Page 43 of Justice for Francesca

“Unfortunately, once I got home, there was another form of betrayal by someone I thought loved me and had our best interests at heart. My girlfriend started pushing. She wanted marriage. I was nowhere near ready for that, and I began to doubt her. Felt like I didn’t know her anymore… felt like shewas backing me into a corner. Needless to say, we didn’t last long after I got home because if I wasn’t ready to commit, she was moving on to someone who would. She was young. She had romanticized military life. I knew the truth and couldn’t perpetuate her fantasy.”

Numb. Hazy, but not because of smoke or ringing ears or eyes that wouldn’t focus due to light. Just blissfully numb. Could he do another? If he did, would he wake up? It wouldn’t hurt anymore if he didn’t. Was he brave enough to follow through? If one more wouldn’t do it, he could do two. Or three more. If that didn’t do it, there was always the metal box in the closet.

“Cosmos was working in LA. We had kept in touch as best we could, and when the shit hit the fan with my girlfriend, he invited me to stay with him for a while to try and get myself together. Find my control. He introduced me to The Library. I’d never been into BDSM, but the concept gave me a means to recalibrate. It gave me the feeling of security that my unit and the military did. Contracts instead of missions. Mapped-out expectations instead of rules and regulations. It fit like a second skin.”

“But it’s not you, really.”

“No, it’s not me. It’s like wearing a costume, but at the time, it was what I needed. I certainly have Dominant tendencies, but they were of a completely different nature, and the clubs are definitely not my scene, although they do make me a lot of money. Triumph is much the same way. He’s not involved in the scene, although he fakes it well. I don’t know all the details, but Cosmos got him the job several years before I retired. That man though? He’s a different story. It’s part of his lifestyle. Nevertheless, we were all functioning well. The club was a social outlet; it catered to our various needs for control in our lives, and then?—”

“And then Tabitha.”

Tripoli hung his head, defeated at his third failure. “Even with the control I’d regained, I had missed it again.”

“What happened to her? All I could see in the records was that she was never caught. In fact, neither she nor Gendry made it into custody.”

He shrugged. “They both disappeared. Lobo and his teammates took them away, I think, before the police got there. When I tried to ask Lobo about it, he claimed he knew nothing. I didn’t ask anymore questions. Had a feeling I didn’t really want to know the answers. Then suddenly I had a lawyer come to me with paperwork saying the club had been transferred completely into my name. No explanation of how, and this time I knew better than to ask any questions at all. Cosmos, Triumph, and I decided we would split the ownership three ways and try to salvage the place.”

“From what I understand, you salvaged it pretty well.”

He smiled. “Yeah, but it took a lot of work. There’s still some fallout, but it’s better than it was.”

“You feel responsible for her, don’t you?” Francesca asked hesitantly.

“Yes, but not the way you think. It’s more that I don’t even know how to deal with what she did. I keep asking myself how I missed it. She totally had me fooled.” He still felt pangs of guilt over it. If he hadn’t missed the signs, maybe none of those women would have suffered.

“Were you two still involved when she was caught?”

“No. We were done almost as soon as we began, which was long before you arrived. Cosmos paired us up as part of my ‘training,’ so we were on a short-term contract. Her nature was such that she always tried to top from the bottom, so other than teaching me how to deal with submissives who did that, it didn’t work out. After the first few months, we did some demostogether for theme nights, but Tabitha was a switch in the BDSM community, and with me as a Dom, that relegated her to the submissive role. The larger issue was that she only wanted to be a submissive for Lobo, which is part of the whole problem she created there.”

“You’re not responsible for Tabitha, you know.”

“I do. Tabitha is responsible for the choices she made, but every day, I still feel guilty over my lack of awareness of what was going on right under my nose. Granted, I was a silent partner—money investment only, no vote—but the shit that went down at The Library? Obviously, it never should have happened.

“Between my superior, my ex-girlfriend, and Tabitha, I struggle with judgment calls now. It’s part of why my managers have so much more say on the employees than I do. It’s why I forced Cosmos and Triumph to take larger shares in the clubs because I want their input as affirmation I’m making the right choices. And it’s why anyone who has a share in one of my clubs has a voice now. Everyone needs to know what’s going on, whether they own twenty-four percent or are a group member of the ten percent.”

“So anyone who’s on staff knows everything there is to know about the club?”

“Yes. From the number of cocktail napkins ordered to the redesigning plans of curtains to the profits every month. If there’s total transparency, no one can say they didn’t know or weren’t told. I also get the reassurance that the decisions I make are good ones because my staff keeps me in check. If they don’t read the monthly reports, that’s different, and that’s on them. Knowing they have a say in everything makes for more invested employees too.”

“It doesn’t create problems, like with salary discussions?”

Tripoli shook his head. “Nope. We have a very clear step structure on salaries, and we pay really well to start with. Plus,when we hire, we’re very clear about the expectations. No one is hired who we don’t feel really strongly about, which is why turnover is so low. Nobodywantsto leave, so they don’t break the rules.”

Francesca shifted gears. “How is Tilly doing? Really doing?”

He sighed and pulled her closer in his lap. “I’d like to say better, but it’s only on the surface. She felt like she was being smothered at home, and who could blame her parents if that were true? I offered her the chance to start over somewhere else, yet still have a support system, and I keep in touch with her parents. Nothing confidential. Just check-ins to say she’s well, etcetera. She stayed with me for about a month, but then she moved in with Triumph. They’re not involved romantically. It’s more big brother, little sister.”

“Why did she move out of here?”

“Tilly being Tilly, she didn’t tell me that Mila was constantly on her about something going on between us, despite us both telling her she was wrong. Tilly ‘resolved’ the issue by moving out. In the long run, it didn’t help. Every time something came up regarding Tilly, Mila always believed the worst or the opposite of what she was told. I would have broken things off with Mila, London property or not, had I known what she was saying to Tilly or how she was making her feel, but she never said anything. Claimed I didn’t need the headache, and she didn’t want to get in the way of the property deal. One and only time I’ve everwantedto spank a woman for bad behavior.”

Francesca shook her head. “Ever the protector.” She smiled at him. “I figured it out.”

“Figured what out?”

“Your Dominant type. I looked it up.”

He rolled onto his side, laying her on her back and squeezing between her and the back of the couch as he leaned on his elbow. “You think so?”

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