Beck: Hollywood Hitman (2 page)

***

Beck carefully refolded the letter. His sharp gaze focused on Remi, and the muscle in Beck’s jaw flexed. “You want me to be a fucking babysitter?” His eyebrow lifted a millimeter, conveying his disgust and yet also his grudging interest, because if Beck Tatum wasn’t the slightest bit interested in the offer that Remi Prince’s boss had just made, Beck wouldn’t still be sitting in this swank, high-end living room with bars on the windows.

“Babysitters don’t usually come equipped with psyops, twelve hostile excursions, and a 18 tk record.”

“19.”

“Heard the last one wasn’t authorized.”

Beck’s nostrils flared. He’d gotten Beck’s attention. Remi’d put the “babysitter” shit to rest—he’d heard it all before, and so had Estrella.

Beck squinted. Remi leaned back in the leather chair and steepled his fingers. He knew Beck Tatum—hell, two decades before he’d
been
Beck Tatum, but with an even bigger chip on his shoulder. A chip so damn large that the cement block weighing him down had nearly sunk him into an early grave. Beck Tatum didn’t know it now, but what Remi’s boss Estrella was offering Beck was not only a chance out of this loony-bin on happy-steroids and into a well-paying gig, but also his fucking salvation.

“You’ve seen my record.”

This time, Remi’s eyebrow twitched upward. He could neither confirm nor deny such access, but knowledge of an operative’s kill record came only with the highest level clearance or access. Direct access.

Remi’s boss had both.

“You’re not dealing with fucking
Sesame Street
here, Tatum. This is real. My boss recruits on a case-by-case basis and matches the operative with the correct client. Your life to protect their life. And we both know that bullshit doesn’t go down easy.”

No, not easy at all. Especially when you didn’t like the person you were meant to protect. And operatives? Hard, tough, battle-tested operatives had a tendency to dislike a number of Estrella’s clients, who were entitled, overindulged, and often had too much money but a big fucking fear of whatever chased them.

Beck’s client would be no different. Beautiful, with a big public life, but a pain in Remi’s ass and hopefully, soon, primarily Beck’s problem.

Beck didn’t know any of those details yet. The letter contained an offer. For a job. To protect and—if necessary—to hit.

Beck crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back into the couch. Odd combo, this giant operative sitting on cushions that had pink flowers decorating the cloth.

“How you like Club Crazy?” Remi asked. “Hear it’s been nearly nine months.”

“Two hundred and sixty-eight fucking days, six hours and”—Beck glanced at his watch—“fifteen minutes.”

“Like it that much?” A slow smile slid over Remi’s face. Beck was interested, not convinced, but interested. Remi could work with interest, and while he had his reservations about Beck Tatum, Estrella thought she could work with Beck too.

A haunted look flashed in Beck’s eyes, didn’t make it to his face or to the hard creases around his jaw. Not a fleck of movement, but those eyes? Yeah, Remi knew that look, knew those feelings. The concern was, did the op have his shit under wraps or was he a fucking time bomb ticking his way to detonation?

“I’m listening,” Beck said. His gaze was hard again.

“Good,” Remi leaned forward. “Now let me tell you how you get out of this Shangri-La with bars.”

Chapter Three

“Where’re you going?”

Natalie’s stomach tightened with the question. She stopped in the marble foyer of her Hollywood Hills home and whipped her head around toward the open front door, where Ari stood, hands on hips.

She shot him a warning look. “Shopping.”

She hitched her purse higher onto her shoulder. People who worked for her didn’t get to quiz her on her personal life. Ari was no different, regardless that he’d been her manager since she was nine. “Do you have a problem with that?”

“Not usually, but today, yes.”

Since Natalie had broken off communication with her parents, Ari was the closest thing to family in her life. Pathetic, really. Three guys in white uniforms fanned out behind him. They held drills and electronic equipment, and each disappeared into a different room.

Natalie crossed her arms over her chest. Great. Cameras and motion detectors and alarms. Soon she’d be a prisoner in her own home as well as in public. Unable to go out and be alone and unable to come home and be unseen. She brushed one hand across her forehead, pulling her hair off her face. The whole security thing exhausted her and pissed her off.

“Natalie, you can’t just come and go anymore, you’re at risk. This isn’t a joke.”

