Daddy's Princess Page 2

  The night had gone unexpectedly smooth.

  The party was a lavish and exquisite fundraiser for a charity organization, and several attendees were board members. Damian’s firm had been tapped to take over the accounting for the charity. He was present to land a strong first impression on the board.

  There was no doubt in my mind: I would have crumbled under the pressure if he had told me any of this upfront. It was only through piecing it together and reading between the lines that I figured out just how important this night was to Damian and his company.

  “You know, it surprised me when I heard you were an escort,” Damian said, brushing my thoughts aside.

  “You think I’m an escort?” I replied with just a hint of indignation.

  “Is escort too strong of a word? Calling you a sugar baby seems a bit… demeaning.”

  “Whatever you want to call it, it’s not what you think,” I said with as much conviction as I could manage. “And besides that, who told you I was on the Sugar Daddy website?”

  “Who doesn’t matter, how they knew it was you should be of more concern. I’m afraid those big sunglasses do a terrible job of hiding your face. It was only a matter of time before someone came across your beautifully unmistakable smile.”

  The compliment caught me off-guard.

  Damian smirked arrogantly, his handsomely dark eyes catching mine as we walked together. “You should be thankful that I’m the one who found you. I’m certainly glad I did. You performed well tonight, Princess. Better than I could have hoped.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Clarke… I think…”

  “Please,” he insisted firmly, “call me Damian.”

  “Alright… Damian.”

  He had always been Mr. Clarke to me, but that’s because of the years between us. I studied the hard edges of his face, surprised at how little he’d changed since the last time I’d seen him.

  Damian split off to form his company when I was fourteen but, before that, he was an almost constant element. He and my father were inseparable, and together they’d built the start of a small empire. Any time I was at the office, Damian was there.

  But things went further than that.

  He was a part of every birthday and Christmas, and Damian spent plenty of nights eating dinner at our table. As our closest family friend and the only man my father ever trusted, he was family.

  At least… that’s how Dad saw things, right up until the big split.

  I’d always seen Damian a little differently.

  He was my first crush.

  Damian had always been firm and even stern at times, but he’d encouraged my ridiculous dreams and treated me with respect. Damian never made me feel like a child around him – he spoke to me as if I was an equal.

  I liked that more than I could ever admit.

  And maybe that’s why it hurt so much when Daddy’s company split up and Damian was out of my life.

  Until tonight.

  It felt natural to walk beside him, my arm looped through his own.

  I shook my head, letting a smile break on my lips.

  “Thought of something amusing, Princess?” Damian calmly observed with smooth nonchalance, his eyes still scanning the parking spot numbers on the concrete.

  Hesitation struck before I answered.

  “I was just thinking about tonight.”

  His eyebrow lifted. “What about tonight?”

  I took a deep breath. “I’m a little new to all of this. I can’t imagine how hard this would have been with anyone who wasn’t you.”

  Damian’s expression was impossible to read as he kept his attention off of me, but I thought I felt him stiffen in the chest as we continued walking.

  “Familiarity breeds comfort,” he eventually replied. “Having you by my side certainly eased my tension.”

  “Because I was familiar?”

  Damian finally turned, firmly meeting my gaze. “Because I know you, and I trust you.”

  He… he trusts me?

  He hasn’t even seen me since ninth grade…

  My mind went back to all our casual flirting over the app the last week. There hadn’t been anything too risqué; it was mostly friendly banter, but the sexual charge between the lines was impossible to deny.

  Tonight had been different. I’d spent the last several hours worrying about what was going to happen, but Damian seemed to be making this a business transaction and nothing more.

  A big part of me was relieved… but a less logical piece of my mind was asking a different question.

  Would I have stopped him if he wanted more?

  I smiled innocently, burying that thought so deep it could never see the light of day.

  As if he knew what I was thinking, Damian stopped on a dime and turned toward me seductively. My heart was pounding in my chest, and I found myself drawn into his dark, piercing eyes. Damian slowly leaned down, his tantalizing cologne filling my senses; the powerful CEO in the sharp suit whispered in a handsome, rugged voice…

  “One-eighty-four. Here you are.”

  It took me a moment to realize what he was talking about, but I followed his gaze and saw my poor college-girl car parked between a Rolls Royce and an Audi R8. They’d given me a wide berth, clearly hoping to avoid any inevitable door dings.

  “Oh. Right.”

  I reached for my car keys in the purse I’d dragged along for the event, beeping it unlocked.

  “Right,” I repeated nervously. “Here we are.”

  Damian calmly stepped around me to the driver’s side door, which he graciously opened and let me inside.

  As I relaxed myself into my seat in a daze, he hung at my side. His arm was casually draped along the top of the door, fingers dangling near the interior side of the window.

  With his generous height, my vision was filled with that designer black suit – tailored to perfectly wrap around his broad, powerful form. He lowered his face in, and I found myself trying to memorize every sharp, angular line in his strong, chiseled features.

  “Thank you again for your services, Princess,” he told me with an air of cool, collected confidence. “Keep yourself out of trouble and have a safe drive home.”

