Private Princess

Chapter 85

Peter Knight looked at the papers in his hand. It was a printout of the premier security companies in the country. These were not businesses that advertised in the local job center, but who recruited directly from the Special Forces and army. Minimum entry requirements were tours of duty, combat experience and solid references from former commanders. They were the kind of people who had worked with Flex both in and out of uniform, and now, Knight hoped they’d be the ones to lead him to the murderer.

He was wrong.

“Come on, Ryan,” Knight beseeched the man at the other end of the line. “We’ve used your company for years. Where’s the loyalty?”

“Well, that’s exactly it, Peter. Even if I knew where Flex was, I couldn’t tell you. Me and him were in the regiment together. Maybe if you told me what this was about.”

“I can’t,” Knight said, closing his eyes in frustration. “Just trust me, Ryan, this is not a guy you want to be associated with.”

“I do trust you. But Flex has built up a lot of trust with me too. We were in the sandpit together, so you understand why I can’t rat him out, even if I did know.”

Knight rubbed at his face. The blind loyalty of the soldiers running these companies was a brick wall that a civilian could not penetrate.

“What if I told you he hurt another soldier?” Knight tried, tiptoeing around the subject. “A decorated one.”

“Then get them to call me. If we have a few friends in common, and they vouch for them, then we’ll see.”

Knight swore under his breath.

“Something big is about to happen,” Knight told the man, sensing failure. “And you’re about to fall on the wrong side of it.”

“Nah, mate. I’m standing back from it, well out of the way.”

“Goodbye, Ryan,” Knight said, hanging up the call. “Bollocks!” he shouted out, crossing off the last name on his list. Not one of the companies’ leaders would speak about Flex.

Frustrated, Knight screwed up the paper and threw it at the wastepaper basket. It missed. Swearing, he crossed to pick it up, but as he did so a red mist of anger descended before his eyes, and instead of picking up the paper, he kicked the basket as hard as he could and let loose a howl of rage. A rage that had built inside him since Jane Cook had been killed in cold blood. His agent. His friend. Killed in cold blood.

“Bastard!” Knight roared, wanting nothing more in that moment than to rip Flex’s heart out with his own hands. “Bastard!”

Eliza Lightwood had done a good job of destroying Knight’s office. Now the angered man did the rest. He threw books, kicked cabinets and punched the walls. He grabbed at his face, pulled at his hair and cried down his cheeks.

He remembered Jane.

“No!” he shouted at everything and nothing. “No! No! No!”

The grief and rage that he’d bottled up hit him like an avalanche. He had been so caught up — so busy protecting Morgan and worrying about him — that he’d ignored his own emotions. Now, faced with the dead end from the security companies, he could no longer hold back the irrepressible savagery of his heartache. As his chest heaved and swelled like an angry ocean, Peter Knight sank to his knees and wept.