by Frost, E J
Inside the towel, there’s a fist-sized machine. It looks like one of those little personal fans that drugstores sell for a dollar in summer, except that it’s bigger and the blades are short. When I rub my thumb through them, they feel soft and flexible.
I take the device back to Logan, who is sitting on the edge of my bed and watching me with a Cheshire cat sized grin.
“Mysterious pirate treasure, Captain Daddy,” I tell him, holding out the little machine. “Do I win?”
“You do, sweetheart, well done. Time for your reward. No guesses as to what this is?”
I turn it around in my hands a few times, finding the control buttons on the bottom. I press what looks like the on button and the machine whirrs to life, the soft blue blades turning slowly.
“The world’s smallest windmill?” I suggest.
Logan chuckles. “What would it grind?”
I hold the machine to my cheek while I ponder. The blue blades caress my skin like a tongue, licking me over and over.
“Is this—a machine to lick me down there?” I’ve never seen or heard of such a thing, and I’m not sure how it would work, but I was pretty skeptical about my rabbit-vibrator at first, too.
Logan’s grin widens so much his cheeks must ache. “Yup, a clit licker, but I also want to try it on your nipples, once they’re out of those clamps.”
I hand him the machine quickly because I’ve gone so light-headed, I’m afraid I’m going to fall over. He takes it in one hand and wraps the other around my elbow, holding me steady. “You okay, baby?”
“Just excited, Daddy,” I whisper. Even as I say it, I’m not sure it’s entirely true. My stomach has started swimming in time with my head, and my legs feel like they can’t hold me up.
“Mmm, are you now?” Logan clicks off the machine and tosses it on the bed. Still supporting me, he pulls the blankets and sheets down, then steers me into the bed.
“Daddy?” What’s he doing? Ravishment should definitely happen on top of the covers. This feels like he’s putting me down for a nap.
“Sh. I figured this would happen. Just relax, sweet girl. Let’s get these off you.”
He lifts my pirate nightie and takes the clamp off my right breast, pressing his thumb into my nipple to ease the burn as I whimper. The pain keeps me from protesting until he has all three clamps off.
“Daddy, please don’t stop playing with me,” I beg. “I’m sorry if I’ve done something wrong. I’ll do better. Promise.”
He smooths my hair back from my forehead and smiles down at me. “You haven’t done anything wrong, my good girl. We’re just hitting the pause button. I’ve been waiting for you to crash. You’ve had two busy days, with a lot of play, and a lot of sex, on top of a three-hour time change. Five orgasms today already. That’s a lot for a little pirate baby.”
I swallow hard. I wasn’t sure if he realized I’d come while he was paddling my breasts, but I should have known he wouldn’t miss it. “I’m sorry I came without permission while you were paddling me. I didn’t even know I could come like that.”
“Bit of a surprise, huh?” He doesn’t look angry or annoyed, just smiles his daddy smile at me as he continues, “You’re knackered. We’ll talk about your unsanctioned orgasm after you’ve had a nap. This is not discipline or even correction. This is Daddy taking care of his girl.”
Well, when he puts it that way. I melt and hold my arms up to him. He gives me a long, satisfying cuddle, during which my eyelids get heavier and heavier.
“Can you nap with the plug in?” he asks in what has to be his softest tone.
“Yes, Daddy.” I could sleep on a bed of coals at the moment.
“That’s my good girl. I’ll wake you in an hour. We’ll have a nice dinner and then we’ll have an early night, hmm? We’ll have a play and watch that scene in the Kennels and we’ll do our bedtime ritual, and you’ll sleep in Daddy’s bed, all snuggled up in Daddy’s arms. Sound good?”
It sounds like heaven, but a worry works against my slide into sleep.
“You’re not mad we didn’t finish the game?” I ask, curling on my side. The plug is a slightly uncomfortable weight in this position, but I’m too sleepy to do anything about it. As I ignore it, the discomfort fades.
“Not at all, little girl. The toys aren’t going anywhere. Plenty of time to play with them once you’re rested.”
I sneak a hand out of the covers and catch his. He curls his fingers around mine and holds my hand as I drift into sleep.
* * *
When I wake, my eyes are gritty and my mouth tastes like I’ve been chewing on a sock. A quick check of my phone shows I’ve only been asleep for forty minutes. Logan said I could sleep for an hour. After snagging a water bottle from my nightstand—did Logan leave it for me? I think he did, because I didn’t put it there, and that’s pumpkin-spice-level-masala chai—and chugging half of it, I pull up the covers to snuggle back to sleep. My eyes are just drifting closed when I hear Logan’s voice through the connecting door.
“Maybe you should have thought of that before,” he growls.
Who is he talking to? Is it the man who was nasty at dinner, Dan Reyes?
I sit up in bed, but I can’t hear any more.
I creep out of bed and over to the connecting door.
As I approach the door, his voice explodes through it.
“No! No! You do not get to do that! You do not get to play the victim. I read the fucking email. I know you had your IUD taken out last September. That was three fucking months before you—”
He goes silent and I cup my hands over my mouth to keep from gasping as the implications of his words sink into my sleep-fuzzy brain. He’s gotten someone pregnant. Of course, he has. I mean, he’s slept with nearly five hundred women. It’s just basic math, isn’t it?
His voice booms again. “You don’t get to make that decision for me! I’ve always been straight with you. I told you I didn’t want to take any risk as long as you were married to Colin. Fuck, I even offered to get a vasectomy just to be safe. And now you might’ve made me a father without my goddamn consent!”
Oh, God. He’s talking to Miranda. He must be. Unless he was sleeping with multiple married women?
