Page 19 of Dominant

Chapter 4

Accounting

Alexander

“I can’t believe you hired Jordan,” said Mark. We were standing at the bar in the parlour room, overseeing the night’s activities at the clubhouse.

My eye fell on a member who was watching a scene in the corner of the room. He was holding an empty glass. “Go ask him if he wants a drink,” I said quietly to one of the initiates who was standing nearby.

“I mean, she does a good job,” Mark persisted. “Jordan. But I remember when you came home from that party, all, I met someone interesting tonight, and, I would never get involved with my partners’ daughter… ” He did a goofy impression of me and I raised an eyebrow at him.

He laughed.

I was only half listening to him. At the far end of the room, an initiate was giving a member a rough blowjob while a crowd gathered, and I wanted to make sure no boundaries got crossed.

“And then you hired her.”

“Hm?” I turned to Mark. “Yes. So what?”

“So are you going to ask her out?”

I rolled my eyes. “I hired her because we need an accountant. You know that I would never get involved with someone from work.”

“No, I don’t know that,” he persisted. “And I’ve seen the way you look at her.”

“The way I look at her? I look at her like a CEO looks at an accountant, that’s all.”

“Ha.”

“Why do you care?” Suddenly it dawned on me. “Oh, I get it. You like her.”

“I mean…” he smiled. “It would be crazy for me to deny how hot she is.”

“That she is,” I agreed. Jordan was probably one of the most beautiful women I’d ever seen in my life. I loved the contrast between her beautiful pale skin and dark hair, and the sharp expressiveness of her unusual eyes.

“So you’re not interested in her?” he tried to confirm.

“No,” I shook my head firmly. There were so many reasons I couldn’t be involved with Jordan. The fact that she worked for me, and that her parents were my business partners, that was just the tip of the iceberg. I needed to take over Chateau Andilet. Like it or not, my future with the Andilets was to betray them. Besides, there wasn’t room for a woman in my life. Traditional, vanilla relationships didn’t exactly work for me.

“Maybe I’ll make my move, then,” Mark said thoughtfully.

“You’re going to ask out Jordan?” I was unable to hide my disbelief. Mark dated more women than I did, he tended to walk the line between two worlds a little easier, but still I didn’t think it was quite appropriate for him to date Jordan. He had just as much skin in the game as I did.

And maybe, if I was being honest, I felt a bit jealous. Why should he have what I was denying myself?

He laughed softly. “Fuck, man. You’re no good at this. If you like her, why don’t you just go for it?”

I opened my mouth to respond, but he cut me off before I could say exactly what he knew I was going to say.

“Fuck your principles, man. They don’t make sense. You want to cut the Andilets out of the winery anyway, you don’t need to make nice with them. And what’s the worst thing that’s going to happen if you fuck our accountant?”

What is the worst thing? I thought to myself, turning back to watch the scene across the room. If anything, it might give me leverage over her parents if she was on my side. She could maybe help me buy their shares. But I would never use her to get what I wanted… would I? How ruthless was I willing to be?

I had a sudden image of Jordan at the Andilet party, casually dropping the rigged hundred dollar bill and then turning to look at me with that blazing, thousand-watt smile. So unreserved, so open, so trusting… I could never be ruthless at her expense.

Mark was in full philosophy mode. He lifted his beer and took a sip, as the initiate across the room began choking loudly. “You think there’s no one for you,” he said. “But you can’t just decide something like that. You think you’re strange, but look at every person in this room.”

I snorted, cynically. “But I’m the Master here. I’m set apart, even here.”

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