Initiative [Suncoast Society] (Siren Publishing Sensations)
Tymber Dalton
Suncoast Society
Initiative
Two years later, Susie mourns the death of her beloved husband and Master, but that aspect of their lives was secret. She now self-medicates with work and thinks love—and passion—are things of the past. When attending her twenty-year high school reunion, her only bright point is reconnecting with beloved friends, Grant and Darryl.
As kids, Grant and Darryl didn’t understand their feelings for Susie…or for each other. It took Darryl going through a disastrous divorce before the men got together and Grant could claim Darryl not just as his partner, but as his slave. They have to keep all aspects of their relationship hidden because of their jobs, yet they immediately recognize the significance of Susie’s bracelet.
That Grant and Darryl now play a far sexier version of Dungeons and Dragons only seals the deal for Susie. When outside forces try to destroy the men’s careers, can Susie take the initiative and save their newfound happiness?
Genre: BDSM, Contemporary, Ménage a Trois/Quatre
Length: 63,832 words
INITIATIVE
Suncoast Society
Tymber Dalton
SIREN SENSATIONS
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
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A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK
IMPRINT: Siren Sensations
INITIATIVE
Copyright © 2015 by Tymber Dalton
E-book ISBN: 978-1-63259-780-9
First E-book Publication: September 2015
Cover design by Harris Channing
All art and logo copyright © 2015 by Siren Publishing, Inc.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.
All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.
PUBLISHER
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
Letter to Readers
Dear Readers,
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Regarding E-book Piracy
This book is copyrighted intellectual property. No other individual or group has resale rights, auction rights, membership rights, sharing rights, or any kind of rights to sell or to give away a copy of this book.
The author and the publisher work very hard to bring our paying readers high-quality reading entertainment.
This is Tymber Dalton’s livelihood. It’s fair and simple. Please respect Tymber Dalton’s right to earn a living from her work.
Amanda Hilton, Publisher
www.SirenPublishing.com
www.BookStrand.com
DEDICATION
For Sir.
Because.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
While all the books in the Suncoast Society series are standalone works which may be read independently of each other, the recommended reading order to avoid spoilers is as follows:
1. Safe Harbor
2. Cardinal’s Rule
3. Domme by Default
4. The Reluctant Dom
5. The Denim Dom
6. Pinch Me
7. Broken Toy
8. A Clean Sweep
9. A Roll of the Dice
10. His Canvas
11. A Lovely Shade of Ouch
12. Crafty Bastards
13. A Merry Little Kinkmas
14. Sapiosexual
15. A Very Kinky Valentine’s Day
16. Things Made Right
17. Click
18. Spank or Treat
19. A Turn of the Screwed
20. Chains
21. Kinko de Mayo
22. Broken Arrow
23. Out of the Spotlight
24. Friends Like These
25. Vicious Carousel
26. Hot Sauce
27. Open Doors
28. One Ring
29. Vulnerable
30. The Strength of the Pack
31. Initiative
Some of the characters in this book appear in previous books in the Suncoast Society series. All titles available from Siren-BookStrand.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Author's Note
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
About the Author
INITIATIVE
Suncoast Society
TYMBER DALTON
Copyright © 2015
Chapter One
Only nine thirty on a Monday morning, and already Susan Costello’s day had turned into complete and utter shit.
If they don’t haul me out of here in handcuffs or a straight-jacket by the end of the day, it’ll be a miracle.
Right now she was rubbing at her forehead, trying to stave off a tension headache as her service manager, Tom, ranted about some bullshit her brother-in-law had pulled on Saturday while she wasn’t at the dealership. It figured, the one freaking Saturday she’d taken off in a couple of months, and Jack had decided to strut his stuff in front of a friend of his.
It’s looking more and more like handcuffs.
“Now, I stayed on because I loved working for John,” Tom said. “And I love the heck out of you, Susan. But Jack-off needs to butt the hell out of my service department and leave my crew alone, or you’re going to be needing to hire a lot of damn techs. We’re sick of his bullshit.”
