CHAPTER EIGHTEEN #2
Alistair blinks, perhaps surprised by the way Troy speaks, no deferential tone, no pussyfooting around.
‘Yes, very well. You’ll be contacted later.’
‘See you around, Black Site.’ Troy drops Lachlan a wink as he walks by, openly appraises Blaire with a small hm of appreciation before he leaves, closing the door a little too hard behind him.
Alistair’s gaze has darkened, watching him leave.
‘How I despise street level,’ he mutters, ‘but this is the necessity you have forced upon me, Lachlan. Containment is so ugly. Explain yourself to me for I am sorely disappointed.’
‘I would prefer to speak alone, sir,’ he says, desperately wanting Blaire far from here, because if she sees whatever happens, then she’s involved and he wants to protect her almost as much as the kids.
‘Your preference bears no weight.’ Lachlan keeps his mouth shut, staring blankly down, but the old man eventually says, ‘Leave us, Miss Montbelliard.’
Blaire murmurs a quick, ‘Yes, sir,’ and leaves.
Lachlan exhales slowly and then begins.
‘The scope of the failure holds many aspects, and some of the blame sits rightly at my feet. There was frequency interference that I didn’t pick up on.
If I had, we could have gotten people to safety sooner.
That’s very much my fault, sir. However,’ he says, lifting his gaze, ‘with the greatest of respect, the Estate was far more secure until you dismantled our systems a month ago.’
Penhalyx’s mood darkens drastically. ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘The ballroom, for example, had a reinforced cover above the dome. It was still semi-transparent, but it made the glass impervious to breakage of any kind. You removed it your first week here because you wanted your guests to see the stars. The exterior doors were all monitored, magnet-triggered and safety-locked until you ordered free access so people could come and go as they pleased. The interior doors were reinforced with locking mechanisms that went two feet into the floor. You ordered them disabled so people could go in any room they liked. Fenwick and I came to you with concerns about the fact that your guests were trying to hack the security systems. You told us to ignore it. It was, in fact, one of your guests who successfully hacked the system and accessed security layout, who knew enough to direct attackers towards the East Wing. I installed motion detectors in the grass and gravel. You had them removed. I installed heat-seeking technology on the roof. You said it was unsightly, so it was taken down. I asked three times for safe rooms to be built around the ballroom. You denied my request and gave no reason. If you want me to walk you through my failure, wherever that leads, then we must first walk through yours, sir.’
For a long time, Penhalyx says nothing. He stares at Lachlan with a degree of malevolence that almost frightens him. ‘You dare to blame me?’
‘We’re walking the path towards answers, as you requested, sir.’
‘Who do you think you are to speak to me like that? Some low-born dockside rat. This failure is yours.’
‘It’s my failure that I didn’t more strongly object to your interference in matters of security, yes.’
‘My interference? I am master of this house,’ the old man declares with imperious, tremulous anger. ‘I am Alistair Sael Penhalyx.’
‘With all due respect, you know very little about what it takes to maintain the safety and security of such a vast—’
‘DO NOT INTERRUPT ME!’ he bursts out and Lachlan knows now why he never raises his voice, because it shakes when he does.
‘I am speaking now!’ Lachlan falls silent.
‘You are hired help, and I have given you inordinate freedom and allowance. How dare you outright insinuate my fallibility in what you allowed to happen. My children were in danger! You are their bodyguard.’
‘Both your children are uninjured.’
‘A fact for which you should be grateful as it is the only reason I didn’t have Troy Harker kill you where you stand!’
Lachlan tips his chin, locks in. ‘You’ll never find anyone who does what I can for your children.’
‘You are not rare. You are not even competent. What delusion are you nurturing that allows you to imagine yourself irreplaceable to me?’
‘That I love them. I love your children,’ Lachlan Tanner says plainly, ‘and that love will keep me innovating and inventing and improving myself wherever possible to keep them safe. Not money, not a promotion, not power and not a fucking bonus cheque. Without me, your Estate would be in ruins by now and your children would be long gone. No one will ever love them the way I do, and no one will ever protect them as well as I can, so if you’re going to kill me, accept that you’re signing their death warrant right alongside mine. ’
‘Love,’ Penhalyx sneers coldly. ‘What good does love do beyond weaken what might be strong and soften what should be—?’
‘Someone has to love them.’
Penhalyx’s mouth falls open, eyes wide.
He wants to contest it, Lachlan can tell that the old man wants badly to counter it, hurl some degree of denial at him.
But there is none.
He doesn’t love them. They both know it.
