Chapter 11

This woman was no bimbo, I twigged.

“Let’s go through and join the ladies.This is fascinating to watch.”

We did so, and Jenny turned to her man.

“These daughters of yours are not what you led me to believe, Archie, you naughty man. These girls are quite delightful.”

She returned to go speak with them again, and we were left to talk alone.

I ventured, “Looks like you have a good one there, sir, if I may be so bold. A keeper?”

“Definitely a keeper, Jimmy.”

“So a wedding might be in the offing in the near future?”

“Unfortunately not.”

“Eh? I don’t understand, sir. If neither of you is married, what is to prevent you getting hitched?”

“Complications, Jimmy. Her divorce settlement is worded so that if she remarries, much of her settlement goes to a trust fund for her children. She would have very little left for herself.”

“My apologies, sir, if I sound of limited intellect. Surely you earn enough to take on her and her children without too much effort?”

“How do you know that, Jimmy?” he demanded, but with a smile. He added, “I bet you blackmailed that crooked head of accounting to let you know the salaries of everyone.”

“I never bet, sir. It is a mug’s game.”

“You didn’t deny my accusation, Jimmy, but you are right. I could afford her without a problem, but she doesn’t want to dump all the costs on me, when she could help out with the housekeeping and so on. She insists we don’t have to be formally married to be married to me. Her kids would call me Daddy, and she would call me husband, and that would be that, she says. No prenup contract, nothing. What man could pass up a deal like that, Jimmy.”

“So she will just be known as Mrs Emerson to the world?”

“Exactly. Now, do you want to say goodnight to the girls before I take you home, Jimmy?”

I wordlessly gestured for him to precede me, and we joined the ladies. Mr Emerson interrupted the discussion, “Ladies, I would like to thank Jimmy in front of all of you for his wonderful work, before I take him home.”

There was a dead silence for a few moments, before Sharl spoke acidly.

“Daddy, Jimmy is already home. He will remain with us. Is that clear?”

Emerson was shocked at her tone.

“Sharlene, what are you talking about, girl?”

“Daddy, Jimmy stays with us, full stop. You wanted him to get a wife, well you succeeded, in spades!”

“Sharlene, Jimmy says he will not marry any of you!”

“Quite right. The law prevents him having three legal wives. It doesn’t prevent him having three wives.”

He looked bemused at her words, and then they sank in.

“Eh? All three of you want to be with him, as his wives? All of you, together?”

“Yes, Daddy, and we have made a start on our family. All three of us are pregnant.”

Jenny by now had switched from amazement to hilarity.

She told him with a broad smile, “Archie, if it is good enough for us, it is good enough for them!”

He kept switching his gaze between Jenny, me and the three girls.

He finally stammered, “You mean this, Sharl? Cherry? Charlie?”

Sharl gestured to Cherry and Charlotte. “Tell him, girls.”

Cherry led off, “Daddy, I am pregnant and Jimmy is my husband and the father of my baby.”

Charlotte ended with, “Daddy, I am pregnant, Jimmy is my husband now, and my name is now Charlotte, as that is what my husband prefers.”

“Good God!” Emerson exclaimed. “My daughters all married and expecting!”

“Yes, sir,” I agreed. “You may or may not decide I am your son-in-law but I am the husband of your girls, forever. We will move to my house when they are ready to move; there is no rush.”

“Dammit, Jimmy, I was hoping you would take one off my hands, but all three? You have excelled yourself. AND you have changed them from ravenous caterpillars into butterflies? What else could a man want? Congratulations, Jimmy, son.”

Jenny sauntered over to grab me in a massive hug.

“Welcome to our family, Jimmy.” She turned to her man, suddenly secure in herself with this revelation. “Archie, welcome our daughters’ husband to the family.”

He mumbled to me, “Welcome to the family, Jimmy.” He was still in shock.

After another moment of reflection, he said to me, “I suppose we had better promote you again, so you can support my daughters in the style that they have got used to: new clothes all the time, and so on.”

Cherry remonstrated, “Daddy, we have spent months with our man, entirely naked the whole time, and got used to it. We now realise how important clothes are: not in the least. We will use the wardrobes we have for now, for visitors and for outside, but inside our own home with Jimmy, we intend to be naked.”

Emerson was shocked into silence.

Cherry turned to Jenny and said in a stage whisper, “Naked is much more suitable for fucking him! You should try it with Daddy.”

Jenny giggled, a surprise from a lady in her late thirties, and got a further shocked look from her Archie when she came out with, “I might just try that!” Then she sobered slightly. “What will you do when your belly swells up?”

