Page 7 of The Torturer's Target

“Tell them I’ll be right out,” Max said with a nod. Olivia smiled and left, closing the door behind her.

“Don’t forget to submit all the records for the month to me. I’ll be here on Monday for my next shift, and I want everything to be ready by then,” Max said, turning to gaze to Pattie.

“Yes, Doctor, everything will be ready,” Pattie assured him.

“Great, I’m heading out now,” Max said before leaving the surgical preparation room, and going to his office. He changed out of his scrubs and into his regular clothes, a crisp blue shirt and black pants. He grabbed his phone and briefcase before leaving his office.

Max felt a sense of peace as he made his way to the waiting room where his friends, Bose and Clinton, awaited his arrival.

“Good evening, gentlemen. I hope I didn’t keep you waiting,” Max greeted with a smile as he approached the men. They were more than just friends to him; they were his trusted protectors, lethal, efficient, and dangerous in the face of peril.

“Not at all, sir.” Bose and Clinton stood up, paying their respects to their boss as he approached. Bose stepped forward, taking the doctor’s briefcase from him. “Shall we?”

They stepped out of the hospital. It was drizzling, and the air was crisp. Clinton opened an umbrella and positioned it over Max's head.

“Not the car. Let’s walk around and talk for a while before heading home.” Max didn’t want to talk in the car, even though the rain was getting heavier. Bose nodded and placed the briefcase in the vehicle before shutting the door.

“Bose, you said that you had something serious you wanted to tell me. So, what’s up?” Max asked, curious. The only thing that was urgent in his life was making it to the hospital on time for an emergency call and operating on a patient fast enough to save their life.

“I’m not really sure about this boss, but I think we’ve been tailed for the past few days,” Bose answered.

Max raised a brow. “On second thought, let’s get in the car.”

Bose and Clinton nodded. They led him to the special edition Mercedes Benz G-Class. The car was luxurious and it was upgraded with bulletproof armor and glass. As Clinton opened the door for the doctor, Bose shadowed his back closely, using his body as a shield to protect against unseen threats.

“Now, repeat what you said earlier,” Max said after they were seated at the power-adjustable rear bench seat.

“I think someone has been on our tail, sir,” Bose repeated.

A threat to his safety was nothing new to Max but definitely not what he expected Bose to tell him. He hadn’t had any drama in his life for some time. Since he paid the Mevials News Media to publish several articles on him giving up his shares and right of ownership of the company, and swore his executives to secrecy, his life had been an almost simple one. Work, eat, a little me-time, a little fun time, and sleep. Rinse and repeat.

“Are you sure about this, Bose?” Max looked from Bose to Clinton and back again.

Bose hesitated. “No, I’m not. It’s just a gut feeling I have. I haven’t been able to get any evidence, despite my best efforts.”

Max pondered that admission. Bose and Clinton had been with him for ten years and kept him alive over multiple attempts. He wasn’t one to dismiss a hunch from either of them. “What do you think, Clinton?”

“I think Bose is being paranoid, boss. I would have picked up a tail if we had one, but I didn’t.” A small smile played on the tough guy’s face. “Maybe it’s because we haven’t had any action in a while, and it’s making Bose edgy.”

“That’s not it,” Bose protested.

“Or, perhaps, it’s because his girlfriend left him. He hasn’t exactly been himself since that happened five months ago.”

Bose glared at him. “You are full of shit, Clinton.”

Clinton smirked and gave him the middle finger.

Max leaned back in his seat and shook his head as he watched the two of them banter. They might be elite soldiers and best friends, but most times they came off like twelve-year-olds with their childish exchanges.

“I think Clinton is right,” Max announced. They stopped playing around and stared at him, turning serious once again. “Not the girlfriend part, but the inactivity part. Before working for me, you two had missions all the time. There was always one dangerous task after another, but now, you gotta live in my house, guarding my regular, boring life. So, yeah, I think you are probably edgy. But let’s not laugh it off just yet. Let’s be more cautious of our environment, shall we?”

“Yes, sir,” they responded. Clinton said, “Well, truth be told, it hasn’t been all that regular. Walker did send an assassin to kill you six months ago. The second attempt in thirteen months.”

Max hadn’t forgotten that. The Homers Group was a major rival of Kingston Hotels Group, led by Carter Walker, the sixty-five-year-old founder and CEO. The man would do anything to wipe Max off the surface of this earth. Not just because it would benefit his company but also for a far more personal reason. All the man’s attempts at his life had been professional, but so far unsuccessful. Walker’s assassins never left evidence, which was why the man wasn’t in jail yet.

“It was him, but we have no evidence to prove it,” Bose said, his eyes darkening in anger. “If only the boss would give the orders, he would be a dead man.”

“We don’t get blood on our hands, Bose.” Max repeated the mantra he had been drilling into them for the past ten years. They lived in a dark world, but he lived by that code. No staining the hands unless it was unavoidable.

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