Page 49 of Lethal Torture

I tilt my head.

She sniffs. “Well, that’s something, at least.”

My introductionsat Pigalle Soho kick off much the same way.

“Holy shit,” Nadja greets us, staring at me in blatant fascination. “Enzo wasn’t lying for once.” Her eyes cut to Zinaida with a knowing look. “Nice,” she says.

I have the satisfaction of seeing Zinaida color slightly.

“Thanks for coming in early,” she says crisply. “I’m going to leave Luke with you and Anatoly to explain the security setup.”

“Sure.” Nadja is stunningly beautiful, despite the shit-eating grin she’s currently giving Zinaida.

“Da.” Anatoly turns cold eyes on me. “At least you use front door dis time. Last time he break in to prove point,” he explains when Nadja looks confused.

“Really?” She looks even more intrigued by that disclosure. “Well, that explains why I don’t remember meeting you. Because Iwouldremember,” she says, shooting Zinaida another dirty grin. “He definitely makes an impression.”

“Hmph,” Anatoly grunts, looking rather less than impressed.

The old man is clearly her self-appointed bodyguard, and from the soft way Zinaida smiles at him, he’s also the person she trusts the most.

He’s the one who matters here.

“Well,” Zinaida says, glancing at her phone. “I’ll leave you to it, then.”

I know she has back-to-back meetings with suppliers, which gives me a clear run to get to know her staff.

“Hope you don’t mind taking a punch or two,” Charlie says, grinning at me. “Anatoly has the new recruits in for training today. We could do with an extra body.”

“Sounds good.”

“Don’t be afraid,” she says cheerfully, then winks at Nadja.

“Be afraid,” Nadja shoots back. “Be very afraid.”

I look between them. “The Fly?”

“Holy shit!” Charlie does a double take. “You know that movie?”

I hold up my hands and give them Veronica Quaife’s line: “I don’t know what you’re trying to say.”

“Oh!” Nadja feigns a swoon. “And he delivers another one! Welcome, Luke, darling. You just won yourself a coffee. After you’ve finished taking whatever punishment Anatoly has planned for you, of course.”

Anatoly scowls. “He has no gear.”

“Yeah, he does,” Charlie answers for me. “There’s a bag in the back of the limo.”

Anatoly frowns at me. I lift a shoulder. “Wasn’t sure what we’d be doing today, so I thought I’d come prepared.”

“Hmph.” He gives me a skeptical up-and-down look. “Ve see.”

I takethe obligatory beating from Anatoly in the boxing gym he runs around the corner, letting him get a few decent ones in before I actually put him on his ass.

When he gets up, we both turn our efforts to his trainees instead of each other. By the time we’ve put half a dozen of themthrough their paces, Anatoly’s stopped grunting insults at me in Russian and begun pointing out how useless the trainees are instead.

Back at Pigalle Soho, Zinaida is still tied up with meetings. Enzo, having clearly decided that I’m not to be trusted alone, arrives when his shift at Pigalle Mayfair ends and picks up where he left off, bickering with Charlie while I finish my briefing with Nadja.

“Follow us, darling,” he tells me imperiously when Nadja and I emerge from her office. “Time we took you to the mother ship.” All four staff members accompany me along the corridors and through a thick steel-lined door to the security room, exchanging humorous insults the entire way.