I stopped the car I'd rented under an alias with a freshly stolen card in the company car park and stepped out. I was looking extremely waiter-ey. I’m not sure if that can be used as an adjective but it’s how I felt. Black trousers and jacket, white shirt and in keeping with the theme; a long black tie. Shiny black booties as well. I’d fit right in at a John Wick fan club meeting. The thought of bullet proof suits always made me smile.
Of course, in the ankle of each of my boots was a short polycarbonate knife honed to as much of an edge as the material could manage, which was certainly enough to slit a throat with a bit of force behind it. Inside my tie I had painstakingly inserted a garrotte made from a high tensile fishing line with small leather handles at each end, one of which could be worked out from the bottom of the tie fairly easily to retrieve the weapon.
Hidden in the bottom of a pack of cigarettes in my jacket pocket I also carried a paper envelope containing enough warfarin to end a few thousand rats or one shithead of a slumlord. I’d had to trim the end off all the smokes so the filters lay flush with the box. I was considering demanding a bonus from Carol for that indignity.
In the worst case scenario I would commandeer something blunt and heavy and bludgeon the old bastard to death but hopefully that wouldn’t be necessary. It’s noisy, messy and not very professional to kill someone that way; I pride myself on offering a professional service. It would make escaping a lot more difficult as well.
The sign over the entrance to the smart looking office building read “Prime Cuisine”. This was an upper crust kind of catering company that handled bespoke get-togethers for the rich and powerful.
How the hell Carol had gotten my fake identity approved on their books was something of a mystery. If I didn’t already have the ninety K sitting in my account I’d have been tempted to walk away from this. There were too many happy coincidences and synchronicities.
“Excuse me sir, name please,” said a big guy standing at the door who made looking menacing seem easy. I handed him my paperwork and smiled.
“Sure. David Culpepper, reporting for duty,” I said pleasantly. “So where’s the gig tonight? The boss was pretty hush-hush about it in the emails.”
“It’s just out of town. You don’t need to know, you’ll be dropped off and picked up afterwards. If you’d like to step through here please sir?” I followed behind the aspiring bodybuilder and passed through a temporary metal detector. He didn’t set it off so he wasn’t carrying a gun either. What kind of serious security didn’t carry firearms? I did set it off however so I passed him my cigarettes and lighter before passing through again without creating an alarm from the bloody machine.
“Is this normal?” I asked as he began to pat me down. “Easy bloke! I’m not into that kind of stuff!” I lurched backwards as he patted my butt cheeks and moved onto my thighs.
“Funny. No phone?” he deadpanned before resuming the pat down. I shook my head. I’d been told to leave all electronics behind in the email confirming the gig.
“You could at least have bought me a drink first,” I muttered as he finished up. He’d been passably thorough but the pain in my ankles had been all the assurance I’d needed that the most obvious weapons on my person would escape a pat down.
“Go on through please sir. From now on you can’t leave the premises until the ‘gig’ is finished.”
“What about a smoke break?” I asked, retrieving my cigarettes and lighter from him.
“Mr. Mortimer doesn’t approve. Just keep them in your pocket till you’re done. The rest of them are in there already. You’re the last,” he rumbled, pointing at a door past the sterile corporate reception area, before heading back outside. With a smile on my lips I walked over and pushed the indicated door to one side.
“About fucking time! Come on slowpoke! Get in here and we’ll do the briefing before we set off!” snapped an angry male voice as I stepped into the room. “Do you mind if I call you Dave?” he asked.
“I prefer David,” I replied. I moved towards the seating and sat down at the end of five other people dressed like penguins.
“Great. Well Dave, the chefs are Lionel, Monica, Sam and Rachel.” The asshole waved at the four people to his side wearing chef’s whites. “Your colleagues are Tom, Phil, Andrea, Ramon and Sarah.” I nodded politely to my fellow penguins as I sat down at the end of the row.
“The food is all prepped and being kept warm in bain-maries. There’ll be final cooking and presentation to do when we get to site. A guide will be provided to show you to the kitchen. From there we’ll be told how to get to the smoking room and then the dining room when it’s time to serve.” I was starting to believe this asshole, with his prissy manner and slicked back hair, didn’t have to breathe when he was speaking.
“There’ll be a round of drinks and hors d'oeuvres in the smoking room and then the guests will proceed in an elegant fashion to the dining room. David and Andrea are running drinks and snacks at the start but once the guests move to eat you’ll each have an assigned ward. Whatever they want, you do. They want to feel you up? Smile and make them think you like it. Any questions?”
