The Highest Bid

"Essie! Why did you do that to Laura? You colored her hair and her fucking scalp bright red! With Indian ink! Do you know what it is going to cost to get that sorted? Her father is fucking going to sue me!" I said, fucking furious with my daughter.

"She started it daddy. She's a bitch and a slut! She screwed Will away from me."

"What? Did Will sleep with you?"

Essie knew she was on thin ice now. She knew that I thought Will was a gutless coward with a quick tongue and nothing else who wanted her money. She also knew there was going to be hell to pay if he had deflowered her, there was already hell to pay for what she had done to Laura. I had a track record of being able to escalate any punishment and that meant she needed to convince me that she had not romped around with Will.

Essie already knew her start up fund was going to take a hit because I had warned her when she turned seventeen that I wasn't going to scream and shout and spank her anymore if she was out of line. I was going make a dent in her start up fund. She was going into adulthood now and needed to understand there were bottom line consequences for screwing up.

On her fifteenth birthday I had opened an account for her and put half a million dollars into it for her to start her own business or pay for college. She had watched it grow over three years very nicely and as it stood now she could study anywhere if her marks were good enough and buy herself a place to live, and still have some left over for a little sideline hustle.

"No dad! We only dated twice but we were set to... then she opened her legs for him!"

I considered what she said critically. I bought it too, my greatest strength in business was an ability to know when somebody was lying to me. I also pegged Will to be the kind of guy who was into instant gratification and who saw no reason to build anything.

I had started in business as a private detective and had been paid to find evidence for divorce cases mostly until I got a scoop on a really nice case of stolen money. A construction firm had lost eighty million dollars to an accountant who had embezzled the money and sent it on a world tour through banks to launder it at a profit. More accurately he had been blackmailed into doing it and had died before the laundering was complete. It had been a long investigation that had taught me a lot about how international banking worked and found a professional at extorting money.

The accountant had tried to work an insurance policy in clearing the extortionist's bank account on the last stop. The extortionist had screwed up torturing the information out of the accountant and I got him put away for murder in a South American prison. When I found the money eventually there was a lot more than the construction company had lost and nobody to claim it. Instead of bending over backwards to find out who the money had been stolen from I had kept it because the extortionist had tried to kill me too and used it to start my own thing as a venture capitalist and trader. This had given me a seven hundred million dollar start in business.

Essie's mother had cheated on me when Essie was eighteen months old and got shot by a jealous wife. I had known she was cheating and had been in the process of getting evidence when she got shot, being a cop at the time it had meant the end of my career. As such I did not really mourn her and had no trouble getting custody of Essie. Social services saw me starting the private detective business and gave me the benefit of the doubt because my parents were available to help take care of her. In thanks for a cheaper, quicker, and less painful divorce I had made sure the killer got it easy in prison and set her up in a beauty parlor business when she got out.

I thought Essie had dodged a bullet with slutty Laura showing her what spineless Will was. She had heard me talking about cheaters often enough to know that the best thing that could happen with a cheater was to sass him or her out before you committed and the damage got serious. She thought she knew what I was going to say.

I was more curious about how she had got it right. For ink to soak up hair into the follicles and then into the girl's scalp to give her a painless but very glaring tattoo must have taken hours. I did not buy the story Laura spun that Essie had tied her down, my daughter didn't work that way. She was too small while Laura was entirely capable of delivering a ferocious slap.

"How did you do it?"

"We were drawing mandalas in art for the semester exam and Laura was in front of me. She was having fun before the exam started by slapping me in the face with her braids so when we started drawing I put them in my ink bottle."

I actually thought it was a pretty good move and struggled to keep a straight face. The only thing wrong with it had been that there could only have been one culprit. Laura's blonde hair in tight Nordic braids had soaked the whole bottle up. She now had her hair shaved and was apparently crying at home with a bright red scalp. There was a doctor looking at the problem and he was talking about a laser process used to remove tattoos. That was going to cost a lot. It was going to cost even more because the stupid slut now needed counseling for the trauma too. In a court I would lose a damages case although the judge would have a damn good laugh. I was tempted to pull that on her father but that would chew Essie's start up fund completely.

"Right here is what we're going to do. We're going to make her dad sue for damages. I will deal with the legal costs. Until the case is resolved though your start up money is frozen. When they can give a total we'll deal with it."

"Yes dad. How much do you think it is going to be?"

"Maybe a hundred thousand? I know her dad though; he's going to start at a million before even suing. So we let him sue and make him prove damages. In the mean time I humiliate Laura by making them show pictures in court, that's going to get a good laugh. Will is going to have to take the stand and both lawyers are going to tear him apart because I will blame your conduct on him. I will pull Laura's list of boyfriends into court and prove she's a slut who had it coming."

"Jeez! That's mean." Essie said staring at me.

"They screwed with my girl. Had you come to me we could have worked something else and even more horrible out."

She did a double take at that and laughed. I sent her away to get ready to go and have supper at her best friend Nina surprising her even more that she was not grounded. I actually had another reason for going to her best friend too, several reasons, one was that Nina was damn pretty and I liked her.

