Page 4 of Nanny for the SEALs

Maurice rolled his eyes again. “Okay, James Bond. We’re on the suite level. Now what do we do?”

“Now,” I said, “we find the right suite to sneak into.”

2

Rogan

I fuckinghatedgoing to events like these.

We were standing in the suite at the Lakers game, idly looking over whenever the crowd noise rose to a roar. I didn’t care about basketball at all. That’s how I felt about most sports, actually. Games were just that: games. They weren’t real life.

But I did care about business, and that meant clients and potential clients needed to be schmoozed. Especially in this ass-kissing town. Most of our clients were athletes, models, or actors. All three needed their egos stroked to completion before they would hire you.

“You simplymustdiversify,” the guy in front of me was saying. He was the president of a Los Angeles talent agency. “It’s true you get a higher return in the stock market, but the point is to reduce risk as you get closer to retirement. I’m currently dabbling in a variety of target-date funds that automatically…”

I zoned out within five seconds of listening to him again. Retirement? I was thirty-two years old, and my job was to protect people. I wasn’t retiring fordecades. Who the fuck did this guy think he was talking to?

Like I said: I hated events like these. That’s how life felt sometimes. Just a series of events I didn’t want to attend featuring an endless parade of people I didn’t want to talk to.

Sometimes I missed being deployed. At least then life was simple.

I nodded along to the guy, sipped my beer, and gazed around the rest of the suite. In addition to him, we had a member of the Los Angeles Rams public relations team talking to one of my partners. Asher—my partner—stood very still while explaining the computer network we used at our HQ, occasionally adjusting the glasses on his nose while the woman nodded and asked questions.

The other big fish in the room was Boras Scottsdale, one of the top athletic agents in Southern California. Clinging to his arm was a small, leathery woman with the biggest fake tits I had ever seen in my life—and that’s coming from a guy who lives in Los Angeles, the silicon capital of the world. Brady—my other partner—was telling them a long, and veryloud, story in his thick Boston accent.

“So we land in the middle of the fucken night outside Baghdad. It’s so dark it might as well be the bottom of the fucken ocean. But we’ve got enough tactical gear it’s no problem. With nightvision goggles, we can see better than Ted Fucken Williams.”

My attention drifted away from the war story I’d heard Brady tell a thousand times. The three potential clients in the room were good, but I had expected more than them. We originally had twenty-five tickets to give away. Boras Scottsdale had taken five, but then he only showed up with Madam Volleyball Tits rather than any of his athlete clients. The Rams Public Relations director had accepted six tickets, but the only person she had brought was her husband. The talent agency president—who was now explaining mutual fund yields to me—had taken the rest of the tickets, but then he showed up all alone.

I didn’t mind wasting money. Our company had plenty of that. But I absolutely hated wasting time.

When the talent agency president paused to breathe, I cut in. “Is anyone from your agency coming tonight?”

“I invited a few people,” he said offhand, oblivious to the reason I was asking. “Mostly new talent. Oh, and Amirah Pratt. She’s the pretty little blonde girl starring in that new Netflix show. The one based on the book series.”

“Fantastic,” I said, even though I had no idea who Amirah Pratt was. But if she was starring in a Netflix show, she wasn’t a small fish.

“Amirah—lovely girl—insisted she would be here,” the guy said. “She’s had some death threats on social media since her show aired. Lots of crazies in this town.”

“That’s what my company is for,” I said smoothly. “To keep people like her safe. You can’t put a price on peace of mind.”

He abruptly pulled out his phone. “I need to take this.” Without any other comment, he strode out of the suite.

I breathed a sigh of relief once he was gone, and took a few steps closer to the arena. The suite was one big shoebox-shaped room, with the entrance at one end and the court side at the other. The wall was glass, and a door led down to four rows of seats overlooking the court. These were private seats, only accessible through our suite and not connected to the ones on either side. Right now, there was nobody sitting in them.

I sipped my beer and watched a few seconds of the game. The Lakers were winning, but it was only the second quarter. The crowd was happy about that, but I didn’t care. It all seemed so pointless to me.

Brady appeared next to me with a glass of beer in one hand and a tumbler of clear liquor in the other. “Fucken LeBron only has two rebounds. I bet a C-spot that he’d have a triple-double tonight.”

Brady’s Boston accent was thicker than Good Will Hunting. “C-spot” sounded like “C-spaht.” Sometimes, if I wasn’t paying attention, it sounded like someone was talking to me in a foreign language.

I had no idea what a triple-double was, so I said, “We’re not here to watch games. We’re supposed to be focusing on recruiting clients.”

Brady downed the clear liquor in one gulp and frowned at me. “Look around, pal. Not many asses to kiss. At least, not in our suite.”

“I know.”

“Fuck it. Might as well enjoy yourself.” It came out asyahself.As if to emphasize his point, he guzzled half his beer. “Nobody’s driving, and Patty’s watchin’ the boys.”

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