“What’s your name, bloke?” I asked. I was half tempted to look him up after this job and if he was less than morally spotless I’d make time to pay him a visit. His attitude made my fists itch.
“I am Jerome and for the rest of this evening I am your lord and saviour. I am the Maître D’ for the evening. Do you know what the D stands for?” I opened my mouth to reply but then thought better of it and shrugged instead. “It stands for Deus. God to the likes of you! You hop when I say hop. Understood?” He narrowed piggy eyes at me and I nodded politely then dropped my gaze to his feet. He harrumphed in satisfaction at my submissive display while at the same time I was working out how many of his fingers I’d break when the time came to pay him a visit on my own time. With an internal sigh I let it go. After this job I’d stay as far away from all these people as I could so I’d have to let karma catch up with this pillock on its own terms.
“Right, now blondey has wrapped his head around the pecking order we’ll get down to brass tacks…” Naturally, I’d dyed my hair and cut it shorter than usual for this job as well as wearing contacts to change my eye colour.
I had to hand it to Jerome, he ran a tight ship. I always respect a professional, even if they were an ass. We were running to and fro loading covered hot plates into racking in the back of a van in less than ten minutes. Five minutes after that we were given a final briefing letting us know which of the guests we’d be personally serving and then we were hurried into a minivan to be delivered to site shortly after the food.
I had been assigned to a lady named Mrs. Routledge. All her dining requirements were to be met by me with a smile, diligent attention to detail and extreme politeness. Not getting to wait on Mortimer was a minor problem that complicated things but I’d figure a way around it.
I settled into the minivan next to Andrea and smiled politely at her. She was short, slim and her black hair was neatly styled in a bob. She flashed an impish grin at me and leaned back in her seat as she pulled the belt across.
“First time?” she asked quietly.
“Kind of. First time with this outfit anyway,” I replied.
“Don’t worry about Jerome. He’s always like this on big jobs. He’s a pussycat the rest of the time,” she said, nudging my arm out of her way as she spread out as much as possible. For such a slight woman she managed to steal several inches of what I was fairly confident was my space. “So what do you do?” she asked.
“I’m a waiter,” I said simply.
“No. Not how do you pay the bills, what do you do? Look. Tom over there writes screenplays that nobody wants,” Tom leaned round his chair back and glowered at us. Andrea blew him a kiss. “Phil is a passable caricature artist and Ramon and Sarah are both in one of those Cirque de whatevers. I think they do the big swing thing? I’m an artist. Surrealism. So what do you do?” she asked.
“I write,” I lied.
“Oh nice! What is it? Fiction? Let me guess… steamy man on man romance? I love those,” she said happily. I made a note to never dye my hair blond again.
“No, nothing like that. Just bog standard fantasy. Dragons and stuff,” I hedged.
“Ooh cool,” she began to ramble at me about her favourite fantasy series. I made polite noises to keep the conversation going but quickly found she was more than able to do the talking for both of us. Throughout the conversation I couldn’t help but notice that all her favourite books had been made into TV shows in the last decade or so. This was helpful for my masquerade of being a fantasy writer but suggested she wasn't really that into the genre.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
The van stopped at an impressive set of ironwork gates that slid out of the way to let us through. Andrea continued to babble away at my side, only needing the occasional grunt or monosyllabic interjection from me to keep up a steady monologue. A long winding drive led past impeccably kept grounds. We crossed a large gravelled area outside the main entrance and pulled into the shadows between the house itself and the eastern wing of the building. It was grander up close than it had looked on the plans. It was all limestone pillars and massive bay windows at the front. I’d memorised the layout after I had acquired the schematics of the building in exchange for a fairly sizable sum in order to keep my access to them confidential.
“Righto ladies and gentleman. Service faces on!” Jerome sounded completely different as he twisted and called back at us from the front seat. His voice had lost that arrogant edge and he sounded like a normal person for the first time since I’d had the misfortune of meeting him.
We filed out and were escorted through some narrow corridors to a kitchen area where the chefs began setting up. We ferried the food in from the other vehicle and the chefs began snapping at each other and barking orders at everyone except for Jerome, Andrea and myself.
“You two, prep your trays. I’m going to greet the guests,” said Jerome as he straightened his jacket and checked his teeth in the chrome top half of an oven. “Rest of you, the soup is first up so get the table laid but for the love of god don’t put any food out until I give you the word! Lionel: you’re in charge until I get back. I expect everything to be ready to go when I do, understood?”
“Yeah, yeah. We know what we’re doing Jay,” muttered the chef as he turned and began checking the contents of the hot plates. Jerome harrumphed but spun on his heel and glared at Andrea and I.