And if Lachlan dies here and now, he hopes to God his little girl remembers that day in the sunshine, that Blaire does what she can and Jules knows that Lachlan tried.
‘I do not believe you are capable of protecting them.’
‘I can absolutely protect them, but it depends.’
‘On what?’
‘On whether you want me to protect them or prostitute them?’
If looks could kill, Lachlan would be ribbons of flesh.
‘What did you say?’
Lachlan doesn’t look away. ‘You heard me.’
‘Who do you think you are?’
‘I’m the trained killer who would die to protect them.
’ Lachlan steps forward. Alistair blinks rapidly, throat working.
‘The mercenary who had to balance their safety alongside the people you saw fit to give free rein when you cracked this place wide open as punishment for a teenager’s insolence.
I’m the bodyguard. I am their bodyguard.
And I answer to you, Mr Penhalyx, but strength doesn’t bend well to ego, and security either exists or it doesn’t, there’s no half-measure.
I did my job despite everything, and I always will. ’
Lachlan falls silent. He’ll accept whatever the outcome is unless the old man tries to hurt those kids, in which case Lachlan’s going to kill him. Penhalyx stares off to the side, breathing shallow.
Anger suits him ill.
Ages him decades.
Whole minutes pass in silence.
‘I think,’ Alistair says slowly, ‘my father would have liked you.’ The old man straightens, shuttered efficiently.
‘It is hard for me to accept that what you’re saying is true.
No one speaks to me that way anymore. But you are right.
I contributed to the breach. My presence here is detrimental.
’ He taps his desk and it comes to life like always. ‘My son has learnt his lesson.’
Lachlan doesn’t dare to hope that it means he’s leaving, is still caught in the moment of his own outburst, half certain he’s about to be shot in the face.
‘I will be leaving tonight,’ he informs Lachlan, seemingly busy with the hover screen.
‘You may hire a household manager of your own choosing, so long as they are vetted thoroughly. Perhaps your Miss Montbelliard. I will overlook your insubordination this one time given how intensely you feel towards my children. There is much you do not know and never will, but I am not a monster. I want them to be happy and safe, to have childhoods. I simply cannot…’ Alistair frowns, staring at nothing until he blinks it away.
‘I leave the Estate and my children in your capable hands. Keep me apprised of the management choice. I will see you next quarter.’
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Lachlan cleans himself up, looks in the mirror.
He can’t quite believe he’s still alive.
But true enough to his word, come sundown, the helicopter takes off with all Penhalyx’s inner circle staff, one of whom seems to be his highest-ranking assistant. A man named Lionel Maddox, in his late thirties. Lachlan exchanges information with him, has the direct connection now.
He watches the chopper ascend, needs to see him leave.
All the other guests trickle away, Sorrenko last, who catches Lachlan before he calls a staff meeting. ‘Ah, you are alive and therefore available.’
‘What do you want?’
‘To talk.’
Lachlan leads the older man into an empty room nearby. The first floor of the North Wing is mostly untouched, all lounge areas, statues and vases.
Sorrenko waits until the door is closed.
‘I would like Vasily to stay here with you.’
It’s not what Lachlan is expecting at all. ‘No.’
‘He won’t take up space.’
‘My priority is the Penhalyx children.’
‘Vasily likes it here, he told me. I will pay whatever you want.’
‘Julian and Jessamine are my priority.’
‘I’m not asking you to make Vasily a priority. I’m just asking he be allowed to make home here while I travel for business.’
‘Why?’
‘Alistair has already agreed, you may check with him.’
‘Why do you want your son here?’
‘Because he is a gentle boy, withdrawn and shy. I see how you are with them, with the little one. I know what you think of us,’ Sorrenko adds, tiny hint of a defiant smile. ‘I know what you think we are, but I am not Alistair.’
‘Oh, really?’
‘I love my sons, all of them. Roman will fulfil his duty. I’ll educate him in business as he grows into it. Vasily, however, is of no particular use to me. I would rather he be happy here.’
‘I can’t allocate resources to protect—’
‘Then train him. Teach him. Give him a job. We do not raise pampered boys, even in upper echelons. You are good soldier, Tanner. My boy Roman told me, and I know Vasily likes you.’
‘He likes me too much.’
Sorrenko snorts. ‘That is your fault for looking like this,’ he points out, gesturing up and down and then sighs, more serious now.
‘Not all swim well in the cold. Maybe here he can find his own waters, yes? And more importantly,’ Mikhail Sorrenko is quick to add, ‘I will owe you. So, what do you think?’
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