“Yes, I need you to fly down to Nice tomorrow and prepare yacht for the weekend,” he ordered.
“Of course, my Thomas,” Nara responded in return without hesitation, using the word “my” in front of his name as a kind of respect to his position when given a task.
A natural linguist fluent in Russian and Arabic and a passable knowledge of Turkman, Mandarin, and Japanese, and who had read Russian and Classics at Oxford before joining the Army. Thomas’s education had provided him with the unique understanding of the endocentric constructions of languages, so he knew the use of “my” was Nara’s way of indicating to him the hold he held over and in her life. He had never bothered to try and correct her English despite the many years they had been together.
In the early part of his adult life, this education had been one of the reasons how he had ended up in the Special Air Service (SAS) as part of the Mobility Troop Squadron. When he left the Army in 1991 after the First Gulf War it had also enabled him to build his Empire in the ashes of Yeltsin’s Russia.
“Excellent, Louise will send over the details and requirements to you.”
“Of course, my Thomas,” again she repeated firmly, wanting to please him.
The call out of the way, Thomas sat down behind his desk and went back to reading the contract notes from the lawyers he had been mulling over at the window.
On the street corner was an alert man dressed in a single-breasted dark blue suit, which gave the impression of someone that shouldn’t be “messed with”, watching for possible threats.
At his side, stood a beautiful woman who in contrast to that of her bodyguard who looked anything but that of a woman that shopped in a local Marks and Spencer for her wardrobe. Her mane of long hair was pulled back, a tight black silk tight top showed off her full ample cleavage, and a pair of black skinny jeans wrapped around her legs as though they were part of her. Wearing a pair of black simple Ballerina shoes on her feet all under her couture half Sable Fur by the famous Marc Kaufmann, the personal designer of choice of the wealthy Russian émigré women that lived in ‘Londongrad’, was Nara Gurbanammedowova.
The Blackberry’s “hum and buzz” indicated to her that an email had been received at the same time as her call with Thomas ended. Focusing her mind, she clicked open the email.
Skimming it, the beautiful woman quickly decided to stop her mission to “shop before she dropped” in order to allow her to return home to prepare herself for tonight’s dinner with one of his business associates.
After all, she only had three hours to ensure she looked the part for the evening.
“Mason, I would like to go home,” Nara ordered.
Immediately the bodyguard sprang into action. He touched his earpiece and spoke a few words. Seconds later, a black Vogue Armored Super-charged Range Rover pulled up alongside them.
Opening the door to the private section of the two-ton luxury four-wheel vehicle and still fully alert to any threats, Mason allowed his charge enter the vehicle.
He then closed the door behind her, took one last look around to make sure there were no threats on the horizon and then climbed into the front seat.
“Let’s go!” he said to the driver at once, disappointing the on-looking shop assistant of the boutique Nara had been about to enter before her call. Such was her reputation for being able to spend.
As they sped off, Nara reflected on the abruptness of the conservation she had just had with Thomas. She nibbled her bottom lip as the Range Rover began to weave its way through the traffic.
“Is he losing interest in me?” she pondered. A deeply complex man, honorable, hard, yet fair unless crossed or dishonored collectively, something he once described to her as the “Homeric” code of honor, loyalty, and revenge. Yet to her it sounded more like the tribal laws of her Turkmenistan unknowingly due to her limited knowledge of the Classics that those laws had actually come from Alexander the Great, a follower of Homer and the conqueror of Turkmenistan thousands of years ago. She loved him passionately.
Compassionate, intelligent, powerful even humorous, something again Nara had observed over the years they had been together, that he often used as a defense mechanism whenever he was deflecting difficult questions. Although still passionate in their lovemaking, it was only on rare occasions he reciprocated and told her he loved her these days. This in spite of her losing count of the number of times she told him that he was the only man she ever loved. No small thing as she had been a man-hater up to the moment he entered and took possession of her life.
For his all idiosyncrasies, one thing she loved most about him completely, unlike her own father, was Thomas’s parenting abilities.
He had even allowed her to register Victoria, his only heir, as a Muslim and always backed her in matters relating to their daughter.
“Well at least until recently!” she thought nibbling her lip nervously, again thinking back to their recent horrible argument over their baby, as she thought of her current insecurities over her future role in his life.
Twenty minutes later, after her protection team had confirmed that it was safe for her exit, the beautiful woman stepped out from the four-wheel drive and made her way up the path towards the large mansion. Yet before she could even reach the door of the house, a man opened it to greet her.
Anybody meeting Stephen Pritchard would assume he represented a classic literary image of the quintessential British Butler with his manners and demeanor.
He was a tall man of 5’11”, single never married, and obsessive in regard to standards relating to dignity. Physically, he would be best described as thin, willowy, and long. He had grey hair and a pair of blue eyes hidden under his simple silver rimmed glasses, and something the beautiful woman whom he had open the door for had never seen him out of in all the years she had known him; his classic butler’s uniform of black long coat, white shirt with butlers tie, and morning suit trousers all finished off with a pair of extra black polished Northampton soled shoes.
He was sixty years old, but Nara had never checked nor had she even wished him ‘happy birthday’ during the twelve years he had served her.
The mansion had once belonged to the late mother of Thomas that meant Pritchard’s loyalty towards that of the Litchfield family was total, having served them and her love since he was fourteen. Unfortunately, this had also meant the man was by definition “untouchable,” despite her many attempts to get rid of him over the years.
“Good Afternoon, Lady Gunara,” Pritchard said without smiling, using the term that he only used when Thomas wasn’t in the house. For when her love was in the residence it was, “Miss Gunara.”
To Nara this insult was taken by her as Geci’s way of sending the message that she was only his Mistress for short periods, and thereby here at the grace and favor of Thomas and Victoria, who he always referred to as either “Sir Thomas” or “Lady Victoria” or “My little Lady.”
Affection was something Stephen certainly never shown towards her in any shape or form in all the years Nara had known him. Today was no different.
Where this mutual distrust and resentment had come from had its roots in an event seven years ago, when the old “Geçi” meaning “Goat” in Turkman, as Nara always thought of him, had complained to Thomas about her conduct over the disciplining of a member of the household staff.
The shame and embarrassment the exotic woman felt from that moment still burned deeply within her and as a consequence would never leave her. As far as far as the butler was concerned the incident had showed him well and truly where the “little cow,” as he thought of her, stood within the pecking order of the house.
Although the butler had never quite comprehended exactly what Thomas saw in this uneducated, fiery, and impolite Russian woman from central Asia, despite her physical attributes, his feelings towards their daughter were a completely different matter. In the little girl’s case, she could do no wrong. He absolutely adored her. She was the grandchild that Stephen had never had.