Domination Inc. (17 page)

She caught him staring at her, and he smiled. ‘I'm sorry, you look so familiar I was trying to place you. The cover of January's Vogue, right?'

It was bullshit, and both of them knew it, but he suspected she'd be unable to respond to such a blatant compliment. ‘Not me,' she replied, in a voice which had just enough of a drawl to suggest that though she was originally English, she had spent several years in the States. ‘I'm not a model. I work in information technology.'

Roger might have been tempted to add, ‘Clever as well as beautiful,' but that would have been pushing his luck. There was a secret to seducing a woman – and after only a couple of moments in her company, he was certain he wanted to seduce her – and too many corny chat-up lines were not part of that secret. Instead, he said, ‘Do you know much about setting up a database?'

‘That's easy,' the girl replied. ‘You learn that in Software 101. Why do you ask?'

‘Well, I'm going back into business, and I'm going to need to keep records of my clients' details. If I was in luck, you'd be travelling back to England permanently, rather than just going for a couple of weeks' holiday, and you'd be looking for some piece work to tide you over until you found something steady. At which point, I'd offer you this…'

He'd put the business cards together in the departure lounge of Los Angeles Airport. The address was temporary, the home of a friend who owed him a favour, and the account for the mobile phone had been surprisingly easy to set up. The girl took it and gave it a cursory glance, but did not immediately hand it back.

‘Roger,' she mused. ‘Well, hello Roger, I'm Nina.' They shook hands briefly before she continued, ‘So – this business of yours. What would it involve? If I were to need some piece work, as you put it?'

Hooked, Roger thought triumphantly. ‘You might say you'd be working in the service industry,' he replied cautiously. He itched to tell the girl the whole story – how he had left Laurel with the ruins of a failing escort agency, expecting her to sink under the debts she had unwittingly inherited. How, instead, the buzz was that Laurel had turned the agency round beyond all expectations, taking it in a direction which, if he was honest, he had never considered, and how he was now about to reclaim his half-share of the flourishing business – but he was not sure of her attitude towards what might be considered a sleazy profession.

‘That could mean anything,' Nina replied. ‘I've had guys who work in burger restaurants telling me they're in the service industry.'

‘In which case, I'll be frank with you,' Roger said. ‘How do you feel about escort work?'

Nina glared at him suspiciously. ‘Is this some kind of a come-on?'

He shook his head. ‘Not at all. Before I left London I was running an escort agency.'

‘That is so weird,' Nina said. ‘Would you believe my sister does exactly the same thing?'

‘Your sister?' Roger was intrigued. ‘Is this in California?'

‘No, London. And though I say sister, she's really my stepsister. Her mom married my dad when I was about thirteen. We're not exactly close.'

Roger's brain was racing ahead of the conversation. ‘And what's your sister's name, if you don't mind my asking?'

‘Not at all. It's Laurel. Laurel Angell. She has an agency called Moonshine, or some dumb name like that. You might have come across her, seeing as how you're both in the same line of work.'

It was an answer Roger had half-expected, but it still stunned him. The chances of meeting a relative of his erstwhile business partner on a Transatlantic airline were almost infinitesimal. That the girl should have no idea of the relationship between himself and Laurel was even more unlikely. For a moment he felt as though he had stepped into the in-flight movie. Then he recovered his composure.

‘You're going to think I'm making this up, but I know Laurel very well. In fact, we used to run the agency together. I can't believe she's never mentioned me.'

‘Like I said, we don't really get on.' Nina's voice took on a bitter edge. ‘If you want the truth, I hate the tight-assed bitch. I left England as soon as I could, when I was sixteen, went to spend some time with my real mom. That was five years ago. I haven't been in contact with Laurel from that day to this. Oh, I get Christmas and birthday cards from dad every year, and there's a couple of lines about what my beloved stepsister is up to, but I don't take any notice. I doubt your name ever came up in conversation, and if it did, I wouldn't have remembered it.'

‘So you're not going over to London on a family visit, then?' Roger said.

‘No way. I'm homesick, but not for Laurel. I've got no intention of looking her up while I'm over there. I don't see the point.'

‘That's a pity,' Roger replied. ‘You see, things had become somewhat strained between Laurel and myself, too. I thought it was easier if I spent some time away, let Laurel get on with things by herself for a while. I knew it would either make her or break her.'

‘Hopefully the latter,' Nina interjected.

‘Just the reverse. Laurel took the decision – entirely unilaterally, I might add – to concentrate on providing a service for female clients with submissive needs.' Roger parroted the information he had seen on Domination Inc. in a recent issue of a Los Angeles-based fetish magazine. ‘She's making a remarkable success of it.' He took a deep breath, aware that he had to phrase the tale of events in a way which showed him in a favourable light. ‘I'm going back to London to take a more hands-on approach to the agency.'

‘Meaning?' Nina asked.

‘Successful as she's been, I don't think Laurel's the right person to take the business on to the next stage. I think we should be expanding the brand globally. There are a lot of wealthy businesswomen in cities like New York, Amsterdam and Paris who would welcome the opportunity to buy the services of a discreet escort who'll pander to their secret sexual needs.' This had been the thrust of the article Roger had read, but he was happy to let Nina think it was his own opinion. ‘I intend to relieve Laurel of her day-to-day duties, and work towards that global expansion.'

‘In other words, you're going to give her the push,' Nina said gleefully.

‘Not quite how I would have phrased it,' Roger said, ‘and it's not going to be easy, given that she owns half the business. And I doubt she'll be too pleased to see me return to the office. Like I said, our relationship wasn't on the best footing when I left. But this is where you might come in.'

‘Me?' Nina said. ‘How?'

