Free NO KISS FOR THE DEVIL (Gavin & Palmer 5) by Adrian Magson

relationship beyond trading on the written word?
    Before she
could reply, his eyes slid past her shoulder and his face became serious. Riley
turned her head. The balding man who had met her at reception was standing in
the entrance to the lounge. He gave them both a brief smile, then turned and
walked away without a word.
    ‘Riley,’ said
Richard Varley, getting to his feet and picking up his briefcase. ‘I’m afraid I
have to be going. My associate needs me to deal with something.’ He thrust out
his hand and held hers for a long moment, towering over her. Then he let it go
and stepped past her.
     
    Ten minutes later,
Riley was in the back corner of a coffee shop, holding a large latte and
scanning the contents of the heavy folder Varley had given her.
    Her initial
reaction back at the hotel, given Varley’s wandering eyes and the fact that
she’d never heard of the magazine, had been to ignore the lure of the unusual
signing-on fee and give the job a miss. Now she saw who the profile target was,
she was beginning to wonder if she shouldn’t go straight back and dump the
papers – and the cheque – in Varley’s lap.
    She had no
first-hand reason to think that billionaire retail giant, industrialist and
party benefactor, Muammar ‘Kim’ Al-Bashir, was anything other than above-board.
There were whispers of heavy-handed reactions whenever journalists delved too deeply
into the Egyptian-born businessman’s background, aided by a private army of
no-nonsense security guards to discourage further probing. Added to that were
friends in very high places and a ruthless thirst for revenge on those who
dared cross him.
    But a quick
glance at this file showed that it contained material which wasn’t exclusively
business gossip – although there was plenty of that. Included were pages of
detail and much anecdotal reportage about the man. Her initial impression was
that it had been compiled by someone with a very organised approach to gaining
the maximum effect from every word - yet in a very readable style.
    Another
journalist?
    Riley pondered
on this for a while, uneasy at the idea that someone else had already worked on
this project. If they had ducked out of the assignment before her, as Donald
Brask had so pithily suggested, maybe she should ask who… and why. Then she
noticed something even more interesting.
    In addition to
the commercial information in the file, which must have been difficult enough
to collate - knowing what little she did of the subject and his ways - there
was information of a purely personal kind: the kind which delved into the
biggest no-go area of Al-Bashir’s life.
    His wife,
Asiyah.
    Riley wondered
whether this wasn’t simply courting disaster for the sake of it. Taking on a
known litigant of biblical proportions, a man with his own security force and
the confidence to use it, was not likely to go unnoticed. Nor would it do her
reputation much good if the detail contained in the file turned out to be
erroneous, misguided or even downright malicious.
    She picked up
the copy of East European Trade and took out her mobile. She had promised to
let Donald have details of the publisher involved. She didn’t want to get into
a discussion with him about this just now, so she took the easy option and
texted him the details instead.
    As for
Al-Bashir, she toyed for all of five seconds with the idea of tossing the
assignment aside. Even if she was going to tell Varley to get lost, maybe a
more detailed look at the file first wouldn’t do any harm.
     
    ********
     

12
     
    Palmer
sat at his desk and picked up the large brown envelope. It was bulky but light.
He soon saw why. Ripping it open, he tipped out a miscellaneous collection of
sheets from spiral notepads, sales receipts from various shops, discarded
sheets of A4 plain paper, a holiday postcard showing a slice of blue sea and a
rocky coastline, and even a couple of envelopes addressed to Helen at her
London home. Mrs Demelzer hadn’t been