Prologue
Prologue
Archer
“So that’s it? Rent-A-Daddy is just… over?” Theo frowned, looking down at the press release Nyla had drafted up, canceling any and all existing contracts with full refunds. “But?—”
“But what?” Bas interjected. “Theo, you just got married. You have a baby on the way. The rest of us are married now, or getting married, thinking about having babies of our own. Lennon moved out of the building, and so did Bain. Nyla and I are looking at houses.”
“It was such a good idea. There was so much potential. It had a purpose!”
Theo’s new wife Erin patted his arm. “It was a great idea with lots of potential, and it did serve a purpose. Just not the one you thought it would.”
“It served a great purpose,” Lennon said from across the room, his words echoing my thoughts. I looked at my long-time friend and shook my head in disbelief. Out of all of us, Lennon had probably changed the most. Rent-A-Daddy had certainly served a purpose in his life. In all our lives. I looked around the room at my friends, who all had the loves of their lives by their side, and thought about what each of them had gained.
Bas and Nyla, constantly stuck in friends-with-benefits mode, had finally cut the crap and admitted how much they meant to each other after Nyla left her asshole husband and came home to Philly where she belonged. With us. With Bastian, once and for all.
Bain, the silver-spoon elitist who’d gotten even richer when the five of us had won the lottery together in our last week of college, had been brought barreling down to earth when he’d fallen for Jasmine, one of Nyla’s friends, after the struggling, grieving, single mom of three had drained her savings to hire Rent-A-Daddy to help her get her life in order. Now Bain spent most of his day playing Mr. Mom. Honestly, I’d never seen him happier, and I was pretty sure they would announce soon that they were expecting a little one of their own. Our kids would grow up together.
Lennon, the forever frat boy who’d taken the party-animal lifestyle to an artform, had settled down, and spent most of his evenings painting or watching movies, attending gallery openings and theater shows all over the city with Zoe, the professor he’d been in love with since our college days. Now he only drank once a week at our Friday meetings, and he’d shown all of us a side of him we’d never expected to see.
Theo, a recovered asthmatic nerd-turned-hopeless-playboy who’d only felt fulfilled by having an endless stream of submissive ladies in and out of his bed, had finally settled down. Erin had made him see that there was nothing left to prove. Theo was comfortable in his own skin, and didn’t seem to need to have all eyes on him all the time. And he would be a father soon, a plot twist none of us had seen coming.
And then there was me, our resident workaholic shark of a lawyer. I'd finally realized I couldn’t do it all, and that was okay. For the first time ever, my life had balance. I was learning to prioritize what was important, and I had Audrey to help me organize the rest.
Our lives were good. Still, Theo had believed in Rent-A-Daddy, and wasn’t ready to let it go. I had mixed feelings about it. My Rent-A-Daddy experience had been the most unique and the most exhausting, but in the end, I’d gotten Audrey out of it, and my life felt complete.
“It can’t just be… over,” Theo whispered in disbelief, staring down at the press release again.
“Get over it, buddy. It’s over.” Lennon clapped him on the back. “You know what they say… Here for a good time, not for a long time.”
“And with that,” I decreed loudly, “I think it’s time for a toast.”
I raised a glass of scotch in the air, and my friends did the same. Erin raised her lemon water, which matched Zoe’s drink of choice. Jasmine had a glass of white wine, but she hadn’t touched it.
Dropping the paper with a resigned sigh, Theo joined the circle and lifted his glass. Good enough for me.
“To Rent-A-Daddy, and all the unexpected goodness it brought into our lives,” Bas said.
Our glasses clinked together and everyone sipped from their respective drinks. There was a finality in the moment, but it didn’t feel like an ending. Instead, it felt like our lives were just beginning. At least, that’s how it felt to me.