Another reason was her father and mother. Her father had a very good business ethic and struggled sometimes because of it. What it did mean though was that I was confident doing business with him, that I listened to him when he gave his thoughts, and that I would seriously consider his advice.

His wife was just as honest and had stood up to me despite millions at stake when I had done something stupid or done something wrong with Essie. I appreciated the courage and went to great lengths to protect the friendship.

Over the years they had helped a lot with Essie; I just knew he was going to have something to say about this. I thought Essie dying Laura's scalp red was minor and actually funny. I needed Nina's parents to help me on more than just Essie right now though.

I had never remarried after Essie's mother died. I had little patience for promises of undying devotion and doubted that very many women were interested in me beyond the money. I had not been celibate though, I had maintained a few girlfriends either in a house near me in Boston or on a hobby farm in the Appalachians in Tennessee that I had inherited from my parents when they died.

On the morning that Essie had exacted revenge on Laura my girlfriend had realized that I was not going to play for a ring and found a guy who would. She had sent me a message that she was moving out and that it was over. I wasn't really sad to see her go but I was wondering whether I should keep the house in Boston. The farm in Tennessee was great to have as a get away and I had no intention of letting it go. My question was whether Essie would handle me bringing a girlfriend home.

I had been careful to not bring my daughter into my romantic interests although I knew she was aware that I had some. Nina's mother was the closest to a mom Essie had and probably knew her better than I did. In nine years of being friends she had been the person I asked about raising a girl.

We had supper with Nina's father and mother having nothing but praise for what Essie had done. They were entirely happy that I was going to let Laura's father try his luck and completely agreed that punishment should be suspended pending the damages. Nina's mother did say that sometimes revenge was a good thing but you had to be prepared to carry the consequences in support of my decisions. Laura had apparently pissed a lot of girl off according to Nina, they had seen the red ink soaking up her hair and said nothing on purpose to laugh behind her back. Among the girls at school Essie was a hero.

It was while Essie and Nina were upstairs that I spoke about the romance situation. Nina's mother was clear that Essie would be happy to share her dad but she was clear that another woman was not her mother. As long as a woman I brought home understood that it would be fine. Nina's father was adamant that I should find a woman who would not even try, somebody not much older than Essie herself.

I caught his undertone of vicarious delight at the idea and merely smiled. He knew my girlfriends tended to be in their late twenties or early thirties while I was forty three. Nina's father did have a voyeuristic streak, something that made him more likable to me.

Half jokingly Nina's mother said I should consider courting Nina. The two girls had been inseparable since they met each other in third grade and would get along well. I glance at Nina's father who actually thought about it seriously and was nodding slightly. I put that aside as just after dinner feel good chatter for the next part that I needed advise on.

I had a small country looking to buy a coast guard component to their navy. They needed small coastal patrol boats and some rescue craft too. There was a design and I showed Nina's father who nodded. He could build a boat every three months without committing his entire capability or delver a boat a month if that was his only work. I brokered a meeting and discussed how we would run the financing for the materials before eventually going home.

I got the impression that he needed the work while we talked. I also knew this would probably only get to production the next year; government sales took long to complete. I thought about it as we drove home and decided to speculate on luxury yachts again to keep the shipyard busy.

I was shopping for boats on insolvency auctions, coast guard confiscation auctions, and Treasury auctions the next morning when I got a message: Buy our hymens! Auction for the privilege of deflowering two eighteen year old virgins! Terms of the sale: bids will be on documented offers. Opened on May the ninth offers must include details of how payment will be made as well as the total cash value. Offers will be opened on live broadcast. Bidders must include contact details for us to be able to contact the winning bid and to communicate transmissions of the bids evaluations.

The picture was of two pretty girls side by side on a bed in their underwear, faces not shown. There was a link and I clicked it out of simple curiosity. There was a PDF form that had the details they wanted. For a joke I filled it in noting they were not looking for real names or verified identities. I offered a combined value of five million. One million each in cash, either in notes or a numbered bank account each. The house in Boston I had used for girlfriends was worth half a million so I put that in as a transfer into both their names upon completion of the deflowering. And then the other two and a half million was to be paid in the form of study or business assistance in a trust fund. The funds would be ready within a week of medical certification that their hymens were in tact while the house would be available for view upon acceptance of my bid. Upon me arriving for the event I would have the funds with the cash settlements paid up front and the rest after completion. I did advise them to set a weekend aside as satisfaction for them was best if I deflowered them by turns on following days.

I fully expected it to be a scam and was in fact curious how this was going to work. I sent the PDF back and then got onto finding boats again. It took me a few hours but I found five boats for Nina's father to evaluate and retrofit or to break up for scrap. We had done this type of thing before and he knew I would not sell at a price that would have him making a loss. I also took three coast guard cutters to refurbish as a sweeter to the naval sale. If the foreign navy came through and saw the yard busy on a military vessel they were more likely to consider the yard capable of building the new boats.