“Trays! Andrea, you’re on snacks. Dave, try not to spill the champagne!” he snarled before plastering on a calm face and moving back into the corridor outside.
“Charming as ever. I wonder what he really does? You think he’s a playwright maybe? I hear those types are highly strung,” Andrea asked as she collected a silver tray and moved into the kitchen. I picked up my own and moved over to the fridge where the bottles of bubbly were housed. I opened a couple with loud pops and poured out half a dozen glasses, carefully placing them evenly around the centre of my tray.
“This is his only job, I'm not sure he has the soul of an artist.” I grinned at her as I waited for the nearest chef, Sam I think but I hadn’t bothered to match their names to faces, to carefully lay out an array of tiny overpriced snacks.
“The first bite is with the eye,” muttered possibly-Sam as she arranged the bitesize morsels in an obscure but undeniably aesthetic pattern. “Right, you’re good to go. You know the way?”
“Yep. Left out the door then follow it through to the entrance hall. The smoking room is the middle door on the far side,” replied Andrea confidently as she carefully raised her tray, making sure not to disturb the delicate arrangement the chef had constructed. I brought my own tray to my shoulder, balanced on the ends of the fingers of my right hand and gestured for Andrea to lead the way with my left. She winked at me and walked demurely out of the kitchen with me trailing behind her. I had to focus on not wobbling my tray while hers looked like it wouldn’t budge if we had a sudden earthquake. I always respected professionals, whatever their calling was.
I followed along like a good penguin. As Andrea pushed open the door at the end of the corridor bright lights silhouetted her for an instant. She was almost as shapely as Carol had been. Her monkey suit obscured much of it but she was clearly a beautiful woman. Her cheeky grin, dimpling her cheeks, hadn’t had anywhere near the effect just being near Carol had had on my more base instincts but under different circumstances I could see myself making a pass at her. A missed opportunity, alas, but on the plus side after tonight I’d be three hundred and fifty thousand bucks better off, minus Jimmy’s cut. On balance: a trade I was happy with.
I blinked as my eyes adjusted to the reception hall. A stairway rose off to my left that split halfway up before continuing to the upper floor on either side. Everything was marble and dark wood. Even the floor was panelled in wood that I suspected would remain outside my price range even after this evening. Glittering chandeliers hung above me. I followed Andrea, carefully maintaining the stability of my tray and stopped as she opened the door to the smoking room.
She went in and began a slow orbit of the room so she could offer her tray to the handful of guests. As I stepped in I cast a quick glance around the room. The guests were split into three groups. A man and a woman were talking off to one side. She looked awkward. All angular lines and sharp features. When she glanced my way I saw she was slightly cross eyed and wore milk-bottle-bottom thick glasses. Her hair was a tangle of straw that left her looking like a scarecrow despite her formal blue dress. This was Mrs. Routledge, the lady I was here to serve this evening.
Across from her stood a swarthy man in a military uniform. The drab olive of his suit matched his dusky skin and dark eyes flashed as he smiled at his interlocutor. I made my way in their direction as I quickly checked the other parties.
Two men were talking on the other side of the snooker table that occupied pride of place in the smoking room. One was tall and lean, the other short and clearly not a fan of the gym. Both wore tuxedos and it gave the effect of a daddy penguin and a baby penguin having a chinwag. At least the staff weren’t the only people forced to look like characters from a shitty animated film this evening.
Off to one side was the mark. Mortimer was... There’s not really a polite way to say it and even if there is… I’m going to kill the bloke sometime soon so I’m not too worried about his feelings. Fat. Big and fat wearing some kind of red velvet dinner jacket. On his nose perched a pair of circular glasses and above them rose a halo of strawberry blonde hair. His hairline had long since beat a retreat and now tufts of hair, that were reluctant to take root anywhere in front of his ears, stuck out like a clown wig. He was chuckling to himself animatedly which struck me as strange but none of the guests seemed to mind and I was just a menial at the moment. His time would come.
Much like the entrance hall the room was all dark wooden panels and flooring. The only colour was the golden lights above, comfy looking leather armchairs and the deep green drapes hanging across the huge windows in deference to the encroaching night outside.
I approached Mrs. Routledge and the military man, a colonel or above by the look of his badges and medals, as they were closest to the door in order to offer them a drink.
