The Armstrong Assignment (A Janet Markham Bennett Cozy Thriller Book 1) by Diana Xarissa (books for 10th graders TXT) 📕

“I can have food brought in,” the youngest man at the table offered. He was wearing black trousers, a blue shirt, and a tie with his cowboy boots and hat.

Bobby shook his head. “I want to go out and get something at a real French restaurant. The restaurant here does American food. If I wanted American food, I could have stayed in America.”

“Most of the guests here prefer to have the option to have food that’s familiar to them,” the younger man told him.

“Well, I didn’t come this far to eat the same food I can get at home. We’ll go out after the meeting,” Bobby replied.

“If you have a specific restaurant in mind, I can have it cleared before we get there,” Edward suggested.

Bobby sighed. “I thought we could stroll into the middle of the city and pick a place that looked good.”

“Of course we can,” Edward told him. “That’s just slightly riskier.”

“You’ve all met Edward, of course,” Bobby said to the others. “He’s in charge of spoiling my fun, mostly.”

Edward shook his head. “That’s the last thing I want to do. I simply want to keep you safe.”

“Allow me to introduce the very lovely Janet Markham,” Bobby continued. “Ms. Markham has graciously agreed to act as a translator for me while we’re in Paris. She speaks fluent French.”

Janet blushed. “Of course, you must all call me Janet,” she said.

“Um, Bobby, I did offer to hire a translator for you,” the young man said. “I’m not certain where you found Ms. Markham, but I do have some, um, concerns about bringing in someone random.”

Bobby waved a hand. “It doesn’t matter where I found her,” he replied. “Add her to the payroll. She’s getting five thousand dollars a day, starting today.”

“Five thousand?” The man was clearly shocked.

Janet glanced over at Edward. He looked surprised as well.

“That is considerably more than the going rate for someone to help you order your lunch and dinner,” the young man argued.

“She’s going to be doing a great deal more than that,” Bobby countered. “We have a lot of business meetings coming up over the next two weeks.”

“And each of the companies with which we are going to meet has already promised to have translators available if necessary,” the other man countered.

“Do you trust them?” Bobby demanded. “Do you trust them all to be completely honest and above board? I want someone in the room who can listen to the conversations taking place and let me know what’s really being said.”

“You’re paying her to spy for you?” the man asked.

Again Janet glanced at Edward. He looked amused and, when she caught his eye, he winked at her.

“I just want someone in the meetings who can understand everything being said and who I know is on my side,” Bobby replied. “Janet, the man arguing against you is my assistant, Theodore Bradley.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Bradley,” she replied, suppressing the urge to call him Teddy.

“Call me Theodore,” he replied unenthusiastically. “I’ll need some information from you before I can put you on the payroll. We’ll have to talk later.”

Janet nodded. “Of course.”

“I think hiring your own translator is very clever,” the man sitting next to Theodore said. He was the man who’d looked so out of place the previous day.

As he had been yesterday, he was wearing a suit. He had a cowboy hat on his head, but it very much looked as if it had been put there by mistake. Janet could only imagine that he’d be removing it as soon as he possibly could.

“Janet, my business partner, Neil Sullivan. He partners with me on some of my businesses, but that includes everything that’s happening here in Paris this week,” Bobby said.

“It’s nice to meet you,” Janet told the man.

He shrugged. “It’s nice to meet you as well. Call me Neil, and please don’t take offense, but just how fluent is your French?”

Janet took a deep breath. It was just possible that some of the others spoke some French, so she needed to be careful. “It’s very nice to meet you all, and I’m looking forward to working with Bobby to help him with his business deals, but if anyone here doesn’t trust me or doesn’t want me involved, I can go back to enjoying myself in Paris and waiting for my husband to join me. Goodness only knows how long that will take, but I can be patient when I have to be,” she said in French.

Neil raised an eyebrow. “The only word I understood was ‘Bobby.’ Did anyone understand her?”

Janet looked at Edward, knowing that he’d understood every word. He was staring straight ahead and didn’t say a word.

“I understood a bit,” one of the women said. She was the younger of the two women, probably around forty, and today she was wearing a bright red dress. It was cut low at the front, revealing ample cleavage. Her cowboy hat was also red.

“You studied French for four years at college,” Bobby said.

The woman laughed. “I studied fraternity parties for four years at college. I dabbled in French when I wasn’t too drunk, which was just about never.”

“My daughter,” Bobby told Janet. “Lucy Stone. You may have heard of her.”

“I don’t believe I have,” Janet replied, wondering if the woman was a model or an actor.

Several people laughed.

“I guess Lucy’s antics haven’t made it into British gossip magazines,” Theodore said. “That has to be a good thing.”

Lucy rolled her eyes. “I’ve something of a reputation back home,” she told Janet. “I drink and party too much and I make terrible choices when it comes to men. All of that has changed now, though.” She looked over at the man sitting next to