“Jack-off” was one of the nicer nicknames most of the employees at Costello Luxury Motors had for Jack Costello. Who, at twenty-nine, had apparently made be
ing an asshole his major mission in life, since he’d pretty much failed at everything else.
“I’m really sorry, Tom. I’ll have a talk with him.”
“You don’t need to apologize to me,” Tom said. “Everyone knows he’s an asshole and none of us blames you. We know you’re kind of stuck with him for now. But we’re done putting up with him, seriously.”
Once Tom had left, Kristin walked in with a cup of coffee and handed it to her. Her administrative assistant wore a knowing smirk. “I didn’t spike it with bourbon, if that’s your question.”
“Why not? I thought you loved me?”
“Because you want to be stone-cold sober when you go and confront Jackass.”
“True.” Susan sipped the coffee, her third cup of the morning.
At this rate, she was thinking about spiking it with some of her leftover Xanax.
“He’s not in yet, anyway,” Kristin offered.
“Figures.” Susan settled back in her desk chair and slowly shook her head. “I’m sick and tired of him.”
“Want me to see if I can find a hit man?”
“He’s not worth jail time.”
“Hence why I kept you sober this morning.”
“You’re too good to me.” Susan smiled up at the older woman, who’d been her husband’s assistant when he’d run the dealership. “Have I told you ‘thank you’ lately?”
“Every day, sweetie.” Kristin settled into a chair in front of Susan’s desk. “The lawyer get back to you?”
“Yeah. No, I can’t outright fire Jack without risking a lawsuit from him or his parents, if they want to fight it.” She smiled. “But I can reassign him. And if he refuses to do the job assigned to him, that is considered failure of duties. Then I can fire him. The will doesn’t guarantee him a particular position or a specific salary, only that he should be offered one. And it doesn’t specify that I can’t move him into another position. If he refuses to do whatever job I give him…” She shrugged.
Kristin grinned as she leaned forward. “Oooh. Tell me more.”
“He gives me any bullshit today, he’s going to become the newest lot wash guy.”
“Ha! I don’t think Jack can wipe his own ass, much less wash a car.”
Susan’s husband never anticipated the manner or timing of his death, or she knew damn well he wouldn’t have left his will set up the way he had. He’d had it drawn up right after they’d gotten married and he’d opened the dealership, when his younger brother was still just a kid. He’d willed a very small percentage of the company, only a two-percent share, to Jack. His parents already owned a third of the shares. Susan owned fifty percent, and a couple of other people, some of them relatives who’d invested when John had started the dealership, owned the rest of the shares.
When John died two years earlier during an accident while on a fishing trip on Jack’s boat, if it hadn’t been for the fact that several of John’s friends had been there, too—who also nearly died as a result of Jack’s stupidity—Susan would have pressed for a manslaughter investigation.
Susan had stepped into her husband’s role at the dealership, as per his will. The fact that she’d helped him build the business and knew every aspect of it from the ground up as well as he did helped her greatly.
Something else that pissed off her in-laws to no end, when they realized they couldn’t just slide right in and take it out from under her.
Susan sipped her non-spiked coffee. “Jack’s going to learn I won’t put up with his bullshit. It specifically states in the will that Jack’s only ‘guaranteed’ a position for thirty months following John’s death. We’re getting close to that now. If he quits at this point, or fails to perform, I’m not obligated to give him another job if he asks for one after that window shuts. John never intended for Jack to sit on his ass and earn a paycheck for doing nothing while pissing people off in the process. He wanted to make sure Jack had a chance he could earn a living. Key word there being ‘earn.’”
“Someone should tell Jackass that.”
“I plan to.”
“As soon as you finish your coffee?”
“Damn straight. I don’t want to face murder charges.”
“I think it’d be manslaughter. I didn’t hear you plan a damn thing.”
“I love you, Kristin.”
The older woman smiled as she hauled herself up out of the chair. “I know. Job security. That, and I have access to the corporate checkbook to post your bail.”
Kristin gently closed the door behind her as she left. Yes, Susan couldn’t do this without Kristin to help keep her sane and nonhomicidal.
