Chapter 8

The shrill sound of his ringtone woke Prin. He sat bolt upright. The room was still in darkness, lit only by the screen of his phone.

Who the hell is that?

He grabbed it off the nightstand. It was three in the morning. His blood ran cold when he saw the number. Quickly he pressed Answer.

"Nanny? Is everything all right?"

"Hello, Prin. Why wouldn't things be okay? Can't I ring to say hello?"

"It's three in the morning."

"Oh darling, I'm so sorry. I will never get the hang of this time difference."

Prin lay on his pillows. "It's all right, Nanny. How are you?"

"You must go back to sleep. Don't worry about a silly old woman who can't do math."

Prin grinned. She was neither silly nor old. "It's nice to hear your voice. How have you been?"

"Oh you know. The same as usual," she said. "How about you?"

The careful way she was choosing her words meant there was a reason for her call.

"Tell me what is the matter."

She chuckled. "You are very perceptive, Prin. You always have been."

And she was maddeningly slow to get to the point. He hadn't noticed this until he came to the United Kingdom. People's abruptness had terrified him at first. Now he wouldn't have it any other way.

"Are you well, Nanny?"

"Yes. It's nothing like that."

Realisation dawned on him. There was only one other person that they shared in common.

"Is it to do with my uncle?" he asked.

His question was met by silence.

"Nanny?"

He heard her sigh all those miles away. "Yes, I'm afraid it is," she said. "I did bump into your uncle the other day. Prin, he doesn't look well."

Prin wasn't sure what to do with that information.

"Prin?"

"Yes, I'm here. I'm sorry to hear that, Nanny."

His heart was racing. How unwell was she talking?

"Couldn't you see your way for a visit?" she asked.

Prin squeezed his eyes shut. "I don't think my uncle would be very pleased with that. He made his feelings clear last year, if you remember."

"A lot of water has gone under the bridge since then. I'm sure he's missing you."

"Did he say something to you?"

"Not in words as such. He's a proud man. We both know that."

As cryptic as ever. Yet there was an undertone to her voice that wasn't lost on Prin. She had a will of steel when she wanted to. It appeared to be in full working order.

"I won't be able to get away from work at the moment. I'm working on something very important," Prin said. "After it is tied up, I promise I will take some leave. I have plenty."

"That is wonderful news. Do you need me to wire you the money?"

"You know I don't."

"And how are things going there?"

Whenever she'd asked that in past phone calls, Prin had had to fight the urge to wail down the phone. He had no intention of doing that. She would probably fly straight over and drag him home.

Today, he didn't have to.

"I think things might be coming together," he said. "I've made some new friends."

"I had every faith in you," she replied. "You're one of my favourite people in the world and I'm never wrong. Now off you go, get your sleep."

"Goodnight, Nanny."

"Goodnight, Prin."

He finished the call and snuggled down under the duvet. His mind fell on the news about his uncle. They had parted badly. Prin did not want a repeat performance. But duty had literally called. It wouldn't kill Prin to make an effort.

The bus stopped and a yawning Prin disembarked. He had done this thousands of times since he had got the job at Pleasure Seekers. This time felt very different. The industrial estate was desolate and he had a gorgeous man waiting for him.

Prin made his way to the Pleasure Seekers building. He found Scott leaning on the wall by the service entrance that only Barry used. The light seemed to dance around him.

Now that is a Saturday morning treat.

Scott beamed. "Are you excited?"

"That's not quite the word I would use."

Scott laughed. "Come on, partner. Before anyone sees us."

Scott held the door open for him and they went inside. They were by the men's changing rooms again.

"This is becoming a habit," Prin said.

"It's also the first Saturday morning I've not had a hangover in decades," Scott replied. "I quite like it."

Prin laughed. "We should get moving. I keep thinking Barry is going to jump out of a locker and demand to know if we've wiped our feet."

"How did you persuade Elliott to agree to being on call again?"

"Easy," Prin said. "Darren was supposed to be doing it and was going on about some football match. I just asked Elliott."

"He must have thought all his Christmasses had come at once."

Prin nodded. "I half expected him to say I should do it. Then I would have been sunk."

"Why? It's normal for people to have commitments at weekends."

"It's not normal for me," Prin replied.

He caught Scott watching him. He must think him a sad little soul. Prin's face burned with embarrassment.

They made their way up the staircase and into the office.

"Gosh, it feels so much bigger when it's empty," Scott said.