  My brain was not processing this.

  “Is that… it?” I asked.

  Damian’s head tilted. “Were you expecting something else?” His smirk grew into a wide, arrogant smile. “Go home, sweetheart. Drive away before you end up doing something we’ll both regret.”

  There wasn’t anything I could do to hide the stunned allure that must have been painted across my face. All I could do was stare into his eyes for a few long, provocative seconds…

  But Damian smirked, closing the door.

  I watched him in the side mirror as he walked away from my car, never turning back. Within a few seconds, he had disappeared into the dark parking lot, leaving me alone and confused.

  What the hell are you doing? I asked myself.

  But no answers presented themselves.

  And with no better alternative in mind, I swallowed my frustration and drove home, unaware of just how quickly I’d see him again…

  Damian

  The edge of my lip curled into a sly smile as I confidently strolled towards my shining Mercedes. I thumbed the key lock in my pocket, listening that beautiful, sleek piece of German engineering roar to life in its spot.

  That’s right, I smirked to myself.

  Purr for me…

  I slipped into the leather seat and took a moment to adjust the rock hard erection in my pants. That wasn’t the car’s fault – it was courtesy of Chloe Lockwood, whether she knew it or not.

  Goddamn that girl.

  Revving the engine up a notch, I slipped the car into drive. The Mercedes rewarded me with a chirp of the tires as I whipped her around and down the ramps of the parking garage before finally pulling free of the building.

  The place where I always hung my jacket wasn’t too far from here, but I took the long way to give myself a few moments
to think. Half an hour later, the car was parked in yet another garage, and I was rising up the elevator towards my private rooftop penthouse.

  Motion-detecting lights thrummed to life as I stepped into my foyer, unbuttoning the wrists of my suit jacket. The hallway welcomed me with its carefully selected paintings along one wall, but I turned towards the den instead.

  Floor-to-ceiling glass lined the far wall of the room. In the corner stood a bar, stocked with vintage wines and imported, exquisite liquor from around the world. I poured myself a glass of fine merlot, and then paused to admire the city view through the wall.

  Life was good at twenty floors up. From where I was standing, the world couldn’t touch me. Not even Patrick Lockwood, Chloe’s infuriatingly stubborn father.

  But he was certainly on my mind.

  Seeing Chloe brought back plenty of bad memories. I’d met Patrick at Carnegie Melon University in our hometown of Pittsburgh. It wasn’t long before we were plotting financial domination through a pie-in-the-sky business idea.

  Patrick had the tech know-how, and I had the charisma. Together, we built a small online accounting firm. With the internet booming, what started as a dream turned into more profit than either of us could have anticipated. It had been his idea to outsource the work, and mine to skim twenty percent off the top to split between us.

  Patrick had chosen to dabble in business management, whereas I’d focused on marketing. This allowed us to focus on our strengths and leave the rest to the other. I built up our business acumen, and Patrick evolved from the quiet, standoffish tech whiz into a partner I could trust with any aspect of our operation.

  Business was booming, but our eyes were set on a bigger prize. We were going to expand beyond personal accounting and move on to bigger fish. I wanted to dominate the business accounting world.

  We turned half our apartment into an office and expanded beyond a two-person operation. Within a year, we were hiring employees, and within five we were debt-free and rising fast.

  That’s the kind of teamwork that let our business thrive for fifteen years, right up until everything came apart at the seams.

  The rift between us, when it came, shattered our company to its very core.

  So I’d left.

  Patrick bought out my shares, and I took the money to ascend to the next challenge: beating him at his own game.

  I worked day and night, dragging half of my old clients along with me and crippling the behemoth we had built together. I took a bit of pride in watching Patrick’s company lose good employees as they were forced to downsize.

  Which meant I’d hired good employees.

  Clarke Financial Solutions had been on the rise from the start, and that shooting star wasn’t burning out anytime soon. My reputation alone put powerful people in front of my desk, and it didn’t hurt that I made sure they got results.

  Patrick had always played by the straight and narrow. Meanwhile, I was willing to play hard and dirty with the money, doing whatever it took to save my clients every penny that I could without raining down audits upon them.

  I was willing to go further than anyone in the field. I knew where the line was drawn, and I was happy to step right up to it.

  When pressing about the corners that even I wouldn’t cut, I referred them back to my old partner for shits and giggles. One consultation with Patrick and his firm, and the clients were sniveling back at my door like lost puppies wandering home.

  And then my rates went up for daring to test me with their insolence.

  I had it damn good, and I knew it.

  But now there was this new wrinkle.

  To be honest, I hadn’t quite expected Chloe to go through with the night, even before she saw that I was the man on the other side of the screen. Sheer luck had put me back in touch with the girl. I ran the personal accounting of the twenty-two year old punk who built the Sugar Daddy website. It was a fascinating operation. Grown men were paying young women for their company, and the website took a healthy cut for every ‘date’ a sugar baby went on. Pimping for the twenty first century, all powered by a mate-matching algorithm this little math wizard had knocked together in high school.

