Page 7 of Salt Kiss
“Oh, my sweet army puppy,” Goran laughs. “Information aboutotherpeople, of course. Or information they’ve gotten from whatever jobs or positions they have. We have a Moldovan diplomat here, for example—he’s not telling Mr. Trevena about the time he cheated on his college girlfriend. He’s telling Mr. Trevena about arms deals. New mercenary groups. Cabinet members who sympathize with the continuing rebellion in Carpathia. That sort of thing.”
I look back at the server room with a new respect...and a new wariness. When Mark and I spoke of blackmail the other day, I suppose I had been thinking of all the shallow and tawdry peccadilloes that people would be desperate to buy silence for. Not state secrets. Not whispers of martial movements, governmental shifts, and all the other tesserae that come together to form a mosaic of a world still dragging itself back from the edge of war.
“Now,” Goran says, shepherding me back to the elevator. “Let’s see your new digs.”
Part of my employment offer was to live here at the club, and it’s something I’ve accepted, since commuting in from the farmhouse would be a pain in the ass, and this place comes rent free. Mark is paying me enough that I could afford a decent apartment nearby, but it seems like a waste to pay for a home I’ll barely be in.
And when I see my apartment on the third floor, I know I’ve made the right decision. It’s in the prow of the building like his office above me, with glass walls overlooking the river, a small but expensive kitchen, and equally expensive furnishings. I walk over to one of the glass walls while Goran explains parking and a few other details to me. The prow doesn’t face the city, but rather the Potomac itself, pointed like a ship about to sail to sea. For a minute, I imagine it is, that the whole building is moving to the open ocean, spreading massive sails above it.
“...and he’ll be expecting you in his office within the hour. My guess is that he’ll go over his rules and requirements and what he’ll need from you then.”
I nod, my eyes still on the place where river meets sky, thinking of Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic beyond.
“...and you should know that no one will think any differently of you. You can’t work at a place like this and not have it change the way you think about things, and if any one of us were in your shoes, we would probably end up doing it too. Mark has that way about him, and this place has a way about it too. Gets into your bones. Makes you want things you thought you would never.” A pause and then a cheerful: “And his last bodyguard never seemed anything but over the moon with the arrangement.”
I turn away from the view and stare at the former Marine, utterly lost. “Pardon, sir?”
Goran’s eyebrows lift and then his mouth slowly closes as his hands come up. He’s the picture of someone sayingoh shit, never mind.“You know what, I shouldn’t have said anything,” he says, seeming to fumble a little. “It’s nothing. You’ll hash all that out, I’m sure. Or not. Either way, none of my business.”
I open my mouth to tell him to stop, to explain himself, but he’s already beating a hasty goodbye, surprisingly brisk for such a large man.
Mark has that way about him.
Makes you want things you thought you would never.
Maybe Goran just means working here in general. Here, where the mundane is made of blindfolds and ropes and the extraordinary is kept locked away below the waterline, trapped behind two sets of glass doors.
With a final look around my new home, I leave to find Mark upstairs and start my new life as his shadow.
Three
“Ah, my new bodyguard,”says Mark as I’m let into his office by Ms. Lim.
He’s standing up from his chair and his suit jacket is off, thrown over the side of his desk next to a laptop, a folder, and his seemingly perennial glass of vodka or gin on the rocks. The other day on the roof, I saw his proportions under the immaculate tailoring of his suit, but without the jacket, with only the expensive cotton of his button-down shirt, I can see that he’s more than just well shaped. The neat lines of his waist leading into his trousers and the curves of his arms and shoulders are those of a man in his prime.
Goran had showed me a gym here—available for all club guests and employees—but strangely, I can’t picture Mark in it, fussing over the kinds of muscles that are for show. He’d be more into running and calisthenics, maybe. Push-ups in the morning, squats and sit-ups after.
I tell myself I’m only noticing because I may need to help scout running routes when we travel. His habits are my business now.
“Good afternoon, sir,” I say, coming to stand in front of his desk.
“I take it Goran has taken care of the paperwork and the essentials. He explained the dress code to you?”
“Yes, sir.” It isn’t much of a dress code—suits in black or gray, an issued firearm, and a leather shoulder harness for wearing said firearm. But there is a stipend for the suits at least.
Mark looks at the suit I’m wearing now, his gaze trailing from the slightly too-short trouser cuffs to the tightness at the shoulders. It’s something my father bought me after I graduated West Point, saying that a man always needed at least one suit for the occasions he couldn’t wear his dress uniform to. It’s eight years old now.
“I’ll give you the name of the tailor I’d like you to see.” He holds up a hand, as if forestalling any protest. “I’ll make sure the club covers it. You are mine now, so I’ll need you to look the part.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Those army manners,” he says. “They’ll fit in well here. Did you meet Sedge?”
“Yes, sir.”
“He will email over my schedule each day, along with travel itineraries. I’ll try to give you as much notice as I can with travel, so you can make whatever security arrangements you’ll need to make, but many of my trips are unexpected, so my promises are cheap. When we’re here at the club, most of my meetings will be here in my office—and for most of those, you will be asked to wait outside, as a show of privacy and discretion for my members.”
I nod.
