Page 24 of New Blood

And it seemed to work: Thaddeus rose. “Yeah, let’s go, or it’ll get too late. The docks aren’t exactly safe at night.” Not that a werewolf would be concerned about that, but he let Thaddeus’s excuse stand.

He and Mason walked out, and the door shut behind them.

“So, that leaves the vineyard,” Jude said.

“I run the vineyard,” Owen volunteered. “I guess you want me to show the vineyard to one of your guys?”

“That’s the plan.” Jude looked at the remaining two team members whom he hadn’t assigned to anybody yet. “Grant? Parker? Who wants to go with Owen?”

Grant raised his hand. “I never say no to a bottle of wine.” He looked at Owen. “What varietals are you growing?”

“I’ll tell you on the way,” Owen said and rose. “Let’s go. There’s a lot to show you.”

When they walked to the door, Eve rose too. “Well, since the meeting is breaking up, guess I’m allowed to leave too?”

Jude caught the challenging look she tossed him. Yeah, she would be a tough nut to crack. “You’re free to leave whenever.”

When she turned without another word, he was relieved. On his way out, Ransom tossed him a glance and mouthed You owe me one. He was aware of that. Byron and Wendell also left, with only Parker, Spencer, Flora, and Violet, as well as himself, staying back.

“Okay, that leaves us,” Jude said, putting on a friendly smile. “Flora, I’m assuming you’re running the house and the estate?”

“That’s right. Are you gonna have somebody shadow me, too?” A slight tone of annoyance accompanied her words.

“No, that won’t be necessary. I haven’t seen much of the estate yet, but from what I can tell, it’s run expertly.” So what if he had to butter her up a bit?

He noticed the surprise in Flora’s face, and she seemed to relax. “Oh? Well. Good.”

Jude turned to Spencer. “Spencer, what’s your field of expertise?”

“First and foremost, security. That also involves IT, and William also had me look into possible acquisitions.”

“Excellent. Our own IT guy is Francisco. He’ll be back tomorrow, and then you can show him how the estate is protected from intruders, and bring him up to speed.”

“Sounds fair.”

“At a later point, you and I can talk about acquisitions.”

“Fine.”

“How about finances? Who’s in charge of all the financial reporting?”

“I am,” Violet said. She cleared her voice and continued, “I do all the accounting and consolidate the finances across all businesses, so that Uncle William always knew what the whole picture looked like.”

“That’s great. So, Violet, I’d like you to prepare a financial overview for me. Will you be able to do that so that we can meet sometime tomorrow to go over it together?”

“Yes, that’s not a problem. I can run the reports pretty easily.”

“Thank you. Well, that’s all.” He looked at Parker. “Parker, a quick word before I go explore the estate for myself.”

“Sure,” Parker replied.

“Do you want to get a tour of the estate?” Flora asked, and pointed to Violet. “Violet can show you around so that you don’t get lost. It’s quite big.”

The idea of being stuck with Violet, whom he was even less attracted to than Eve, didn’t appeal to him at all. “That’s really not necessary, Flora,” he said with a forced smile. “Violet is busy enough with the financial reports. I’ll ask Heath or Chase to show me around.”

Or Danielle.

He waited until everybody had left the room before he motioned Parker to approach.