Caden's Dilemma (Indiscreet #6) (7 page)

CHAPTER SIX

“I do like Masato,” Caden said as they served his eggs.

“
Pride goeth before a fall.
Remember how much you like him when the time comes.” Reed put ketchup on his home fries.

“What are you talking about?” Caden was getting rapidly annoyed.

“I can’t tell you. But I can say this, most people wouldn’t consider this a bad thing. But you’re pigheaded, so you might.”

“He soothed me. Everything pressing going on in my head just went away when he looked at me. He came easy to my hand on Friday night. Maybe I was meant to be the one to break through the ice,” Caden said with satisfaction.

“Oh, you’ll break through the ice all right. The question is what are you going to do with him when you get him? Someone is going to get hurt. My advice is to wait three months until you see the file.” Reed picked up a piece of very crisp bacon and put it in his mouth.

“These two have been circling around each other since August. I’ll bet a hundred bucks he has him in three weeks.” Bear took out his wallet and threw a hundred on the table.

“It took me six months but I had impediments. Once I got him home it only took five days. Put me in for a week.” Gary threw five twenties on the table.

“I don’t know what the impediment is but it took me six months, I’ll bet he waits the whole three.” Bull took out two fifties.

Cisco lifted his head from his plate and said, “Greg fixes me better eggs at home. You have to have him show your chef. I’m in for a hundred. It took me a couple of weeks, but Caden’s been warned. I give it six weeks.” Cisco threw down a fifty, two twenties and a ten.

Reed was about to take out his wallet when Bear stopped him. “You can’t bet. You know the impediment. You get to hold the money for the rest of us.”

“Well I’ve made an arrangement to do a scene with him tonight, so we’ll see who’s right. If I don’t like what I see, I win and you all lose.” Caden looked smug. “But Gary has the inside track, I really like him. Bear, how goes it with the Pest?” Caden asked.

“He’s taken to eating my shoes instead of shitting in them.” The whole table burst out in laughter.

“Why don’t you find a farm to take him? You could tell Brian he’d be better off on a farm with room to run.” Gary hid his smile behind his hand.

“Your dog is a Shetland sheepdog and you don’t live on a freaking farm.
We live on a farm
, you ass. That’s why Brian wanted a big dog. I might as well have let him get a Mastiff or a St. Bernard. Even though they’re big, they’re smart. The Golden Retriever was a compromise. I never heard that the breed is dumb, but Pest doesn’t make the case for breed intelligence. Pest is the dumbest dog I’ve ever met bar none. But if Brian heard me say that I’d be staying in Reed’s old quarters here for a week, and that’s if I got lucky and he decided to forgive me. The pout would be monumental in scope.” Bear shook his head and munched on an English muffin.

“I told you that you should have bought a cat,” Bull said with a modicum of pride. “Mischief and Tom are getting along just fine and make no messes. They don’t even scratch the furniture. Jamie takes care of that by rubbing catnip on the scratching post.” Bull’s chest puffed up as if he was responsible for the cats’ good behavior.

“Both Leo and Widget are extremely well behaved. Brian got Leo for Danny. Of course I was smart enough to pick Widget out myself.” Gary poured himself another cup of coffee. Bear shot him a dirty look.

“The answer is quite simple,” Cisco said. “Train him yourself. That way the job gets done right, you won’t go easy on the dog and I know Golden Retrievers are not dumb dogs. He’s smart enough, if he’s getting away with murder, it’s your fault. You didn’t let him know you’re the Alpha.” Cisco buttered his rye toast.

“What do you know? You don’t have any pets.” Bear harrumphed.

“Yeah, spoken from high on the mount,” Reed cracked up laughing.

“Well, I’m considering getting Greg a lap dog. He loves animals and we can’t have a cat.”

Bear looked straight at Reed. “Stop chortling. You should talk, you’ve got Washington, the ghost cat. I don’t know if anyone else here has seen Reed’s cat, but he teleports from room to room. You never see him move. And then of course, there’s Laverne and Shirley, the yappy Maltipoos.” Bear chuckled. “The name alone can make me laugh out loud.”

“Enough with the pets,” Cisco finished his eggs. “I’ve got a hospital to run. You may be semi-retired, Bear, but the rest of us have to earn our living.”