“-But the problems with Latifundia were already known!” the woman enthused. “If you look at the contemporary sources it’s clear they understood the economic impacts only too well. The issue was they didn’t have any acceptable solutions! If they had freed the slaves the plebs and freemen would have rioted. Never mind how the equestrians would have reacted to all that lost property!” Mrs Routledge’s voice was articulate and clear. I mentally tagged her as some kind of educator. Her physique suggested she wasn’t someone who did a great deal of exercise. Not a threat. Her companion was a different matter.
“They could have conscripted them into the legions,” argued the man in a middle eastern accent. “That way when they completed their service they would be citizens and no one would have been able to complain,” he suggested politely.
“Colonel Amir, how would your army feel about conscripts of dubious loyalty being armed and trained? I understand you had a bit of a mutiny not too long ago,” Mrs Routledge replied as she took a glass of champagne from my tray. I shifted my fingers slightly to account for the change to the balance of the tray.
“Ah, thank you,” The Colonel said as he took a glass himself. “That was fermented by outside elements. But I take your point. You wouldn’t want to dilute a relatively elite and motivated force with resentful conscripts.” This man was clearly not a REMF. His hands were scarred and his body was heavily muscled. His dark hair was buzzed short and his intelligent black eyes glinted as he talked. He went to the top of my watch list.
Their conversation faded away behind me as I moved to the other pair of men. Andrea seemed to have decided to save Mortimer for last which was fine by me. As they took a few morsels from her I moved in to offer them access to my own tray.
“So you got ten million views in a week?” drawled the taller man. He was lanky but clearly worked out daily. His dinner jacket failed to conceal his musculature. His blond hair was neatly trimmed and he had a well kept beard. Grey eyes peered over his glass as he took a sip. I turned to offer the tray to his companion who managed to lift a glass while ignoring me completely. The short guy held the glass delicately with two fingers, a thumb and his pinkie outstretched whereas the tall dude held his drink like a normal bloke.
“Yeah. But it’s no big deal James. With your branding you’d be able to jump into it at almost the same level. Think about it: James Gallagher Fight Talk. Or something like that. You’ve got a premade audience. You never know, you could go full Rogan!” The shorter man was overly neat in every way. His hair was too perfect, his clothing fit just right to cover his lack of exercise yet leave him looking almost fit and healthy. His brown eyes flashed as he pushed the fringe that “naturally” fell in front of his left eye back for a moment. I concluded he was a pansy. Some kind of social media idiot and put him beneath Patricia on my threat list.
Mr. Gallagher was a different kettle of fish entirely. I knew his name and now I could see him properly, I knew his face as well. A former UFC champion who was looking to make a comeback in the near future according to the newsfeed on my phone. The guy had a mean roundhouse and was good on the ground. He’d started out as a wrestler then learned striking later on. He favoured a few softening hits before getting into the ground and pound. I like fighting. Sue me.
He joined the Colonel at the top of the people-I-needed-to-give-a-shit-about-list.
“Not my thing, Jez. I’m not a talker. Put me in a ring and I’ll smack the snot out of anyone, or give it a go anyway. Put me in front of a mic and I get all shy. I’m not like you.”
“You think Jez Thornton was always so cool on camera? It takes time mate! Look, I’d love to give you some pointers. Maybe some practice? I’ve got a slot for a show next month, it’d just be a couple of hours and I’d let you set the pace. It won’t be live so don’t worry about making a tit out of yourself!”
I moved to follow Andrea, leaving the fighter and the wanker to their own devices. I saw Mortimer take a nubbin of something off her tray and then Andrea offered it to the air next to him. She curtseyed like she was dealing with an aristocrat and backed away before turning. Mortimer continued to babble away, looking like someone having a very enjoyable conversation with fresh air.
As I passed Andrea the woman caught my eye and she brushed a drop of sweat off her brow with her free hand. I carefully maintained the integrity of my now lopsided tray of drinks and approached my target for the first time in the evening. Even on a cursory examination it was clear that he represented bugger all threat to me. If he fell on me I’d be in trouble but otherwise he’d be no problem. I carefully avoided looking at the bulge of his Adams apple directly while I planned where to sit the garrotte before giving it a sharp pull and twist later on.
“-But where is our final guest? The one you’ve been so mysterious about?” he said in a gruff voice to, as far as I could see, empty air. “Ah, thank you,” he finished as he lifted a glass from my tray.
“Why my dear Robert. He's just this very minute arrived.” My blood ran cold. I knew that silken voice. The empty air Mortimer had been talking to a moment before was now filled with wavy green tinted hair, unholy curves and purple flecked green eyes. I lost my battle with balance and mass distribution, scattering the remaining glasses on my tray across the polished floorboards. The shattering-clattering drew all eyes my way. Shit.