His Lordships Daughter

by de'Ville, Brian A

“All that beauty and all that money. Oh boy! I wished she worked for me.”

  Steven sipped his drink.glancing at him “Have you met her?”

  His accountant shook his head, sadly. “I should be so lucky. You should consider yourself very fortunate that you have her on your books. What does she do?”

  “She is a Progress Chaser! And very good at it as well.”

  George sighed and shook his head in astonishment. “I don’t know! Some people have all the luck!” He sipped his drink “She works for you and you bank with her father. Can’t be bad can it?”

  “Pardon?”

  “Can’t be bad?”

  “Not that.” Steven said, his eyes narrowing. “The bit about the bank?”

  “You have recently moved your account into their family bank. I’m not sure on this, but I think it all belongs to Phyllipa Gore now. Lord Hemingham has taken a back seat for the past few years, and…”

  “Are you sure about this George?” Steven rudely interrupted.

  “Of course! Didn’t you know?”

  “No! I bloody well didn’t!”

  “They are a good bank to be with.” His guest pointed out. “They don’t supply you with an umbrella in dry weather and whip it back when it pisses down.” He emptied his glass and eyed his host hopefully. “At the moment, they are picking up quite a few major accounts.”

  Steven topped their glasses up. He was only half listening, a rather sort of odd idea was finding feet in his mind and trying to gain strength, but, he knocked it out of the way. No! he thought to himself, she wouldn’t do that to me!” suddenly he glared at George. “Do you know a guy called Braseby, Manager of the Imperial Bank?”

  “Yes! I know Clive. As a matter of fact, he and his family are very friendly with the Inchcape-Gores. Big pals, so they say!”

  Steven groaned to himself. His little idea was gaining stature. “Clive” was the name Phyllipa had let slip. For a few moments he gazed into space and got lost.

  “Are you there?” George shouted, waving his hands in front of his client’s face.

  Steven jerked himself back to reality. “Sorry! I think I have made a very large mistake!”

  “Perhaps I can help you?” his accountant offered.

  “Thank you but no! this is something that only I can sort out!”

  Chapter 16

  The Managing Director of SG Packaging, sat in the darkness of his office, staring at nothing. The information given to him in the previous night had not only shaken him rigid, but had intensified his anger, allowing his secretary’s clairvoyancy to come true. He had put two and two together and come up with five!

  The lovely Phyllipa Gore was a taker, he had concluded. She had taken his heart and his company. With a lot of effort he may get the latter back, but the former would be beyond recovery.

  It had gone! Given in everlasting faith to a cause which was lost before it had even began.

  The over lights flooding on, startled him as June entered. “Sorry! I didn’t know you were in.” her boss looked at his wristwatch and gave a rueful grin. “I couldn’t sleep. Work is a wonderful tonic for the insomniac!”

  June pulled a long face at the very thought of such an idea. “I’m glad you think so.” She murmured, switching the desk lights on and wondering why he was sitting in the dark.

  He walked to the window and looked out, it was eight o’clock in the morning The staff were trickling in, only one machine worked around the clock and that was for the Kristex job. He shook his head in admiration at Phyllipa’s methods. The breakfast cereal contract was the icing on the cake. Phyllipa’s cake!

  He swung round as his secretary returned with his early morning coffee. Taking it gratefully, he tried to smile without success, indicated to his chair. “Sit down June, I’d like a word.”

  June sat and waited expectantly. He’s got something on his mind! She conjectured, knowing the work habits of her boss pretty well.

  he sipped his coffee, appreciatively. “Five weeks ago you gave me the address of a merchant banker.” June’s stomach did something, but she wasn’t sure what. “Yes!” she murmured, watching her boss carefully. His eyes looked strained as he rubbed his chin with his hand. “Where did you get it? Was it out of the Yellow pages or what?”

  June’s brain shot into overdrive. She didn’t wish to fib to her boss, but she didn’t want to give the question a straight answer either. “I’d have to check on that.”

  “Did Phyllipa give it to you?”