Since she couldn’t go after Jackass until he arrived, Susan turned to her computer to start going over yesterday’s sales reports. John never put up with bullshit from Jack, and Jack had spent his time with his nose crammed so far up his older brother’s ass he hadn’t had time to piss off anyone else.
But without John’s iron will to keep Jack in line, he’d pretty much become the asshole everyone else knew he really was.
She was not, however, obligated to put up with it forever.
And she wouldn’t.
* * * *
Jack finally made it in to work a little after eleven. His excuse this time was a dentist appointment.
Susan thought she’d heard the sales guys had an ongoing “Jack’s Excuse Bingo” pool to see what he’d blame for his perpetual Monday tardiness. She had consumed yet another cup of coffee and had worked up a pretty good head of steam by the time Kristin phoned her and let her know Jack had been spotted on the property.
Susan wasted no time heading to his office, knowing Jack would likely scoot out for lunch as soon as he could, not reappearing for a couple of hours.
He’d barely settled in at his desk when she walked through his office door and shut it behind her, locking it before turning to him wearing what she hoped looked like the grin Kristin had dubbed “shark terrifying.”
He must have sensed a problem, because he sat back, leaning away from her as she walked over to his desk and planted both hands on it, looming over him.
“I had an interesting and enlightening talk with my attorney this past weekend, Jack. Would you like to know what he told me?”
He swallowed hard. “Um, what?”
“That John’s will doesn’t guarantee you this position,” she said, tapping the desk. “It guarantees you a position, with starting pay. Now, John loved you and put up with you far longer than I ever would have. If I hear you ever again pull a stunt like you did this weekend, you will be our newest car washer. Got it?”
His eyes widened. “You can’t do that!”
“Watch me. My attorney said I can. There’s not a damn thing your mommy and daddy can do to stop me. And if you refuse to do the job I give you, then you can be terminated for refusing to perform your duties.”
She fought the urge to laugh as she leaned farther across the desk and he actually pushed his chair back and away from her until he bumped up against the wall.
Her gaze narrowed. “I don’t like you, Jack. I hold you responsible for John’s death. You’re damn lucky you’re not cleaning toilets and mowing the grass here. Don’t think I won’t do that, either.”
She made him flinch when she feinted at him before straightening and raising her voice to a normal level. “You do your job. You are a salesman. You do not throw your weight around service, parts, the body shop, or even sales. You are not in charge, and you have no standing whatsoever as management. Therefore, you keep your nose out of other departments. We clear?”
He nodded.
She headed for the door and shot her next comment over her shoulder. “Oh, and turn in that car you’re driving. I’ll have one of the guys give you a trade-in.”
“What?”
She stopped, glancing at him. “Again, the will states you can have a car. Whatever car I decide you can have. Or, you can always pay the friends and family dealership cost rate and buy the one you’re driving now.�
�
He frowned and slowly shook his head.
“Good. You don’t make enough in commissions to warrant you having that car. I need to turn it over before it gets too many miles on it. Get your stuff out of it and hand the keys over to Matt by noon. If there are any damages on it, I’ll take it out of your pay.”
“But I have a date tonight!”
“Excellent. You can show her your new ride.”
She made sure not to slam the door when she left. She’d already notified Matt, her sales manager, to prep a fifteen-year-old Ford Focus for Jack. It was a trade-in they’d received that week, and they’d been planning to load it on a hauler to send to auction with about seven others.
It was mechanically sound, if not cosmetically in the best shape.
Earlier, Matt had nearly wet himself laughing as she hung up the phone with him.
Susan would make Jack’s life as miserable as possible until he finally quit, which had been Ed’s advice to her, delivered over dinner Sunday night at his and Hope’s house.
Make Jack miserable to the point so that when she offered him a buy-out he’d gladly take the money and run, because once his time ran out, she could fire him for failure to perform. And the shares he owned only gave him voting power, not monetary payouts, so they were pretty much worthless on their own.
Jack wouldn’t be her problem anymore. And if he quit anyway, or gave her cause to fire his ass, even better.
I can only hope.
As she walked back to her office, she realized her day was edging away from handcuffs and back toward a straight-jacket.
Win!
* * * *
