The Troika Dolls Read Online Free PDF

They never flickered—they were as strong as steel and Stevie always felt like they could see right into her.
    She looked away. ‘I met with the Hammer-Belles this afternoon. There have been no specific threats but they feel generally vulnerable and they want people to know they are protected,’ she filled him in on the situation. ‘I get the feeling highly visible security is what they’re looking for: bodyguards, big cars, patrol dogs—the works. I also recommended awareness training but I’m not convinced they will take that up.’ Stevie paused to light a cigarette. ‘I think their whole outfit is a bit chaotic—the entourage especially could present a security problem.’ She went on to describe the situation at the Ritz.
    As she and Rice discussed the details of the package they would put together for their new clients, Stevie felt a warmth spread through her. David Rice had that effect on her: calming, reassuring, comforting. She admired him tremendously.
    Rice had known Stevie since she was a small girl. He’d met her parents in the Carpathian Mountains one particularly rainy spring. They had been trapped together for days in a mudslide and began one of those strong friendships that are forged in adversity.
    When Stevie went to live with her grandmother in Switzerland, she and Rice had all but lost touch. It wasn’t until she was in her fourth year at Oxford that she looked him up again. She had warned him she wanted to come and work for him and they’d met for lunch at The King’s Arms.
    It was pouring with rain that day. Stevie stumbled in, more drowned rat than fiercely competent future employee.
    ‘I’ll have the fish pie,’ she’d ordered confidently, knowing it was important to appear decisive in interviews, because this informal lunch was, no matter how carefully they both dressed it in the guise of friendship, an interview.
    Rice had changed little from the strong, booming presence she remembered from her mother’s kitchen, her father’s garden terrace. The memory was painful and yet pleasantly familiar all at once. Stevie felt her heart beat a little faster and she had the curious sensation, looking at David’s strong hands and broad face, that she had come home.
    She waited for David to speak first.
    ‘My goodness. You’ve changed, Stevie Duveen.’
    ‘Well, you haven’t, David Rice, not a bit.’
    The powerful man sighed and raised an eyebrow. ‘If only that were true.’
    There was another silence. David broke it again: ‘I believe in plain speaking, Stevie. I don’t like the idea of you coming to work for me. Mine is not a pleasant world and it can be dangerous. I don’t think it is what either of your parents would have wanted. Our firm is mostly ex-military. It wouldn’t suit you at all. Surely there are a million other wonderful things you could do with your life.’
    Stevie shook her head. ‘I want to work for you. If Hazard won’t consider me, there are other risk-assessment agencies I can approach.
    As for my skills, I may not have the obvious background, but I can get by in seven languages, and I have very good intuition.’ Stevie paused to take a mouthful of her fish pie and slow her words down. She had to appear imperturbable.
    ‘Surely you have missions that require someone of a rather more unassuming appearance? My greatest advantage is my discretion: I am taken for granted, overlooked, invisible; I slip through the cracks of life.
    What better qualification could there be?’
    Rice fixed her with his granite eyes and said nothing for a very long time. Stevie held her breath and his gaze, every inch of her steel core longing for him to say yes.
    Rice shook his head. ‘A little slip of a thing like you wouldn’t even survive the most basic training.’
    Fury rose in Stevie’s slender throat but she forced it down with a dry swallow. She looked at Rice with clear and steady eyes, and when she spoke her voice was quiet. ‘Don’t forget what I have already