  Shifting uncomfortably in her chair, June removed the pencil from her hair and stabbed it back again. “As I just said, I will check it out.” She answered in what she hopes was a convincing tone.

  Steven drank some more coffee. “She gave it to you didn’t she?” It was more of a statement than a question.

  His secretary hesitated. “Can I claim the right to silence on this one?” she finally asked.

  Her boss nodded. “You have told me all I wish to know.” His voice creaked as if he had a bad cold.

  “Will that be all?” she asked, already half way to the door.

  Steven nodded. “For now!”

  Almost running, June cut through the Print Floor to Phyllipa’s office.

  “Are you on some sort of fun run?” the company Trouble-Shooter grinned, noting June’s anxious face as she flopped gratefully into a leather chair.

  “It’s bridge crossing time!” her friend said, breathlessly.

  “Really!” Phyllipa murmured. “That was quick wasn’t it?”

  “The boss is probing. He put a straight question to me which deserved a straight answer, but he didn’t get one.”

  “Sounds ominous.”

  “Someone has obviously got in his ear and told him things.”

  Phyllipa nodded. “It was always on the cards that he would find out, but I didn’t think it would be quite so soon.” She smiled, as she opened her daily newspaper at the crossword page. “Not to worry, eh?”

  June stood up. “I just thought I would warn you that’s all. I don’t want you and Steven to fall out. What you did was for the best possible reasons!”

  Phyllipa sighed. “History is full of such excuses!”

  “Yes well…..” June added. “As I said before, mind your feet, it could be a difficult day.”

  “See you in the pub later on. We’ll compare notes and thanks!”

  Phyllipa watched her friend leave, then scanning her crossword, studied the clues. Ten minutes later, leaving her desk she looked into a mirror on the wall. “The best form of defence .” She told her image. “Is attack.” Leaving her office, she watched and listened to the giant machines thundering through their cycles and smiled openly at the kick she got from the activity. Suddenly the noise was dying away to a gentle hum as she approached the Managing Director’s office. He was sitting on the edge of his desk studying some papers, but, something in his stance told her he was waiting for this moment.

  “Good morning!” he looked at her without returning the greeting, showing his tired face.

  Phyllipa watched him carefully. “Is there something wrong? Perhaps I should go out and come back in again?”

  He dropped the papers he had been reading on the desk. “My accountant popped in to see me last night.”

  “That’s nice. Good news I hope?”

  Steven ignored the question. “He gave me some startling information. It was only startling because I didn’t know anything about it.” His eyes narrowed and his face coloured in anger. “But apparently you did!”

  “Did what?” Phyllipa stared at his face.

  “It was you who paid off my overdraft, and it was you who engineered the company account being moved to your bank!” he attempted to laugh, but it didn’t come out quite right. “Your bank!” he shouted. “There was me thinking I had a white knight in the background and all the time it was a dark queen.”

  Her eyes flashed dangerously, but she kept quiet to let him say what he had to say.

  “It worried me how
quickly you bought in the Kristex accountant. There was just something not quite right about it. Nobody and I don’t give a damn who they are, could get a contract like that without there being something just a little bit suspicious about it.” A heavy frown replaced the sadness in his face. “For all I know you and your family probably own the whole outfit.”

  “It isn’t what you think Steven.” Phyllipa’s voice was quiet but firm.

  “Isn’t it?” walking over to the window he gazed out. “After my accountant had left me last night, I sat down and started to think and every road which I went down returned to you. All roads lead to Phyllipa Gore eh?”

  “Please! You are being silly.”

  He swung round on her. “Let me see if I have this right. Let me hazard a guess at your modus operandi. Your words.” His voice crackled with suppressed anger. “You and your family chose a small manufacturing company – like mine for instance, and you load it with work. Then the lovely daughter of my lord jumps into bed with the Managing Director…”

  “You are going too far Steven.” she warned.