Prin was no stranger to the office at weekends. He did his fair share of on-call shifts. Most of the work was remote but occasionally, he'd had to come in. He agreed with Scott though. It took on a different form without the hive of activity it usually hosted.

"I like it like this," Prin replied.

"I do too," Scott said. "Not enough to do overtime, but it's not bad."

Prin scanned around. "Where shall we position ourselves?"

"It's all arranged," Scott said. "I spoke to Barry. He said we can use his store cupboard. Bloody open-plan offices don't lend themselves to undercover missions."

"That's handy though," Prin replied. "The main drive for the CCTV is in there too. I installed it last year. Barry wouldn't have it anywhere else."

"That figures."

Spending Saturday in a cleaning store cupboard with Scott hadn't featured high on Prin's list of ideal weekend activities. Still, he could think of worse things.

"All we need is to lure Elliott in," Scott said.

Prin frowned. "Don't you think he'd come anyway? If he's the thief."

Scott clapped him on the shoulder. "Prin. You have to think like him. If he chooses, he'll come later this evening when that kids fun place has closed. Less chance of witnesses. I'm up for a stakeout but not all weekend. No, if we force his hand, he'll probably kill two birds with one stone."

"Wow, you are very good at this."

"Thanks. I think. So what can we do?"

Prin considered it for a second. It couldn't be something that Elliott would be able to fix easily from home.

"It has to be a server," Prin declared.

"Lead the way."

Prin stole across the office space. He knew he technically didn't have to be quiet—the silence was deafening—but it felt appropriate.

When they reached the server room, Prin inputted the code.

"I'll wait for you here," Scott said. "Do you need a hammer or anything?"

"A hammer?"

Scott held his hands up. "I don't know what you're doing to break it."

"Scott," Prin said, not bothering to hide his amusement. "If I smash a server up, we'll have every member of the IT department here in no time. I'm just going to disable a few things. Enough for it to be Elliott's problem."

"Fine," Scott replied, folding his arms. "Do your techy thing."

Prin went inside the tiny server room. He had always found it quite comforting with the whirring of the machines that kept Pleasure Seekers going. He would use the one that had gone down the other day. Elliott had been given a roasting by Richard for letting that happen. Elliott would be scared of it happening again.

He removed just enough connections for it to trigger Elliott's alarm. He'd been planning it and hoped it would be explained away that whoever had been fixing the server the other day hadn't replaced them properly.

He made his way back into the main office where Scott was sitting on a desk, fiddling with his phone.

"Come on then," Prin said.

The store cupboard was near to reception.

"It's a shame we have to do it this way," Scott said as they headed towards the main doors. "It's going to be very cosy."

They both shared a look.

Thank goodness Prin had chosen his best aftershave that morning.

Scott opened the door.

"Bloody hell," Scott said.

The space was full of cleaning equipment, paper towels and a stack of railway magazines.

"Anyone else would have porn," Scott said.

Prin shrugged. "I guess this is Barry's version."

"Ewww," Scott replied. "Let's hope Barry hasn't had any secret assignations in here."

"I wouldn't think so. He doesn't seem the type to me."

Scott clapped him on the shoulder again. Prin tried to ignore the thrill that shot through his system.

"You'd be surprised, Prin, my boy. You have a lot to learn."

At the back was a desk with monitors on. The CCTV hub.

Prin squeezed through and took the tiny seat.

"If Elliott is fiddling with the CCTV footage, do you he'll have to come in here to download the recording?" Scott asked. "I never thought of that."

He closed the door behind them. With the outside world banished, they were cocooned together.

"I don't think so," Prin replied. "If he's using other people's profiles to hack into the system, he can do it from any data point, providing he's sorted access beforehand."

Scott had managed to rearrange some toilet rolls into a seat shape. He tentatively lowered himself down onto it.

"Then why is it good we're in here?" he said.

"This is the master," Prin explained. "We'll get it immediately. I reckon it'd take him half an hour at least to tamper with it. I was going to try and race him to get the raw footage, but this is much better."

Scott nodded. "So, we can download it without him knowing?"

Prin reached into his pocket and produced an external hard drive that he'd brought from home. He held it up to Scott.

"We'll be getting it real time."

"Prin, you're a bloody genius. I don't know what that means but it sounds good."

"Give me a second and I'll sort it."

"My hero."

Prin glanced at an amused Scott.