A dismissive wave and a roll of her eyes. Everyone was taking this whole stalker thing much too seriously, especially Ari. “You’re kidding, right? It’s a couple letters and some crank phone calls—”

“Plus two break-ins the last ten days. How are you so cavalier?” In the dining room a drill bit screamed. Ari stepped closer and lowered his voice. “A strange car followed you home two nights ago.”

Natalie’s stomach pitched forward with the memory of the car, tailing her through the Hollywood Hills all the way from Bel Air to the gates of her home. Giant ugly tears had streamed down her face when she finally got to the safety of her own gated drive. She hadn’t told Ari anything about her shivering sobs, only about the car.

“Photogs.” Natalie spun her key ring around her finger. “I won’t live in fear.” Tough words. Ari didn’t need to know that a tingle slithered up her spine with the mention of the car. All Ari needed, like everyone else in Natalie’s life, was for her to keep making movies and money. He didn’t actually
care
about her well-being; he was simply protecting an investment.

“You’ve got the premiere, and we start shooting the sequel in three months.”

“Busy busy.” She took a deep breath and plastered her my-patience-is-nearly-gone-look onto her face. She’d perfected that look at age nine when still doing TV on kiddy channels. “Then you’ll understand why I’d like a little retail therapy.” The whole thing with the security was beyond tiresome. What next? A security guard? As if that would ever happen. Besides, if the car was owned by who she
thought
owned the car, he wouldn’t hurt her—he just wanted to get her attention.

“Have Stacia bring some wardrobe here for you to view.”

“No.” This was Natalie’s house, her career, and regardless of what her parents had thought, her life.

“Natalie, we’re talking about your safety.”

She started toward the front door. “I don’t recall us having a meeting on the books today, so why exactly are you talking to me?”

Ari grabbed her arm. Heat flashed through her belly. She jerked her arm from Ari’s grip. No one grabbed her. No one. Not ever again.

“If you want to keep your most profitable client, don’t ever grab me.”

Ari’s mouth dropped open, but no words came from his lips. His hands fell to his sides. “Natalie, doll, you know I think of you like my daughter.”

“Uh-huh.” Natalie nodded. “More like a goose laying golden eggs.”

“I want you to be safe.”

“And I want to buy some clothes,” Natalie brushed by Ari on her way out the front door.

***

Remi pulled up to a guard booth and slid down the car window. First the voice, then the fingerprints, and finally a light scanned over his eyes.

“That’s pretty high tech just to pull in the gate.”

“We don’t have unannounced visitors at Greystone. Anyone past this point is by invitation of Estrella.”

Remi pressed the accelerator and they sped up the drive. Winding and twisting, until a giant manse with gray stone walls rose from the ground, a fortress in the midst of the city. Remi pulled to a stop on the drive.

“You’d never know this place was in the middle of Los Angeles,” Beck said.

“I believe that’s the point.” Remi exited the car.

Two guys flanked the front door and Remi nodded to both. “Dex”—Remi nodded to the tall guy with black hair and a scar on his left cheek—“and Carson.” The shorter man with brown hair. The guy with black hair, Dex, cocked an eyebrow at Beck.

The hint of a memory trickled through Beck’s brain. Did he know this guy? Without words or pause Beck followed Remi through the heavy wooden door. “Welcome to Greystone.”

Beck lifted his gaze. The front hall was three stories high and two staircases arched away from the marble floor to the upstairs.

Remi walked past the twin staircases with Beck at his flank. “All primary operations are out of this location. We have satellite offices around the world and you’ll receive that information should you need it, but this, this is our primary headquarters.”

Remi turned a corner and opened the door that led into another giant room, which might’ve been a ballroom once upon a time but now housed dozens of workstations, monitors, and computers. Giant screens adorned the walls.

“If it’s tech and it’s been invented, we have it.” Remi turned toward a man in a white lab coat who scurried toward them like a gerbil on speed. “This is Zeb Dubrowski. We stole him from . . .” Remi leaned forward. “Actually, I can’t tell you where we stole him from, but he’s the most sought-after tech genius in the world. You need it, he’s got it.” Remi turned to the computer guru. “Zeb, meet Beck Tatum.”