  He explained how it worked once or twice. It checked social media profiles and cross referenced friends, family, and interests. A moment of calculation would bring you a custom-tailored list of potential sugar babies to choose from.

  It sounded like the kind of bullshit they throw around in Silicon Valley when an upstart company is looking for somebody with deep pockets to keep paying for their fucking ping pong tables and their crippling Mountain Dew habit, but I let this kid talk me into setting up a profile.

  Chloe was my #1 result.

  The moment that I saw her, the cogs had begun turning in my head.

  Last time I’d seen her, she was the daughter of my greatest rival…

  But the years had been kind to daddy’s little princess.

  I’d gazed through the small album of photos that she’d uploaded, probably from some photo shoot to help pad the resume of another student.

  I couldn’t deny the effect that seeing her had had over me. She was beautiful. I must have watched that little minute-long preview video that she’d posted a dozen times. It was just a simple video introduction, one that was required for verification purposes to cut down on bullshit fake accounts.

  She was the same old Chloe – cute, clever, and sweet as honey. But with some growing up, she’d blossomed into a dangerously sexy young woman, and I knew I had to see her again.

  Besides… it might be fun to let Patrick know just how far he’d fallen. His little girl was resorting to paid companionship in exchange for college tuition. That would crush him, and the opportunity to twist the knife was too much to ignore.

  I took the next step against my better judgement.

  I’d made her an offer she couldn’t turn down, and she’d taken the bait. It was all supposed to be fun and games. but everything changed when I spun her round and said hello... Whether she was willing to admit it or not, Chloe Lockwood had revealed to me in just one glance that she wanted me.

  And standing here looking out over the city, I knew the truth.

  I wanted her too.

  Chloe

  The long, quiet drive back to Temple University had been a whirling mess of emotion.

  By the time I made it back to my dorm room, I was far too confused and tired to spill the deets to Christa. Instead, I crashed in bed, dreaming of distant memories of Damian long since past.

  When I woke up the following morning, she was already in classes. I tried to push it all out of my head and get a head start on the next chapter in my physics class, but twenty minutes buried in the book proved that it was a totally futile effort.

  I was still going over Damian and our night together in my head. Hell, I was even irritated about how he’d made me feel when he’d slammed the door on my vulnerable feelings.

  There was only one way to ease my mind.

  And it only took ten minutes on Google.

  The GPS on my phone listed directions to Damian Clarke’s offices. If I left before the lunch rush hour, I’d have plenty of time to give this man a piece of my goddamn mind.

  I hopped into my car and headed toward downtown Philadelphia, preparing to storm into his office and get some facts straight.

  Dozens of floors above the street in a lavish office building, my anger kept me company for the entire glass elevator ride.

  As it turns out, I shouldn’t have bothered getting all worked up.

  It all went up in smoke in a heartbeat.

  When the doors opened into his lobby I was already starting to question my righteous fury. What greeted me looked a hell of a lot more like a modern museum than the office of a successful accounting firm.

  I found myself facing a subtle cascading waterfall against rounded slate stones, utterly dominating the wall in front. As I stepped out and around, I took in the shotgun approach to the lobby’s architecture –
modern interior waterfall to the left, darkened wall with subtle lighting on priceless sculptures to the right. Nuanced granite tiles spread across the floor beneath my worn sneakers as I walked through this corridor and into the elegant lobby proper. Above me hung large chrome rings, elegantly placed in a way that highlighted the fastest path through the space.

  I found myself moving forward despite my sudden apprehension. The open flow of the main lobby drew all of my attention to the sloping and elegant front desk. Dark, contrasting wood flooring curved around the front, extending up the wall behind to form a focal point on the gentile desk clerk. Somewhere in her sixties, she was dressed politely but professionally, her ruby lips curled into a surprised smile as she watched my approach.

  “Hello, and welcome to Clarke Solutions,” she spoke as she tucked away her confusion. “How may I help you today?”

  It took me a moment to summon my misplaced irritation. Everything about this lobby was strikingly powerful, and I began to question why I was here.

  “I’m here to see Damian Clarke.”

  She glanced at a mounted iPad, flicking along the screen with an elongated finger. “And your name was…?”

  “Chloe Lockwood,” I grumbled.

  “Ah, I’m afraid I don’t have anyone under that name on the books. Could I interest you in making an appointment–?”

  This wasn’t going to get me anywhere, so I was already pushing away and marching across the lobby. The place was extravagant, but it couldn’t be that big. Knowing Damian and his huge ego, all I needed to do was head for the big corner office.

  “Young–“ The receptionist indignantly began to call after me. “Young lady!”

  The older woman was sliding out from behind her desk, but I had a head start and she wasn’t about to catch me in her three inch heels. By the time she made if halfway across the lobby, I’d already popped my head into a few doors – spotting a small team of accountant offices, a modern break room, even a small but stacked company gym.

  Damn, I squeaked to myself. Damian’s firm must be doing even better than I thought.