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“Fine now, both hands on the wheel.”

I get the image of Jake in my mind, stroking himself while he imagines me in the passenger seat, rubbing my clit for him. The image comes unbidden, out of nowhere, and with it comes a pile of misgivings. Do I really want to get sucked in by Jake Ferry? Everything he does comes with strings attached — Reginald Ferry’s strings, whether Jake means it or not.

No… it’s better if I don’t. So, I won’t. I turn my ringer off, and put

my phone on the table facedown.

I won’t.

Chapter 42

Jake

Reginald’s invitation to what he calls the “Big Boys Club” — his shareholder meeting — is the first I’ve received, but it’s not precisely an honor. “You need to meet these men,” he tells me, “if you plan on taking over my company when I retire.”

The implied consequence, of course, is that failure to attend is tantamount to turning down that offer. And I almost do. But then again, being there means I know what they discuss, and for all I know my absence means they’ll be discussing how to establish someone else as Reginald’s heir — or worse, how to blacklist me entirely in every venue they can.

Instead, they discuss plans for Janie Hall’s location. The meeting is at a massive cabin upstate, about an hour’s drive into the foothills at the edge of a sparkling lake. One of Reginald’s vacation properties. Seated around the large meeting room at the back of the luxury cabin, his fifteen principle shareholders pass around Cuban cigars, hundred-year-old whiskey, and discuss the men’s lodge they plan to put where Red Hall currently stands — as if it’s a foregone conclusion that Janie will be out of business any day now.

“It is, Jack,” Reginald tells the one man who bothers to ask that very question. He claps me on the shoulder. “My boy is on it. Janie Hall’s pussy is so wet for him, he’ll have her right where we want her in no time.”

“Not right where we want her,” Paul, a man old enough to be my grandfather, says lasciviously. He laughs as he makes the universal sign for blowjob, and the rest of the shareholders join in.

Reginald laughs along with them, and winks at me. “I’m sure Jake wouldn’t mind passing her around — would you, son?”

I don’t answer, but I don’t need to. My father claps me on the shoulder. “Jake is finally ready to run with the big dogs.”

“Congratulations,” pour in from the group, along with “about time,” and “welcome to the big leagues.”

I try to smile, and probably do a convincing job of it. To sell it, I have to shut down inside. Reginald may be smiling, but I can tell it’s just as fake as mine. Except he isn’t shut down, and in his eyes is the warning that’s been there for days now, nonstop. Don’t even think about failing or fucking me, they say.

After a little more banter, Reginald calls the meeting more or less to order. “Carl, you said you got blueprints in. Lay them out, let’s see what your guys came up with.”

Carl grins, and goes to retrieve a long white tube, from which he produces a roll of stacked papers. In the middle of the room, on the wide table we’re all seated around, he rolls them out and uses paperweights to pin them down.

I can tell just by looking that the plans aren’t meant for renovations. This is for a new building. They want to tear down the existing structure and build something new on it.

“Casino’s on the ground floor,” Carl explains, “with a lounge on the second floor. General admission in the front, VIP in the back, of course.”

“The stage?” Paul asks, pointing at a section of the plans for the second floor.

“Optional,” Carl says, smiling, “but do we really want a twenty-four-hour sausage party in there?”

Reginald barks a laugh, and thumps me in the shoulder like I’m his buddy. “Good thinking. Everything’s better with tits in the background, right?”

They go over the details, and the talk goes over general plans and layouts. Of supreme interest seems to be some of the private sauna rooms and the prospect of hiring Swedish prostitutes to offer oral service in them. It’s Paul’s idea, after visiting a particular coffee shop with a similar model in Sweden. There’s also the more technical talk of materials, who has what connections with this or that contractor or sub-contractor, where to import the materials in, and how to undermine the necessary foreign markets ahead of time to get the best deal.

None of them seem concerned about the possibility that Janie Hall won’t fail — that no matter what I do, or what anyone else does, she’ll manage to keep her head above water long enough to outlast Ferry Lights. Once she gets a solid foothold, dislodging Red Hall will become far more difficult, and Reginald knows that.

And he knows that I know it, which is almost worse. Throughout the night, he’s giving me that warning look, as though my fate is still undecided. Which it is. Not just by him — I haven’t got Janie in my pocket just yet, and honestly I’m not sure I can put her there.

Oh, I’m certain I can get her into bed. I’ve got my foot in the door. But she’s still cautious, and she has her priorities straight. She isn’t going to topple just because she’s got a hot rush for a guy like me. Not even if I want her to.

Eventually the meeting is over, and I can’t get out of the place fast enough. Most of them will spend the night — there are strippers and hookers inbound soon, now that all the business is over with — but I drove myself up here specifically so I could leave.

Reginald doesn’t push me to stay, though. He pulls me aside once the shareholders disperse. “Give me an update,” he says. “How far along is Janie Hall?”

“I don’t know yet,” I tell him. “She’s a tough nut. Confident. Self-sufficient. We’ve been talking, though.”