Tell Me Read Free Page B

Unless you want me to drop you off?” He raised one eyebrow, his expression mischievous. They both knew she absolutely refused to accept a lift home. Ever. It was better that no one at The Wicked Club knew where she lived, even Tony. He often offered, and she always turned him down.
    Ten minutes later, decently dressed in her long overcoat, which completely covered her fetish outfit beneath, Thea scrambled into a taxi at the foot of the entrance steps in front of the club. She lifted a hand to Tony, his smile and sexy wink as the vehicle pulled away causing her pussy to clench despite the bone-deep satisfaction he’d already provided.
    Tony always did have that effect on her. That’s what made him so dangerous.
     

Chapter Two
     
    “Twenty five thousand? How the fuck did this happen?” Tony tossed the sheaf of documents onto his desk and strode to the window. The street scene outside wasn’t exactly peaceful or calming, but it was infinitely more soothing than the mayhem contained in those pages.
    “Someone screwed up, that’s how.” The quiet, measured tones of his PA belied the direct nature of her words. Isabel Barnard had worked for him for the last ten years, and for his father before that. She knew Tony appreciated plain speaking, and had no objection to it herself. “Your predecessor didn’t want to pay out for good legal advice so his head of HR—now your head of HR—managed the case himself. He turned up at the tribunal with incomplete documentation, he wasn’t rock solid on the right procedures, he couldn’t demonstrate…”
    “Okay, okay, I get it. A car crash, right?”
    “Right. The tribunal took a coach and horses through our case, found for the claimant on all counts.”
    Tony surveyed the street below for several more seconds, then turned from the window with a sigh. He scowled again at the papers spread on his desk but the message they contained hadn’t improved since the last time he perused them. Dart Logistics, his newly acquired logistics and distribution company had just ended up on the wrong end of an industrial tribunal ruling, and had been ordered to pay the complainant compensation of twenty five thousand pounds to soften the blow of his allegedly wrongful dismissal. As far as Tony could make out his ex-employee hadn’t put in a full week’s work for nearly four years, and seemed especially averse to Mondays and Fridays, but had still managed to convince the tribunal that he’d been badly treated. At least Tony’s firm hadn’t been ordered to reinstate the idle slug, so he supposed he should be thankful for that.
    “Is there any point in appealing?” He glanced across the desk at Isabel who was leafing through the pile of papers.
    She shook her head slowly. “Unlikely. These matters are more concerned with process than justice. The tribunal isn’t saying you shouldn’t have fired Jeremy Malone, just that you, sorry, the previous CEO, should have made a better job of it. The warnings weren't recorded properly, Malone didn't have representation when he was interviewed by HR, he wasn’t made aware of the necessary standards he had to achieve in order to retain his position. Like I said, process.”
    “Standards! Just turning up for work and doing a decent job would have done the trick.”
    His PA shrugged. “There’s nothing in here to suggest Mr Malone wasn’t good at his job. He just wasn’t here enough to show us that.”
    Tony tunnelled his fingers through his hair, unable to contain his exasperation. “Christ, I know you’re right about the process stuff. We all know how these things work. That’s why it’s so bloody annoying. Twenty five grand, for fuck’s sake.”
    “Yeah. We got the tribunal on a bad day. Might be worth appealing the level of the award, if not the decision…”
    “Get our lawyers on it. Meanwhile, I intend to make sure this crap doesn't happen again. You can start by sending the head of HR in to see me. What did you say his name