Zeb stuck out a hand. “Thrilled, just thrilled to have you with us, Mr. Tatum. Can I say that your operational knowledge on the Saharan Sub Z project was really just extraordinary?”

Beck’s eyebrows furrowed. What Zeb was saying was highly classified, so classified that if the government could find a way for Beck not to remember what had happened with that project, they damn sure would’ve.

“Thanks,” Beck said.

“Remi, when you have a moment, we have a situation.” Zeb lifted an eyebrow. “It’s the . . . well, it’s . . . I think it’s what we’ve been waiting to see on the project.”

Remi’s smile remained affixed to his face, but a flicker of interest pulsed through his eyes. “Let me get Beck settled and I’ll be back. Ping me if it escalates.”

Zeb nodded to Remi. “Happy to have you as part of the team,” he said to Beck, and turned back toward the dozens of computers.

Beck’s gaze swept over the setup in the room. A bit over the top for low-level security work. “Only private security work?”

“We’re on retainer with a number of entities.” Remi started walking down the long hall. “You’re asking about government work?”

Beck nodded.

“We help when they ask.” That explained their high-level access. Some tradesies on the intel, although the government wasn’t ever in the position to need to give away information. “But once you’re ours, you’re ours. It’s an easy deal.”

“Until it’s not,” Beck added. “The US Government is a ten-thousand-pound gorilla.”

“Absolutely,” Remi agreed. “But even a gorilla needs to be fed. We do what we can, when we can. Plus, you know about Estrella. Her network allows us a great deal of . . . leeway.”

“Her engagement to Prince Abdhul,” Beck said.

“
Former
engagement. As well as other contacts.” Remi turned the corner into a kitchen. A chef and several cooks bustled through the open space. Remi grabbed a handful of blueberries from a half-pint container. “Estrella was never just a pretty face.”

No. She’d been linked to a myriad of powerful men before she’d disappeared.

“Is she here?”

“Nearly always.” Remi turned a corner and stopped. “Let’s be clear: Greystone is Estrella’s agency. She runs it, she operates it. She chooses the cases she takes and the operatives she hires, and she does so carefully and cautiously.” Remi turned another corner into a long open hallway with doors on either side.

“We’ve got you in number six.” Remi stopped and opened a door.

The room was more than functional. Not quite as swank as Club Crazy, but there were no bars on the windows or locks on the doors.

“Your own private patio. Bathroom attached. TV, computer, internet. You can eat here or in the dining room. When you’re in-house, this is your place for as long as you want it.”

His place for as long as he wanted it? When was the last time there’d been any place like that in Beck’s life? Long before the last mission that’d taken most of his memories and nearly his life.

“Meet me in the main hall in thirty. You’ve got paperwork and I’ll show you the rest of Greystone. Exercise room, rec room. You name it, we’ve got it.”

Beck dropped his rucksack on his bed. “This setup is a little unorthodox.”

“So is Estrella.” Remi smiled, but a sadness filtered through his eyes. “I guess when you go through that kind of trauma, you come out different than the way you went in.”

Remi’s words struck at Beck.

“Keeping people safe is Estrella’s mission in life. She only works with people that are as compelled as she is.”

Beck’s chest tightened. Keeping people safe. He’d failed at that mission requirement the last time he’d been sent out. He put his hands on his hips. “She sure she has the right guy?” His voice was hard. “The last time I was sent to protect didn’t end so well.”

“Maybe that’s exactly why you’re here. People like us, when we fail? Doesn’t sit well, because failure is never an option. See you in thirty.” Remi walked out and shut the door.

Bright light poured into the room. Beck opened his closet door. Three suits and a half-dozen handmade shirts lined the closet. Shoes. All the right size. The dresser was the same, filled with clothes that would fit. Good thing, because aside from the jeans and T-shirt that he wore, his rucksack was filled with threadbare pajama bottoms, a couple shirts, and a pair of shorts. Maybe he’d burn the whole damn thing—there had to be a fireplace somewhere in this castle.

Chapter Four

“Doll, do your daddy a solid.”

Natalie took a long breath and walked away from the sales clerk at Barney’s who’d been helping her before the phone rang. Why had she answered? She’d known, even if she didn’t recognize the number—hell, it was
because
she didn’t recognize the number—that she’d known this call was from one of two people. And she’d been right. This call was from her deadbeat dad.