Total pages in book: 30
Estimated words: 29741 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 149(@200wpm)___ 119(@250wpm)___ 99(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 29741 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 149(@200wpm)___ 119(@250wpm)___ 99(@300wpm)
She wasn’t sure why he would be proud of her. “All I’m doing is breathing.”
“No. You’re not.” He cupped her face between his hands. “You’re trusting me to help you through your panic. To help control your breathing. You’re trusting that I know how to take care of you. And I hope you always trust me like that, because it’s the most beautiful fucking thing I’ve ever seen.”
She closed her eyes as he leaned in and kissed her forehead.
The most beautiful thing she’d ever seen was his love for her. The way he always took care of her.
Grasping her around the hips, he lifted her onto the counter. “I’m going to get the First-Aid kit to deal with your hand and then we’re having a talk.”
“Are you sure you can be here?” she asked guiltily. “Don’t you have work to do? I don’t want to take you away from anything important.”
“You’re not,” he said firmly. “Because the most important thing in my life is you and our kids. Understand?”
She nodded, breathing out deeply to help settle herself.
It was strange, but she hadn’t realized exactly how wound up she was until today.
He crouched and grabbed a First-Aid kit out from under the sink. They’d learned to keep First-Aid kits everywhere for the twins who had a habit of hurting themselves.
Well, no. That wasn’t true. Baron had a habit of hurting himself. Royal rarely got harmed.
After putting some cream on the burn and bandaging it, he kissed her bandage gently. “There. A magic Daddy kiss will make everything better.”
“Daddy’s kisses always do,” she told him.
“Good. Now . . . we need to talk about your jumpiness.”
“It’s nothing, Daddy,” she said hastily.
He narrowed his eyes at her. “Are you allowed to lie to me?”
“It’s not lying, exactly . . .” She glanced down at her fingers which she’d twisted together.
He grasped hold of her chin, tilting her head back. “No? Because it’s easy to see that something is going on. Matthieu said you didn’t want to shop once you got to the mall. That you said you wanted to go home and you’d do it online.”
“I mean . . . that’s easier, right? Pretty much everyone does their shopping online nowadays.”
“Not you. You like to go out and see the lights and the displays.”
“Yes, but that was before . . .”
“Before?” he prompted.
“Before there was a man who might be threatening Zippy.”
“Are you scared he’s going to find you? Is that why you ended up in the footwell of Matthieu’s truck when someone stepped out in front of you guys?”
“I didn’t end up in the footwell! I just got a bit of a shock. And who knew that Matthieu was a total tattletale? What did he do? Call you as soon as we got back here?”
“Yes,” he replied. “Which is exactly what I would expect him to do. Betsy, you need to talk to me if something is worrying you. I knew you hadn’t been sleeping that well, but I hadn’t realized how anxious you had gotten. It’s not all right to keep that from me.”
Great.
Now she felt terrible.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I knew you had a lot on your plate with trying to find this guy and protect me and Zippy and everything at work. I just didn’t want to add to your workload.”
“You know that’s not the way this works.”
She did know that.
“I know. I’m sorry, Daddy.”
“You know that keeping things from Daddy is very naughty. Do you need to write some lines to remind you to tell Daddy when something is wrong?”
What? Nooo! He wouldn’t.
“I don’t, Daddy! I don’t!”
“Hmm, I think you might. But you also just hurt your writing hand.”
Oh, thank goodness.
Okay, it was probably wrong to be grateful that she’d hurt her writing hand. But if it saved her writing lines, then she was all for it.
“I’d put you in the corner, but I don’t think you need more time to think.”
She shook her head. Nope. She did not.
“From now on, you tell me every time you’re worried or anxious. Do you understand? Or I’m not going to be happy and you will be over my lap.”
“Yes, Daddy.”
“That’s my good girl.” He lifted her down and before she even knew what was happening, he had her back on the counter. Only, this time her stomach was pressed to the countertop and her legs were dangling down.
“Daddy, what are you doing?” she asked. She didn’t think he was going to spank her this time!
“I didn’t forget about that foot stomp earlier,” he explained. “That was very naughty. And in front of Matthieu, too.”
Yikes.
She had done that, hadn’t she?
“Oops.”
“Oops is right. Now, that oops is going to get you a warm bottom. I also owe you some more spanks for texting while driving.”
“But Daddy! You can’t!” she cried.
“I can’t?” he asked as he drew off her pants and pulled down her panties. “Why can’t I?”