Free One Week in the Private House by Esme Ombreux Page A

the way up to my neck, it's got this ridiculous tall stiff collar, and it almost covers my bottom. If it weren't for the cutaways at the thighs no one would be able to see any of my naughty bits.
    She ran her fingers along the choker, and swore. The pointed studs were really quite sharp. And she was not at all happy about the sturdy metal rings that were inset all round both the choker and the belt.
    'Maxine,' she said, 'I've got a nasty feeling about this uniform. It doesn't look as though it's designed for having fun, does it? And I'm sure I've seen it somewhere before.'
    'Well of course you've seen it before, you big silly. You've seen it here. And you're right to say it's not for having fun. That's the uniform that the Security wears. It looks like you're in the private army of the Private House this time.'
    The Private House is a specific place, Jem - or, to be more accurate, it is several specific places. But it is also an institution and a frame of mind, and so in a sense it is everywhere. Mr Headman has invited you to the Private House as his special guest, and I don't think I can adequately emphasise that such an invitation is an unusual honour. But be warned; if you accept, and go to the Private House, you will find it very difficult to leave, and you will certainly not be permitted to make public anything that you find there.'
    Such were the terms of Miss Morelli's offer. Jem had accepted, of course, and had kept her reservations to herself. I'm a reporter, she had protested inwardly, or at least I'm pretending to be one, and Mike McKenzie's depending on me to save Executive Environments by publicising something scandalous about Terence Headman. Mixed with Jem's exultation at her success in gaining access to Headman's inner sanctum were other emotions: intrigue and excitement about the mysterious Private House, to the extent that she had to admit to herself that she would have accepted the invitation even if she had had no ulterior motives. She had the disquieting feeling that the more she seemed to be closing in on Headman, the more their places were really reversed.
    Jem had plenty of time to think and no opportunity to ask questions. Naked but for a fur-lined one-piece flying suit, she had been whisked in a limousine from Headman's office to his city heliport, where a small two-seater helicopter had been waiting for her. The pilot, wearing an expensive pin-striped business suit and an incongruous crash helmet, had said nothing as Jem clambered into the cockpit and had glanced at her only once, when handing her a crash helmet similar to his. He had said nothing since conversation was in any case impossible, because the all-encompassing helmets blocked out every sound except for the dull chatter of the rotor blades.
    The helicopter had sped westward, towards the setting sun. Soon the glass towers of the city were replaced by the neat lines of suburban roofs, densely-packed at first but then no more than brick-red tendrils lying across green fields; and at last there was nothing unrolling beneath the helicopter but a rural carpet of woodlands, farms and villages.
    Jem had pulled open the Velcro strap at her left wrist before she remembered that her watch, along with her clothes and all her equipment, was locked in a strongbox in the helicopter's tiny hold; she wondered when she would see it again. She wondered how long she'd been airborne. It Wouldn't help to know, she realised; she didn't know how fast the helicopter flew, and in any case the pilot had been following a zig-zag course that Jem suspected was designed to disorient her and to avoid recognisable landmarks such as motorways and large towns.
    The helicopter was descending gradually, heading towards a dark green landscape of motley woods and parkland. Something crackled electronically next to Jem's ears - a radio built into the crash helmet, she realised, just as the pilot's deep voice boomed from the speakers.
    'Welcome to the Private House, Jem. We're