  “Now here comes the clever part.” He went on, ignoring the advice. “You spring the trap getting your banking pals to pull the plug on the company overdraft, and then you move in and pay it off.” He looked at her in admiration. “It’s beautiful, really! Now who has a lien* on my company, and anytime, anywhere, anyhow, when it suits you can pull the plug in the same way your banker pals did, I could be out on the streets.”

  She put her hands over her ears. “I’m not listening ,… I don’t believe this is happening.”

  He looked at her again, trying to match her gaze but failed. “It all adds up though, doesn’t it?”

  “Yes! Well, it will wont it? If you keep saying it over and over again. Black becomes white if you work at it.”

  “No wonder you refused to marry me.” He said scornfully, as if he was glad she did. “The only long term commitments people like you look for is with money!”

  Phyllipa had herself under control, but she having to struggle at it. She knew her temper wouldn’t take much more just clenched her fists and stood there, digging her nails into the palm of her hands. “I did what I thought was right.” She slowly explained, enunciating every word as if talking to a child. “Right at the time! I knew if I you couldn’t find the money to clear the debt, your company would shut down. I didn’t want that to happen.”

  Steven gave a bark of laughter. “Do me a favour.” He said contemptuously. “You and that Braseby guy strung this together.”

  “You are not only wrong, you’re being stupid. All I did was to pay off your overdraft. Nothing else has changed!”

  “If it was good intentions all the way, why didn’t you talk to me about it?” he asked pointedly.

  * Lien (meaning) payment or debt

  “I did offer to lend you some money, but you turned me down.”

  “I didn’t wish to borrow any, and I still don’t!”

  “As I just said.” Continuing pressing her point. “I didn’t want the company to fold.”

  He looked at her with disdain. “What a load of rubbish! This was all about money! And you know it. From start to finish your plot was to do with money and power.” His temper was rising again and his face showed the anger he felt. “So, you now own most of the company, but I am still the Managing Director and I don’t wish to work with you anymore, so I am terminating your employment, with effect from today, you’re sacked. Phyllipa you’re out of here! As of now you don’t exist in this company except as an item on the balance sheet.” He rumpled his hair with his hand.

  “There is just one other thing before you clean your desk out, His voice straining with emotion. “In my opinion, you are nothing but a cheap blue blooded whore!”

  “Crack!”

  Phyllipa’s hand, strengthened by years of controlling wayward horses, caught him across his right cheek bone. The blow was so heavy, that it bounced and nearly swung her off her feet, whilst Steven, completely caught off guard, staggered back in pain. For a moment there was complete silence. her eyes were ice cold as she watched her former boss.

  “Blue blooded, perhaps? A whore in your mind, probably! But, never cheap.” Her words cracked across the room, startling Steven. Except for the blood red stain where the blow had landed, his face turned white but the grey eyes looked strangely dangerous. ..” Two can play that game!”

  Opening a cupboard door he took out a bunch of fresh green nettles, causing her to back away in alarm, her voice trembling. “What are you going to do with those?”

  “I bought them in to dry in the boiler room, but I can think of a better use for them.” Phyllipa looked around in trepidation, wondering how she could get out of his office, but Steven was between her and the door.

  “You are always telling me to hurt you.” His voice was almost apologetic as he swished them through the air. “Now I am going to do as you wish!”

  “Not with those.” she begged. “It’s the wrong hurt! They will injure me. You can’t…” the words choked in her throat as Steven grabbed her by the waist. She fought, punching his face again and again with her clenched fists whilst kicking him hard, but to no avail. Holding her in a grip of steel, he dragged a chair out from behind the desk, sat down and draped her body, still struggling, across his knees. Pulling her skirt up to her waist, he tore the panties from her body with a snatch of his hand, bought the bunched nettles viciously down across her buttocks.

