Nash perched on the chair opposite her. “How are you feeling?” he asked.
“You mean after I made a spectacle of myself the other night?”
“You said things that you were obviously feeling. Why keep them in?”
She glanced up at him. “Foremost, because I am not supposed to have feelings. Do you not know? I am made of steel. I am supposed to be in control, at all times.”
“No one can do that, not even you.”
She looked away from him. “I am fine. Going to America will rejuvenate me.”
“And your mother?”
“What of her?”
“I told you about the messages in the park,” said Nash.
“And I told you that I already knew.”
“So you also know about the young man who retrieves the messages she leaves in the ice cream container?”
“My mother was away for a long time. What would be more natural than for her to evaluate how the business she created and ran for decades is doing? And whether I am a good steward of what she had built?”
“Is that what she’s doing?”
“The man in question works for a third party with which I do business. My mother has been seeking information about our dealings with this party. She has, I assume, been doing the same with other parties as well.”
“Why not just ask you?”
She shrugged. “It is not her way.”
“Is the business not doing well?”
“I do not think that is any of your concern,” she said sternly. “You are a bodyguard, not a businessperson.”
“Well, I have dealt with wealthy people all over the world. You pick up stuff.”
She folded her arms and said, “Such as?”
Nash knew he was treading a fine line here. Hewasa businessman, a highly successful one, but he was also masquerading as a bodyguard, a pretense he desperately needed to keep up.
“Such as cash flow is king. Customers are fickle, the competition ruthless. And everybody wants to knock off the king. Or in your case, the queen. You don’t have just the cops watching your every move, but a host of politicians dreaming about using you as their next campaign slogan. You know, ‘I brought down Victoria Steers. Vote for me.’”
She looked at him with fresh respect. “And how do you feel being involved in an enterprise that you wanted no part of?”
“I’m in it now regardless of what I want.”
“And you know if I go down those around me go down as well?”
“I understand.”
“No, I don’t think you do. I will do everything in my power to ensure that you and Thura suffer no consequences.”
“And why would you do that?”
“You are not criminals. You were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, but the right place at the right time for me. You should not suffer over that.”
“That does not sound like something a sociopath would do, if you don’t mind my saying so,” noted Nash.
