firmly. “It’s always better to get away from an unsafe situation, ex-soldier or no.”
“Um, are there many circumstances when you might need to er… run away?” I asked.
Dave caught my eye in the rearview mirror again. My expression must have been more than a little apprehensive.
“Nothing to worry about, Miss Clara,” he told me. “I’m a close protection officer, but it’s overkill, really. There are no active threats against the Sterling family. It’s just a precaution.”
“Oh, right,” I said weakly, settling back into the soft leather of the car. “That’s good to know.”
Ozzie tapped on the glass of the tinted window and grinned at me again.
“And this glass is bulletproof,” he said with that breathless excitement. “Isn’t that cool? And we’ve got jets on the back of the car just like Batman if we need to get away from someone, and we can shoot them with missiles from our wheels if we need to take them out. Right, Davo?”
Dave chuckled from the front of the car. “Well, the glass bit is true enough, Oz. But don’t let any of this freak you out, Miss Clara,” Dave put in quickly. “As I said, no active risk, okay?”
Dave must have misinterpreted my shocked expression for concern when the opposite was true.
There may not have been an active risk against the Sterling family, but there certainly was an active risk against me.
As I settled back against the leather again, I felt my resting heart rate slow to a level it hadn’t been at for over a month.
A feeling of calm and peace settled over me.
I was safe in this car. I had an ex-soldier, bullet-proof glass and tinted windows you couldn’t see in through.
This was maybe the safest I’d ever been in my entire life.
And that feeling of safety only increased when we got to the Sterlings’ house. It was a huge mansion in Putney. There were electric gates on the outside, an extremely complicated alarm system: it was practically a fortress.
I absolutely loved it.