Rise of the Beast: A Novel (The Patmos Conspiracy Book 1) by M.K. Gilroy Page B

path that Klaus had found for her.
    The second gleaming black Range Rover had brought her to the trailhead at Devil’s Den State Park, about an hour south of the airport. The driver would wait for her to circle back to the same beginning spot of the strenuous, fifteen-mile course—she told the driver she would be back in two hours; he figured it would be closer to three—and then take her to a local day spa where she would be pampered and prepped to look stunning for dinner at Per Se on Columbus Circle just south of Central Park. The flight would be less than two hours and she planned to look ravishing—beyond ravishing—which was, she knew, her only defense in the world of Jonathan Alexander and corporate espionage.
    The dress she selected magically wove together strands of provocative and revealing with tasteful and refined. Money might not buy everything but it came close.
    Maybe she had become the greedy superficial person she was pretending to be.
    Pauline wondered again about Burke, the man who hired her to spy on Jonathan Alexander, pretending to be the billionaire’s mistress. Actually, there was no pretending when she was with him. She was indeed a highly paid commodity in the service industry.
    Burke. Was that his first or last name? Strange time to be wondering that. What had he gotten her into? Who was he? She had spent months of preparation with him, but knew so little about him. He was an American. He was well put together physically. Six-three? Six-four? Maybe 200 pounds of muscle. Good teeth and hair. His deportment indicated he was prosperous, but in a non ostentatious way. No suits made from exotic fabrics, just jeans, a cotton oxford shirt open at the top of the chest, and a navy blue sport jacket.
    Was he rich? The money required for expensive logistics were no issue with him. She knew that he was working for someone else, someone else was paying the bills. That someone else might be workingfor yet another person up the food chain. But Burke was simple. He probably had a fortune squirrelled away.
    Pauline felt a pang of sadness as she thought again, Burke was a man I had almost come to believe was a good man. But a good man would not have put her where she was.
    The month-long training and briefing with Burke had been simple. Jonathan Alexander had begun to carry a small leather journal in his suit pocket. He had never previously been seen taking or keeping notes. Apparently Alexander had a prodigious memory and plenty of hired help to do something as menial as committing ink to paper. When something changed with a man as powerful as Alexander, even something as simple as starting to ink words on paper, people noticed and got very curious. Getting in on the right side of a Jonathan Alexander deal could make you a fortune or save you from financial disaster.
    Whoever was close enough to Alexander to observe the change reported the journal had to be important. It was never separated from the man unless it was locked up. When he returned to his estate near Geneva, the first thing he would do was go to his office and place it in his personal safe. Something big must be in it for him to add an extra layer of security to his already heavily guarded Swiss compound.
    How did Burke and whomever he was working for know this? She could only assume that whoever commissioned the assignment had someone reasonably close to the man. Klaus? Impossible to read him. Jules? Not smart enough. He was a jackhammer that bludgeoned Alexander’s problems. Nicky? He was blood related to Alexander. She doubted that Burke knew either. But there was obviously a rat in Alexander’s pantry.
    What did a billionaire write in his journal? That was the question for inquiring minds.
    “Maybe he writes gibberish,” Burke answered when she raised the question with him. “Maybe he draws cartoons. Maybe he has simply decided he wants to keep a diary. Maybe he is writing a novel.”
    She wanted to be taken seriously. So when she pouted