“I had plans,” Theo whispered, setting his glass down on the bar and motioning to Lennon to refill it. “I wanted to expand, bring in more Daddies, move the venture to other cities, contract with other kink clubs to offer our services…”
“Those are all great ideas, Theo,” Bas said, coming up behind Theo and leaning over the bar to grab the bottle of scotch out of Lennon’s hands. “And who knows? Maybe one day we’ll circle back around and implement them. But for now, let’s just step back, take a breath, and enjoy all the abundance that has been brought into our lives.”
I took in his words and turned around to face my friends, leaning my back against the bar as I sipped my scotch. As I looked around the room, at my friends, their significant others, and the love of my life, the tightness in my chest eased.
And then there was a knock on the door to our private lounge, and our bouncer Zeke, a strong, silent, buff, ex-military man poked his head in.
I instantly went on alert as the energy in the room seemed to shift. Zeke had been with us since the beginning, but he rarely said much, and he never interrupted our private meetings unless something was wrong.
“What’s up, Zeke?” Bas asked, stepping forward, ready to go take care of whatever the problem turned out to be.
I set down my glass, prepared to back him up if need be.
“Well, Sirs, um…” Zeke frowned, his mouth a hard line as he pursed his lips and furrowed his brows. “Lola Dawson is here.”
I raised my eyebrows. Lola had been one of my Rent-A-Daddy clients. She’d been 86ed for bullying and not respecting boundaries. “Well, she's not supposed to be,” I reminded him. “Get rid of her.”
Zeke looked at the floor, cleared his throat, and looked back up at me. “She says she wants to apologize, sir, and she seems… different.” He cleared his throat again and looked me straight in the eye before adding, “I wouldn’t bother you all if it didn’t seem important. Says she’s in therapy now, wants to apologize.” He let his gaze roam around the room to my colleagues. “I think you should talk to her.”
I bristled. My hackles were up. My experience with Lola had not been a good one. But Zeke was someone I trusted, and he never stuck his nose into club business. He had spent a decade doing his job. Nothing more, nothing less. We’d invited him to join us several times in the lounge, but he never accepted, insisting that he didn’t want to mix business with pleasure. Audrey wrapped an arm around my waist in a gesture of comfort and support as my friends all looked toward me. Audrey had been my client, after all.
“She’s here?” I questioned, confirming.
Zeke nodded. “Waiting right outside the door. The main door, I mean, not this one.”
The clarification wasn’t needed. Zeke had been doing his job perfectly for a decade.
I sucked in a breath. “Send her in.”
He nodded and disappeared. Five minutes later, he returned with Lola and shut the door behind them.
All right, so he was staying for this.
I know I wasn’t the only one surprised when they entered. The Lola that walked in wasn’t the one I remembered. That one had always played up to her platinum blonde hair, ruby red lips, old-Hollywood-sex-symbol looks with teased locks and barely there dresses. This one was dressed in a soft, lightweight, pink sweater that was doing its level best to downplay her large breasts and tiny waist. The jeans she wore covered her long legs, but I was sure that if she turned around they would hug her booty just as well as any of her club dresses had. Her usually teased up, blonde-as-blonde-could-be hair had been darkened to a honey blonde that lay in soft waves around her shoulders, framing her face. She still wore makeup, I could see, but it was far more subtle than it used to be.
And she was nervous. I’d never seen Lola look nervous before. Zeke must have noticed, too, because he touched the small of her back and said, “Go on, tell them what you told me.”
Lola gave a short nod and licked her lips before opening her mouth. By then, I knew I’d be speaking for the whole room if I said we were ready to hang on her every word. I wasn’t sure it would change anything, but I was listening.
She glanced beside her at Zeke, then nodded once more and started to speak. “I um… I wanted to apologize to you all, but especially you, Archer, for the way I behaved last year. And well, anytime I was at the club, really.”
I wasn’t yet ready to accept her apology until I heard what else she had to say, but I nodded and forced a smile so she would keep talking.