I got a message confirming receipt of my bid the next morning and laughed again before getting on with Laura's father who wanted a million in damages. I told him to sue me and prove the damages then called my lawyer. My lawyer had a long laugh about the whole situation and agreed to fight the case. I set about digging and got hold of some of Laura's ex boyfriends. Three were way older than eighteen and agreed to provide evidence if they were not prosecuted. I sent the information to my lawyer and let him work out how to play the court.

This freed me up to arrange an end of school party for Essie and Nina and some friends. I was going to use the party to recruit witnesses and get more dirt on Laura mostly although I was also celebrating Essie and Nina's eighteenth birthdays. Their birthdays were three weeks apart and had been at exactly the wrong time with SAT exams and semester tests happening at the same time. This was going to be a time for them to wind down and celebrate.

Nina's father made it back from inspecting the boats I had bought in time for a trip around the bay on my yacht that was the venue for the party. Essie and Nina invited their friends knowing that the yacht was mostly reserved for entertaining business clients and this was a rare privilege.

It turned out to be the most boring and most revealing party I had been to in years. Of the twenty guests eight boys got stuck on computer games. The entertainment got violently sea sick and the girls sat around chatting happily joined by a few guys who were more interested in being girls than actually taking advantage of almost competition free seduction possibilities.

Digging up dirt on Laura was not difficult because there was so much! Amazingly three of the boys stuck on video games had slept with her. I wondered how she had managed to tear them away from the game for long enough; or whether she had driven them to video games in the way Essie's mom had nearly driven me to alcohol.

For my own part all those eighteen year old girls were looking way too attractive and I had to stop myself feeling a few of them up. Shockingly the closest I came to actually feeling one up was Essie. I had wandered away from that one deciding it was time to find a new girlfriend.

Then got into a long conversation with Nina. I was thankful for a few interruptions because her lips were so kissable and I just wanted to shut her up. Not that she had a bad voice, it was just that she sounded so lulling. Aside from her lips and voice she had beautiful eyes to drown in. Every time I needed to go and see to something I was both upset and relieved because doing something stupid with a good friend's daughter was just beginning to look like a good idea.

We were all actually a little disappointed but relieved that our daughters had done nothing stupid when the boat got back to port. Astonishingly the kids waved each other goodbye and said they had had a fantastic time and that they should do it again. Nina's parents and I watched the scene in disbelief, me most of all because there was no sign of insincerity from the guests.

Between the court case building and the government officials coming to look at capabilities while Nina's father refurbished luxury yachts meant I completely missed the offers being opened on the Ninth of May. The first I realized was an email notifying me that I had presented the winning bid on the tenth.

I was considering finding another lover because my lawyer's secretary was looking good to me too despite me knowing that she had been married twice and was still under thirty. I stared at the message and then followed the link to the video of the offers being opened. As before the two were on a bed with their heads not in view. With the two facing each other I had a good view of the two, one had big breasts, one small. The one with big breasts was slightly shorter. I was by far the best bid on the video and I realistically considered the two eighteen year old girls for the first time.

Still considering a con likely I sent the address for the house I was thinking of getting rid of and told them that I would deflower them there and that was the house I would give them. They were welcome to have a look and we could proceed from there.

The court case started on the eleventh of May. Essie had to take off school, not that it mattered because she had already graduated, because she was named as the accused. She sat through the opening statement in which Laura's attorney tried his best to make Essie a vicious bitch who had harmed Laura out of spite. Then our attorney got busy. He stated that the burden of proof was in the prosecution and invited them to prove damages as well as intent and left it there.

This meant that Laura's lawyer had to show pictures. This did get a laugh from the judge and then the whole jury as Laura had to take her wig off to show that the laser treatment was still ongoing. It was when the proof of intent came in that my lawyer ripped Laura and Will apart by going through her list of boyfriends first. This showed she was a slut and my lawyer had no trouble calling her that. He had several witnesses to call who had slept with her and even statements from adults who all mentioned a scar under her left breast as proof they had been intimate with her.

Then Will was called to the stand to explain why he would sleep with Laura when Essie was a nice girl. He was forced to admit that he had gone for Laura because she was easy and that he had not considered how Essie might feel.

My lawyer brought up a video of Laura swinging her braids through Essie's face from the CCTV in their art class and proclaimed self defense. He went further by evaluating the timeline. The exam had been three hours. By the end of the exam the red ink had only traveled halfway up her hair. She had screwed around at school (His exact words) for another three before going home and it had been four hours after getting home that she took remedial action. That type of delay was not Essie's fault. That type of delay was because Laura was a slut and none of the girls at school liked her enough to tell her that her scalp was going to turn bright red. The delay at home could only be speculated about but the lawyer made the inference that she had maybe been servicing a customer.

There was nothing for the prosecuting attorney to say at the end of the trial the next day. My lawyer had demolished the case very effectively and the jury was laughing at Laura. My lawyer carried the demolition act through by pointing out that it was very easy to blame somebody else and never evaluate your own actions. Essie had evaluated her own actions and not been in trouble again. This indicated she was forced into a situation to defend herself. What happened after that was entirely Laura's fault.