  The pain cut into Phyllipa’s flesh causing her to cry out, which she instantly stifled. She knew the nettles, at their worst could give her a nasty stinging rash, but at their best, could give her a lot of pleasure. Wincing as her buttocks took the brunt of Steven’s anger she managed a small delicious groan as the heat in her loins erupted sending rivers of delight shafting through her. Gritting her teeth from the rain of pain, as stroke after stroke descended, badly marking her quivering flesh, she cleverly switched her mind to happier times, when any such punishment was earmarked for pleasure only. Suddenly, becoming aware that the beating had stopped, she relaxed her now inflamed bottom, only to gasp again as he roughly stood her back on her feet. Ripping his flies open he pulled her head down, then rammed his rapidly engorging manhood between her lips. “You act like a whore.” He snarled. “So I’ll treat like you one!” Phyllipa smiled to herself as she happily suckled the swollen flesh, teasing the sensitive tip greedily as she accepted the full flow of his tribute as it spurted hotly into her mouth. Snatching it from her, he quickly tucked the rapidly diminishing penis back into his trousers, his finger stabbed at the door. “Now you can get out of my factory!” he growled, his fury undiminished.

  Phyllipa eased her distressed body and glared defiantly at her ex boss and his bloody face. Happy to see his left eye already swelling up from her accurate punching. Then smiling, she opened her mouth and spat his recent offering full in his face, causing him to spring back in alarm as the glutinous liquid splashing into his eyes, dripped from his cheeks.

  “Thank you Steven, but I don’t want anything which belongs to you.” She told him sweetly, the smile on her face deepening as she haughtily walked from his office.

  Easing her car up the long drive to “Rosewood”, Phyllipa sighed. She was very disappointed in Steven’s reaction to her unsolicited help. Alright! She told herself for the umpteenth time, none of this would have happened if she had not involved herself with SG Packaging, and for that she felt a little guilty, but, he could have listened to her side of things and he could have chosen his words more carefully. Braking the Aston Martin in front of her garage she admitted that things had not quite gone has she had planned. Maybe she had not been vigilant enough? Life is like that. Happiness needs constant watching! It has this rightful trick of suddenly sliding into oblivion.

  Strangely enough she didn’t feel any animosity towards her former employer. In fact she felt slightly elated, believing her inbuilt barrier had surfaced to protect her, but the almost imperceptible spark
of excitement which she was feeling wouldn’t go away. After all, apart from her father and Clive, Steven was not only the longest male friend she ever had, but was the only guy she had never backed away from, but the agreeable equation was not foremost on her mind.

  Picking up the car phone, she dialled David, but was unable to locate him. “Damn it!” she swore as she replaced the receiver. She needed him. The contretemps with Steven had not only sharpened her sexual appetite but had put her first gear of arousal on to hold, and it was not going away until her pleasure buds had been satisfied. Leaving her car she walked up to the house where her father, sitting in his favourite chair in the library, looked up in surprise. “How nice, are you in for lunch?”

  Phyllipa greeted him with her usual family kiss “From now on, I am going to be in for quite a few lunches.”

  “Is something wrong?”

  His daughter smiled wryly. “You’ve won your bet!”

  “There are still quite a few months to go yet.” He pointed out.

  Shaking her head, Phyllipa sat opposite him, a sure sign she wished to talk. “It wouldn’t matter if there were only twenty four hours to go, you’ve won.”

  “Do you wish to tell me about it?” Henry Inchcape-Gore was very fond of his offspring and anything which upset her, upset him.

  Phyllipa shrugged her shoulders. “Steven found out I was responsible for shifting the company overdraft.” She shook her head despondently. “He didn’t like what I had done, Father! So he sacked me.”

  “Really!” her father carefully folded up his morning newspaper. “I think you have been caught up in something not of your own making my dear, so I am minded to call the bet null and void.”

  Phyllipa vigorously shook her head. “Oh, no!” she objected. “I went into it with my eyes wide open. I weighed up the pros and cons carefully and I knew it wasn’t going to be easy but, in my defence, I didn’t foresee the intervention of outside influences. Bloody Braseby!” she leaned over and kissed his cheek again. “So you win father. You won it fair and square and I lost it square and slightly unfair, but, that’s the way some bets go. Congratulations!”