“What are we going to do about the subs plotting to put Caden together with Masato?” Gary asked the table in general as he drank the last of his coffee.

“Caden is so confident that he can beat the subs at their own game, I say we let him handle it.” Bear laughed. “We’ll see how far he gets.” The others agreed.

“Looks like you’re on your own, Caden. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.” Bear stood up. “I’m calling the dog trainer as soon as I get home. I’m taking Cisco’s advice and I’m going to handle the Pest myself.”

“I wonder if they know that we meet the same time as they do every week?” Gary asked putting on his coat.

“Well, I’m sure as hell not going to be the one who tells them.” Reed stood up, adjusted his suit and said, “Come on Caden, let’s get you started. Bull, get off your ass and help me get Caden settled.”

Gary turned to leave and said, “Call me tonight. Danny’s going to want to know how you made out today.” Reed, Bull and Caden headed toward the elevator while Gary, Bear and Cisco went out to brave the cold.

§ § §

“We’ll meet in my office,” Reed stepped out of the elevator onto the second floor. Bull and Caden followed. “I don’t know if Masato told you last night, but we are moving all the offices to this wing and putting all the playrooms in the barns and the new additions. We’re also adding a gym with a juice bar. The idea being that the Doms stay longer and spend more money with additional things to do here. As you know, we have a Doms’ dining room where they can take their subs to eat.” Caden nodded his head.

“Bear’s even talking about an eighteen-hole golf course. We are becoming a country club for gay deviants.” Bull interjected.

“That’s a few years in the future. First, I intend to set up a subs’ café where the unattached subs, even those who work for the club, can come in and take a break. We are starting an ad campaign in the BDSM newsletters and gay magazines to acquire more paid subs. I want a place for them to be able to relax and talk amongst themselves away from the Doms.” Reed rolled out a sheet of building plans that sat on his desk.

“Jim and I have discussed this. All of the subs, those who have Masters and those who don’t should be able to have a place to congregate with their own, with their Dom’s permission. The Masters have the Master’s Bar and the Cigar Room. The subs need their own space. A point brought home by the informal Monday gabfests at my house.” Reed laughed. “I’m not allowed to be anywhere near the house when those meetings take place. I’d prefer Jim move them to the club.”

“Why?” Bull asked. “So that you can say you know nothing of what they’re up to next? Bear’s always on Junior’s back about what new craziness they come up with, and Bear tries to hold him accountable. Junior tells him, ‘I’m out in the car, what do I know?’”

Reed gave Bull a long look, “Well, yes, back to business…”

“The price structure here is not complicated. The Doms pay a twenty-five thousand dollar one-time membership fee to belong to the club. If they own a sub, this fee includes the sub. It also includes the sub if they acquire one after they become a member. Doms also pay two thousand dollars a month dues to belong. We give a fifty percent discount on the membership fee to Doms who serve in the military, fire or police departments. Dues are also discounted by fifty percent.”

“I know what a deal returning vets get on the membership fees, fifty percent. But what kind of payment plan does ex-military get?” Caden asked. “I’m thinking of several buddies who might want to join.”

“Dues are discounted fifty percent until they find their first civilian job. Then after the first two years they go up to fifteen hundred dollars a month until year five. After year five ex-military should have found their feet in the civilian world, dues are then the normal two thousand.”

“Cops and fireman get the same deal only their dues are discounted twenty five percent until they leave the force or the department.”

“What about the subs?” Masato was a member and Caden was very curious.

“The subs that join as members pay a ten thousand dollar membership fee and five hundred dollars a month in dues. Since the subs are what bring in the Doms, their fees are much lower.” Red tented his hands.

“Hired subs are paid a thousand dollars a week, with incremental raises every six months. We haven’t hired a sub that stayed single long enough to take advantage of the pay raise. We have a reputation for quality subs.”

Caden was thoughtful for a moment. “What do you include in the dues?”

“We include two meals a month in the dues but they pay for all booze. At the bar, members can only run a tab for the evening but we do not hold tabs for more than twenty-four hours. If you are responsible enough to be a Dom, then you have to be responsible enough to pay your tab as you run it up. Members are cut off from the club if they don’t pay their dues after sixty days.”