“Jimmy says it will make us even sexier! He aims to keep fucking us almost till we pop. See if Daddy is the same way with you, Jenny.”

Jenny, startled at this suggestion of her getting pregnant, smiled as she asked, “Are you girls like this all the time, Cherry? It is Cherry, am I right?”

“Yes, I am Cherry. And no, not all the time, Jenny. We are high tonight, with getting home for the first time in many many weeks. As long as I get a decent sleep, I should be pretty normal by morning.”

Sharl had checked with her father that the girls’ bedrooms were available, and the four of us climbed the stairs to the floor where their bedrooms were to be found. We entered the first one, which was Sharl’s, but no-one wanted to leave me, so we all undressed and piled into her bed naked, attempting a puppy pile under the bedding. All of us were soon asleep.

My bladder woke me early, and I was glad of the night light in a power socket in the room, to see where to go. I went searching for the john. Fortunately there was an en-suite one which suited my needs, for I didn’t fancy walking the halls of a strange house in my naked state.

I got back to the bed and found the blankets had fallen off the women but the room was warm enough, so I had fun running my hands over warm flesh. Charlotte came awake enough to ask what time it was. I checked the bedside clock and told her, “Soon after seven,” and she responded, “Okay,” and went back to sleep. The other two accepted my caresses without waking; it was so familiar to them.

I reckoned I needed to go back to work today, so I showered and then dressed in the same clothes – the only ones I had with me – and went downstairs to find the kitchen and make myself some breakfast.

There I encountered Jenny, preparing breakfast for her brood once they got up. She asked me what my girls wanted for breakfast, but I said it was best to let them sleep, and eat something once they awoke. I usually prepared their breakfast, but today was different as I had to leave.

“I have to get in to work, and my car is not parked here, Jenny. I’ll have to catch a bus or something.”

“Take my car, Jimmy,” she offered. “My keys are on the small table by the front door, the ones with the pink tab. I am staying to spend the day with your women and learn more about them and you. From what little I have heard, it is quite an interesting and enlightening tale. I’ll get Archie to run the kids to school before he goes in to work, so he may be a little later than usual. You can sort out with him what to do about transport later.”

“Thanks, Jenny. You are a good woman, most kind; a perfect mother-in-law for me.” She got a kiss on the cheek from me as a dutiful son-in-law.

I took the opportunity to drive by way of my house and get a change of clothing before going in to the office. I expected to slip in unnoticed, but that was not to be.

“Jimmy! Welcome back. Where have you been, man?” and “Hey Jimmy. There is a problem you’d just LOVE to solve for me.” And so on. It was as if I had just popped out for a while. Before finding my new slot in the company machine, I reported to the admin head.

“John. I am back as from today, and Mr Emerson is going to be a little later getting in; the school run, I am told.”

“Right, Jimmy. Enjoy your transfer? You are back earlier than I thought you might be.”

“Very much. I learned a few unexpected things, John, but a lot was stuff I already knew. Mostly I was on the teaching end, not the learning end. The teaching ended when the students had fully learned their stuff; good students eventually.”

“Good work, Jimmy. Your secretary probably has a pile of queries for you to deal with.”

My secretary was better than any of them knew. She had agreed to take on my replacement, provided she could remaining working on ongoing projects that I had started. I got a report from her on all the work she had signed off, on my behalf; all the problems she had solved for me, and the half dozen where she did not know what to do for the best but were not time-dependent. These were sitting in her desk drawer, so I collected a chair, used the other side of the desk and got to work on them.

It took me all morning to work out resolutions for most. I laid the completed ones on her desk for her to do the final paperwork for passing on, and the final one I decided was for the next level up to solve, as I didn’t have the budget authority to come to a solid conclusion. It looked good on paper as a plan, but the long term outcome was not clear to me, so I passed it to her to send upwards.

I deliberately said nothing to my replacement, for I didn’t want to mess up his head with my previous opinions about the job. Instead I went round the company, re-establishing friendships and collaborations, and updating myself on all the company news and more importantly, gossip. You can learn more about a company from the gossip than from the formal news sources.

I found that my replacement had finally got his feet securely under my desk and was doing a reasonable job, according to the company gossip base. That was satisfactory. I would either get a new position in the firm or get a golden handshake to go find a post elsewhere.

Mr Emerson finally got in, and after a snack lunch my secretary informed me I was invited to attend him at his office for a ‘debriefing’ of my secondment, my temporary relocation. I knew better.

As soon as I was in his office, he told me to shut and lock the door, so we would have no interruptions, and I did so.