‘Well, you'd like to get one over on your stepsister, wouldn't you?' Roger did not wait for the obvious answer. ‘Have you changed at all while you've been away from London. In terms of your appearance, I mean?'

‘Sure. I used to have mousy hair in a corkscrew perm, braces on my teeth and weigh thirty pounds more than I do now. Is that enough of a change for you?'

‘Better than I could have hoped. You see, Nina, I want you to go down and try to get a job at the agency. Be my spy in the camp, if you like. Use a false name. Wear dark glasses to hide those lovely eyes of yours.'

‘Two questions. What do I do if Laurel recognises me, and secondly, what the hell happens if I get the job? I wouldn't know how to go about servicing female clients with submissive needs, or however you put it.'

‘I could teach you everything you need to know about domination and submission. I have the feeling you'd make a more than willing pupil.'

‘Now this
is
a come-on,' Nina retorted, but Roger noticed she was not as bristly and defensive as she had been.

‘Trust me. Once we touch down in England, I'll give you a small demonstration of what I believe your true sexuality to be. If I'm wrong, you can walk away, and I'll find someone else to help me. But if I'm right, then you have the chance to watch your stepsister lose her livelihood. And if she does recognise you, if you're half the woman I think you are, she'll be too glad to have found a top-quality escort to turn you down. Do we have a deal?'

Nina hesitated for the merest fraction of a second, then said, ‘Yes, we do.'

They chinked their plastic glasses. ‘To the downfall of Laurel Angell,' Roger said.

‘Now that's something I'd drink to on any occasion,' Nina replied, downing the dregs of her wine.

 

Clearing Customs at Heathrow was a formality. Unbeknown to Nina, Roger had called in another favour, and when they left the arrivals hall they did not, as she had expected, make their way to the tube station or the taxi rank. Instead, he led her out to the airport forecourt, where a limousine with tinted windows was waiting for them. The chauffeur who took Nina's suitcase was impeccably dressed, in grey livery with a peaked cap. Despite herself, she was impressed.

Until Roger Preston had claimed his connection through to Laurel, Nina had thought he was nothing more than a creep on the make. Charming and not exactly unattractive, admittedly, but a creep nonetheless. When she had shed her braces and puppy fat, she had gained a legion of unwanted admirers, usually twice her age, who thought that simply because she was beautiful, articulate and educated, she was simply dying to let them paw her with their slimy hands, or fall into their bed. Not her. She had standards to which most of these elderly sleazeballs could not even begin to aspire. She would have tolerated Roger's attention until he had made a pass, or tried to grope her beneath her regulation airline blanket as she dozed, and then she would have kneed him in the nuts and called a stewardess. It was a crude tactic, she knew, but remarkably effective.

And then he had offered her the chance to humiliate her own stepsister. It was a chance she could not pass up. Ever since they had been forced together by her father's remarriage, the two girls had barely been able to tolerate each other. Nina had resented the fact that she had to be nice to the snivelling Laurel, whose father had been so tragically killed in a car crash. Laurel, on the other hand, seemed jealous of the fact that Nina, though four years younger and overweight, exuded a raw sensuality which she herself did not appear to possess. Nina knew that when she had lost her cherry on the night of her sixteenth birthday with an older biker boyfriend of whom her step-mother did most definitely not approve, her last act of defiance before she left for California, Laurel's virginity was still in place. For all she knew, that remained the case. Laurel had had what Nina believed to be an entirely deserved reputation as an ice maiden, and there was no reason for that to have changed. Throwing yourself into a demanding business was the typical act of a frigid bitch.

Nina, on the other hand, knew how to combine business with pleasure, which was partly what intrigued her so much about Roger's unorthodox proposal. She loved sex, and the thought of being paid for it was one of her favourite fantasies. She still wasn't sure about the domination side of the agency – as far as she was concerned, that sort of thing was for the kooks out in the Hollywood Hills – but Roger seemed to think she had the necessary qualities.

She settled herself back on the limousine's plush grey leather seat, and prepared to enjoy the ride into London. What she had not expected was for Roger to whisper in her ear, just low enough that the chauffeur could not hear, ‘Not like that.'

‘I'm sorry?' she replied.

‘I promised you a lesson in submission,' Roger said, ‘and it starts here and now. You're not correctly dressed for riding in this car.'

Nina looked down at herself. She was wearing a sweater dress in soft sage-green angora wool, opaque tights and black knee-length suede boots, and saw no problem with the outfit.

‘I want you naked below the waist,' Roger told her. ‘So take off your boots, your tights and your knickers.'

In other circumstances, Nina would have answered such a request with a punch to Roger's solar plexus and fled the car. However, there was something in the tone of his voice, combined with the fact that such requests might be a common occurrence if she were to be taken on at Laurel's agency, which compelled her to reach for the side zip on her boot and slide it down. The chauffeur was staring straight ahead as she began to undress, concentrating on steering a way through the early morning traffic heading for the motorway, but Nina wondered how much he might be able to see of what was happening in his rear-view mirror. As discreetly as she could, she shuffled out of her tights and lacy scarlet briefs, and placed them on the seat between herself and Roger.

‘Now put your hands behind you, wrists crossed,' Roger commanded.

Nina did as she was told. Roger reached for her discarded tights and swiftly used them to tie Nina's wrists together. This was a new sensation for her, and she wriggled her hands experimentally, seeking to discover whether Roger had allowed her the opportunity to slip her wrists free. The knot seemed secure; if anything, it tightened slightly as she moved, which encouraged her to keep her hands still. She fought a flutter of panic, telling herself that Roger meant her no harm, despite the fact that the last road sign she had seen had seemed to indicate that they were heading away from London, rather than towards it.