Is he mocking me?

He opted to ignore it. Instead, he busied himself setting the device up and ensuring that the system would instantly duplicate files on Prin's cue.

It only took a few minutes. Once he'd finished, he turned to Scott.

"All done?" Scott asked.

Prin nodded. "Now we wait."

"How long have we been in here?" Scott asked.

"Half an hour," Prin replied.

Scott sighed. "I'd be useless in prison. This is driving me nuts."

So far, they had discussed work colleagues, Brighton and sharing a flat with Tyler and Eddie.

"Didn't you trigger an alarm or whatever? Shouldn't he have come running by now?"

Prin glanced at Scott. His indignation was weirdly attractive. "You might be surprised to learn that Elliott isn't the most responsive."

"Now that is a shocker," Scott replied. His frown dissolved into a grin. "Sorry. Patience has never been a gift of mine. How about you tell me your story? To pass the time."

"Me?"

"Yes. You're a man of mystery. There must be something going on."

Prin shifted in his seat. He'd never been comfortable telling the world about himself. He supposed it came from a life of hiding the real Prin Lum.

"Not sure where to start," he said. "I'm twenty-seven. I have a feeling you already know that."

Scott clutched his chest. "As if I would use my access to employee records to snoop."

The innocence was not very convincing.

"Very well, I believe you," Prin said. "I came to the UK eight years ago to study in Leeds."

"Why the UK?"

Prin sighed. "I wanted to see what it was like to be myself."

"Gay?"

"Yes."

"Isn't Thailand quite open?"

"Thailand isn't so bad. My uncle, on the other hand, is."

Understanding dawned on Scott's face. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"My parents died five weeks before my tenth birthday. Uncle Decha took me in. He's very conservative."

"Not a good thing for a gay child?"

"Nope."

Scott moved carefully on the toilet roll seat he had created. Prin felt guilty he had commandeered the chair immediately. Still, he needed access to the computer.

"Have you stayed here since?"

Prin shook his head. "No, I went home when I graduated. He and my father built a tech company in the nineties. The plan was for me to eventually take over."

"What happened?"

"Something awful," Prin said. "That I won't go into. Just to say, my uncle insisted I leave Bangkok. I managed to get a visa for England and here I am."

"Prin, that's awful. And you've been here since then?"

Prin nodded. "Just over a year. I'm due a visit home. My nanny rang me at a crazy time this morning just to tell me."

"Nanny?"

"Uncle didn't have time."

Prin did not want to continue this conversation. The conversation with Nanny had unsettled him. His uncle had banished him, but what if he was ill? Prin would never forgive himself if something happened.

He made it clear he didn't want to see me again though.

Prin would have to give this more thought when he got some time to himself. Movement caught his eye on the monitor. The warehouse door was rolling up.

"Shit," Scott said.

"I think we might be in business," Prin replied.

Prin gasped as Scott grabbed his arm. The doors were revealing a figure with its back to the camera. It was pulling a pallet onto a trolley.

"What has he got?" Scott asked. "Can you zoom in?"

Gently, Prin did so. The boxes were labelled.

"Who needs that much lube?" Scott exclaimed.

"It's clearly not for personal use," Prin replied.

He shot Scott a cheeky glance.

"That would be quite the party if it were," Scott said. "Can you track him? We need his face."

The figure disappeared off the side of the screen. Prin slowly manipulated the joystick that controlled the camera.

"If he sees it moving, he'll smell a rat," Prin said.

"Gently does it then," Scott soothed.

The figure passed under the line of vision. Any second and he would reveal himself.

"That's it," Scott continued. "That's the spot. Oh, perfect."

Scott leant on Prin now as they waited for the big reveal. Scott's breath tickled Prin's neck, sending shivers up his spine.

"Nearly," Scott whispered.

Then boom. There they had it. Elliott Brammin in full view of the camera. They continued to follow him. As Prin moved the camera around, a van identical to the vanishing one in the previous clip was revealed. Another male who Prin didn't recognise set about helping Elliott to unload.

"Bingo," Scott exclaimed. "Did you download it?"

Prin fiddled with the computer to double-check if the file had been reproduced.

"I did."

Scott threw his arms around him and kissed him. For a split second, the world stopped turning. All Prin focused on was Scott's lips on his own. He'd not experienced this level of joy for a long time.

Then it was broken. Scott leapt away and put his hand to his mouth.

"Shit I am so sorry."