Page 60 of Submitting to Them

“Sure,” I say, climbing out of the pool and grabbing a towel from where I set it on a chair.

I don’t miss the way Ella’s eyes track my movements.

“Like what you see, little girl?”I ask.

She nods, then steps forward and reaches for the towel.“Can I?”

I hand it to her, bemused.“Go for it.”

She rubs the cloth over me, her touch light but efficient.Before she can finish, I trap her arms at her sides and embrace her.

“Daddy, you’re all wet,” she complains.

“You will be, too,” I say, squeezing her ass.

“Hey,” Bash says.“Ella wanted to tell us something.”

“Right,” she says, wriggling out of my grasp and looking proud of herself for managing to escape.

Amused, I grin.There’s not a chance in hell she could actually escape on her own, without my cooperation.

“Let’s go inside,” she says, “so Kingston can put on a shirt.”

I’m tempted to tease her some more, but there’s a new, serious expression on her face, so I follow her and Sebastian into the living room.

“Be right back,” I say, hurrying to the bedroom, where I find a pair of sweats and a t-shirt to put on.

Ella groans at the sight of my sweatpants.“I don’t think that’s better than going shirtless.”

Okay, so I’m not wearing boxers, but sweats aren’tthatrevealing.

“Just tell us what you want to talk about,” I say, sitting down with them in the living room.

“It’s more what I overheard,” she says, pulling her phone from her bag and tapping the screen.“Listen.”

I recognize Rayanne’s voice immediately.

He must be feeling the pressure by now.Your position isn’t being covered.There was the cyber attack.There’s simply too much work for one man to do.

The second voice is Joel’s, although I can’t make out the exact words he says.

Rayanne responds,Then again, he is the most stubborn son of a bitch I ever met.Your grandmother even said so.

Well, I don’t know how long we can keep doing this for.

However long we need to.

I’m here with your drinks, another voice says, and the recording ends.

I sit back, stunned.“So they’re behind all of this.”

“They never explicitly say so,” Sebastian says, scowling at Ella’s phone, “but reading between the lines…they talk about everything that’s happened, and then Joel says he doesn’t know how long they can keep doing this for.So it sure sounds to me like they’re behind everything.”

“What happened before the recording starts?”I ask Ella.

“It started off with Joel saying something about the staff getting suspicious.She said to fire them.He said ‘he won’t hire me back.’”

I wonder what their staff is getting suspicious about.Is she talking about the staff at Perdure Pharma, her husband’s company?What could Perdure have to do with Tyler Analytics?Nothing that I can think of.