“I’m in therapy now, and I...” She trailed off, shuffling her feet and glancing down at the floor before looking back at us. She cleared her throat, before starting again. “I was raised a certain way. Real religious, and uh… the only thing about me that was ever given value was my ability to please men, and what I could be and do for men. In and out of the bedroom, but especially for sex. I left the church a long time ago, but I guess I hadn’t realized how deeply ingrained that was, and how attached to my self-worth it had become.” She swallowed hard and forced a smile. “I thought my therapist was going to laugh or fire me when I told her about the whole Rent-A-Daddy escapade, but she actually thought it was a good idea. She said I needed to do it in the way that it was intended, though, and use it for self-improvement and goal setting, with sex off the table. I’m nervous about it, but I agree with her. I need to have that accountability in my life, and I need to learn to look at relationships with men differently. So…” She gulped. “I guess I’m asking for a second chance. Not… with Archer or anything. Just in general. Let me prove I’ve changed.”
I looked around the room at my friends, whose expressions were a mix of sympathy and concern.
Audrey stepped forward and walked right up to the nervous-looking Lola, taking her hand. “I’m sorry you went through that, and I’m proud of you for working on yourself.”
Everyone, including myself, nodded in agreement. Lola flushed and looked at the floor again. “Thank you. It’s been a process. I didn’t realize how deeply the way I’d grown up had affected the way I viewed myself.” She cleared her throat. “Anyway, I understand if the answer is no. I just had to ask. I promised my therapist I would do the hard things.”
I glanced around the room, meeting Theo’s gaze, then Bas’ and Bain’s, and finally Lennon’s. I saw their answers clearly, and was about to speak up when Bas did it for me.
“We’re all grateful for and accept your apology, and we’d love to offer you a second chance, but unfortunately, we just closed down our Rent-A-Daddy services for the foreseeable future.”
“Oh.” Lola looked crushed and actually blinked back tears. “I see. I understand. Well, thank you for listening and?—”
“I’ll do it.”
I jerked my head up at the hard tone in time to see Zeke grabbing Lola’s hand that Audrey had dropped.
“What?” I choked out.
Bas frowned. “I’m sorry. That’s not possible. As I’ve said, we shut down the service.”
Lola’s face, which had brightened, became a mask of disappointment.
“Off the books,” Zeke pushed. “Unofficial. For free.”
I arched my eyebrows and briefly wondered why he’d make such an offer. And as the owners of the establishment where she’d come seeking help, did we have an obligation to stop him? My legal prowess failed me. There was no correct answer. But as our resident legal department, it fell on my shoulders to speak up.
“It would have to be a privately negotiated arrangement between the two of you, and it would have to be made with the full understanding that it’s in no way affiliated with the Penthouse.” I frowned, then offered, “You could probably read over an existing contract and questionnaire, but only as an example. You’d have to make your own.”
Zeke stepped forward, nodding his understanding. “The club would be in no way responsible. We’d be two private citizens negotiating terms. Just like any play partners or people in a relationship.”
“Exactly.”
Lola’s cheeks were flushed as she watched our exchange and she was biting her lip so hard I was afraid she might draw blood.
I glanced at my fellow club owners. I could see interest in their expressions, and amusement. They were all clearly hoping Lola said yes.
Zeke shook my hand. “I assure you, sir, nothing untoward would happen, and my behavior will be exemplary.”
I hadn’t asked or expected otherwise, but I just nodded my agreement. I’d never heard Zeke sound quite so formal. As he turned back to Lola, Lennon nudged me hard, an indication he was picking up on the same vibes I was. Zeke, our unflappable ex-military security guard, had it bad for Miss Lola. Interesting.
The scary part was, I wasn’t sure which one of them had met their match in the other one.
I turned my attention to the scene unfolding in front of me. Zeke was standing in front of Lola, his bulky body blocking her from my view.
“So, what do you say, Miss Lola? You gonna let me be your Rent-A-Daddy?”