“Jimmy, I had time to think about our new situation, yours and mine. I saw the similarities between me and Jenny, and you and my daughters, so I am prepared to leave it be. It is up to you and the girls to decide on your future lives together, but what I have seen so far is fine by me. They are certainly much improved, and possibly even more changed than I could have wished for. They have become your problem, not mine any more.”

I said nothing, leaving him to continue the talking.

“As to your job here, the guy you selected has fitted in well, and performs to your specifications. That is good. Your secretary maintained a watching brief on matters you were working on, so she can let you know what is what. Once that is dealt with, your present job is complete as far as you are concerned, and you are freed for a new position I have created for you: company fixer, or some such title; I haven’t decided the words.”

“Oh? Fixing what, exactly?”

“That post will be a watching brief throughout the company. You need to immerse yourself in every department’s work and every member of staff that influences what we do, and clue me in on any matter of concern that you might find while doing so. You can also look at our branches and the two other companies that are in our group portfolio. To those not in the know, you will be my personal aide, acting as I direct and reporting back to me, but you actually will act as my ferret – in the nicest possible way – helping me to make this company efficient and honest, preferably both at the same time.”

“A peripatetic role, not based in one office?” I queried.

“More or less. I may base you nominally in my front office where my secretary has her lair. Do nothing to ‘improve’ her like you did my girls, Jimmy. She is perfect as she is, and I want her to stay that way.”

I was shocked at the thought that I would seduce her.

“Sir! I have my women to keep happy. I would do nothing to jeopardise that relationship.”

He gave an amused smile as he said, “I note that they are no longer my daughters, but your women, Jimmy. An excellent mindset for the future: keep to it.”

“Oh, they will always be your daughters, sir. I taught them the value of respect. In fact, everything I taught them was based on respect for others, so don’t be too shocked if they treat tradesman well.”

“Damn, no. I will be glad if they can treat anyone with respect.”

“In that case, might I formally look upon you as my father-in-law, sir? Your daughters are my wives in all but the legal certificate, sir.”

“You can do that, Jimmy, but we have no nepotism in the company. You are a wage slave just as much as I am; you have to earn your crust, even if it will be a bigger crust than before.”

“I expect nothing else, sir. I will do nothing to undermine your senior position; no-one will know from me about our new relationship. I remain your trusted minion. You are trusting me with your daughters, aren’t you?”

“It is a bit late now, Jimmy, to start trusting you with them, when you have already fucked babies into them.”

“About that, sir, there was a question about whether you would agree to having them live with me when they returned home, so they decided that being pregnant would push you into the right frame of mind, sir. I hope you don’t regret that, as the results speak for themselves.”

“Don’t push it, Mr Hargreaves. Certain facts need not be mentioned between us any more. What has happened has happened. Finis.”

“Yes, sir. Understood, sir.” I knuckled under.

“Now, having added you to the senior staff, I need to show you off to the Chairman of the Board. Are you ready to meet our supreme chief?”

“Does my suit pass muster, sir?”

He scanned me from top to bottom.

“You’ll do, if you can comb your hair. There is a mirror in my washroom. Go use it.”

Once I was to his liking, we headed for the board room, where apparently the chairman was currently sitting alone, going over the latest company projections.

Emerson tapped the door and entered, with me trailing him. The Chairman looked up, a question on his face.

“Our latest promotion, Chairman: James Hargreaves, formerly of our Human Resources division. He was on a temporary transfer and newly returned. I have appointed him as the company fixer, if you will forgive the expression. He is good at spotting dubious practices and downright criminal activities within the company. I expect him to save us his salary in the first year.”

“Fixer, eh?” the Chairman responded. “Can you fix anything, young man?”

“Nothing mechanical or electrical, sir,” I joked, “but human deficiences are usually susceptible to my efforts. I don’t take kindly to embezzlers or to bullies, but my prime target is anyone who is costing the company money.”

“Interesting. What made you pick him, Archie?”

“Past experience primarily, but I recently set him a nasty long-term problem, and he managed to solve it effectively during his relocation. Such expertise is worth applying for our company’s betterment.”

“Good man. What kind of problem was it?”

“A human one, sir. He was asked to change attitudes in certain people, and he managed it superbly. Their names are not revealed on grounds of confidentiality.”

“Appreciated, Archie. Success is all we seek; success of all kinds.”

“If that is all, Chairman, I’ll let you get back to your research.”

“Thank you, Archie. Come back and see me in an hour. I should be free then. I would like your opinion and advice.”