“They also can’t play after having a drink. This is where a juice bar could become a profit center.”

“Are these areas going to be my responsibility?” Caden asked Reed.

“As the Director of Security it is your responsibility to deal with recalcitrant Doms who don’t pay their bills or drink before a scene. The bouncers get a list of who is not current on their dues and they are turned away at the door unless they speak to me about alternate arrangements. The bouncers also control access to the upstairs rooms. If one of them sees a member drinking or one of the bartenders reports a member, they notify the desk. Unless five hours have passed since the drink and they’ve eaten, they don’t get upstairs.”

Reed got up and went to the bar. “Would you like some more coffee?”

Both Bull and Caden said, “Yes, thanks.”. Reed called down to the kitchen to bring up a carafe of Kona and some cups.

Caden picked up his glass. “I guess I better order lunch.” Reed chuckled.

“What about the background checks?” Caden asked, knowing this was a large part of the job.

“I’ve arranged to have the heads of all three security agencies come in to meet with you and me this week. I intend to turn over security checks for any new members and all of the new employees and the new subs, hired or with a membership, to you within the next month. You’ll get a feel of when it’s necessary to call in Rice, the detective agency. I usually find myself doing that when something seems off in the three security reports, their background is murky or the reports don’t agree.”

“What are my other duties?” Caden sipped on his scotch.

“The hired subs have to take on one client per evening unless they are certified as hurt by Jim, Greg or Cisco, our resident medics. They still have to come to work but they entertain the Doms with conversation. If any Dom gets out of hand, in other words, consistently causes more than one sub to safe word, it is your job to look into it and if necessary, ban the Dom from the club. You are basically law enforcement at Indiscreet. You’re going to have to be a hard-ass like Bull. After you, the only recourse a member has is directly through me and a thorough retraining with Bull, where they will find themselves at the business end of his whip to show them what kind of damage they can do if unchecked,” Reed said, idly rolling his glass in his hand.

“But I don’t want to see them if they can’t be rehabilitated.” Bull put his drink down on Reed’s desk.

“It sounds like you take the welfare of the subs seriously.”

“We have to,” Reed said. “If we have no subs, we have no club.”

“I’m going to be keeping a closer watch on the Dungeons and the bouncers who work in that area,” Bull said. “If there are any discipline problems, I’ll bring them to you, but it’s your job to deal with them. All of the bouncers report to you but are directed to respond to orders from Bear, Reed, Jim and myself. If they don’t we’ll lay that at your door for the man to be disciplined or fired.” He took a sip of his drink and looked at Caden.

“You’ll have the most problems with bouncers responding to Jim’s orders because he is a sub. But it’s your job to reinforce the notion that Jim is also a part owner of the club and responsible for all the back of the house personnel including the kitchen and wait staff, plus the hired subs. Anyone who works for us that crosses or disrespects Jim gets suspended without pay. He is that important to the operation.” Reed stated firmly. “And I’m not saying that because he’s my sub.”

“Jim completely runs the back of the house. He helps the chef and the kitchen help, he plays Mother Hen to all the service subs and some of the paid subs, he plans all of the events, in other words he’s irreplaceable.” Bull took another sip of his coffee.

“All in all we have a staff of fifty including the wait staff, the kitchens, bouncers and subs. We run two shifts and the number of members and staff is growing quickly and will grow further as our reputation spreads. We already have people coming down from Manhattan and up from Philadelphia. Because of the top-of-the-line service we provide, the club has a lot of overhead, which is why the dues are so high and likely to go higher. But in order to remain the preeminent club in the area, this is how we need to run things.” Reed finished his drink.

“One more thing, all employees and members sign a confidentiality agreement that forbids them to discuss Indiscreet with anyone but other members.” Reed handed Caden a sheaf of papers.

Reed indicated that Caden should look the agreements through. “It includes outing other members or revealing their aliases. The only person who has that information now is me, and in three months I’m going to turn that information over to you. It is on our state-of-the-art networked system. The network and the files are password-protected and encrypted to prevent hacking. The passwords change every day and you will find yours on your desk every morning.”