“We are not talking about this later!” he roars. “Because I’m not going to see it any other way! You used me. You broke my trust and you used me. That is not okay in a straight relationship, but it is particularly not okay in ours!”
He slams something. The flimsy door rattles. Maybe I should get back in bed? I don’t want him to open the door and catch me eavesdropping. I can’t even imagine the punishment for that.
I’m sliding back towards the bed when I hear him growl, “Sure, Mir. I’m the asshole. You paint it that way. And, yes, I am insisting on a paternity test—or what? Or I will drag you through the fucking courts. I’m not fucking around with you. Your husband is a nutjob who threatened to kill the baby if it’s mine. And you are a fucking liar who stole my goddamn DNA without my consent. You will be getting a paternity test, by a lab of my choosing, so you can’t fuck with the results—that’s right, that’s what we’ve come to. I trust you that little. Goodbye, Mir.”
I stuff my knuckles in my mouth and hesitate half-way between my door and the bed. Should I knock? Go in and try to soothe him? Or does he want to be left alone? I don’t know him well enough to say. I don’t want to make a mistake and make him angry. Angrier. God, he must be furious at her. He sounded it, but Logan’s always contained, always in control, so he probably wasn’t expressing half of his rage.
I want to be left alone when I’m angry, but that’s me. Logan’s not an antisocial troll like my brother always called me. And talking to Logan about my mother actually did make me feel better. And he wanted me with him when he was dealing with all those horrible feelings about his sister. He said I helped. I can at least offer.
Hesitantly, I knock.
Logan can’t have been far away from the door because he opens it immediately. “Emm
y? Did I wake you?”
His angry voice could wake the dead, but I don’t say anything about it because he looks so, so tense. Just like at the airport. His shoulders are knotted under his shirt. His forehead is drawn into tight creases and his hair’s spiky like he’s been pushing his hands through it.
What can I do? What will take away his tension and make him feel better? I can’t go through that hollow sex again, but surely he doesn’t need that this time? He’s angry and frustrated, but not dealing with terrible guilt. This is simpler. It’s about trust.
If I show him how much I trust him, how much I want to submit to him, will that help? He said my submission was beautiful.
I drop to my knees, then press my forehead to the carpet between his bare feet and cup my hands around his ankles. “Daddy, can I rub your feet?”
He grunts. “Sure, baby.”
I rise and guide him to the edge of the bed so he can sit, then trot into my bathroom and retrieve a bottle of coconut oil that I use on the dry skin on my elbows and knees. Moving reminds me that I’m still plugged. Stanley is becoming really uncomfortable now, but Logan’s pain is more important than a little butthurt. And my daddy won’t forget. He’ll take Stanley out before the stupid boulder destroys my sphincter.
I hope.
When I return to him, Logan’s sitting with his elbows propped on his thighs, rubbing his fingers over the bridge of his nose. He looks so sad.
I spread a towel between his feet, pour a little oil into my palm, rub my hands together to warm the liquid, and pick up his left foot. I stroke the oil over his skin before I rub, so there’s no uncomfortable friction.
Keeping my eyes on what I’m doing, I say softly, “I couldn’t help but overhear. I’m so sorry. Do you want to talk about it?”
Logan sighs. His warm hand descends, and he strokes my sleep-damp hair. “Not much to talk about, baby doll.”
He doesn’t want to talk about it. That’s fine. I can’t blame him. He just found out his former sub lied to him in a monumental way and might have made him a father. He sounded less than elated at the prospect. He said he’d been willing to get a vasectomy; maybe he doesn’t want kids at all. That would make me sad. I want kids at some point, with the right person. But it’s ridiculous even thinking about kids with a man I’ve only known for a week—even though I already know Logan would be the world’s most amazing father.
I concentrate on rubbing each toe, the pad of his foot, the instep. By the time I reach his heel, the rigid tendons and muscles under my fingers have softened slightly.
“How much did you hear, Emmy?” he asks.
“I heard about an email and her IUD being removed and you maybe being the father and a paternity test,” I say carefully, trying to distill all the pain I heard down to the barest bones.
“Yeah, that’s right.”
He falls silent again. I finish his heel, set his oily foot on the towel, and pick up his other foot.
I’ve worked over his toes, to the ball of his foot, and am rubbing my thumbs firmly up and down his instep, when he says, “I knew something was wrong. Miranda was never a sweet sub. She always made me work for it. And she never made time for me around the holidays. Those were for her real family.”
Could he sound any more bitter? My heart breaks harder for him.
“Those last couple of months, she couldn’t do enough for me. Couldn’t see enough of me. She flew over on bloody Boxing Day. I should have known.”
That she’d gone off birth control and was using him to try to get pregnant? Why would anyone suspect that?
“No,” I say, looking up at him earnestly. “There’s no way you could have known. There could have been a thousand reasons her behavior changed. How could you have guessed?”
He cups my cheek. “I’m supposed to understand my bottoms. That’s what I do, sweetheart.”
“You said you weren’t a mind-reader.”
He exhales heavily. “No, I’m not. I knew something was off, but I never, ever guessed she’d do that. I knew she’d lied to me, but I never suspected it was about going off birth control. And now, fuck. What am I going to do if I’m the father?”
I put his other foot on the towel before I stretch up to hug him. He pulls me up into his lap, rearranging me into the koala-baby position, which is super uncomfortable with the butt plug still in. But it gives him comfort, so I hold him tightly and rub my face in his neck. The warm spice of his aftershave saturates my lungs.
“You’re thinking too far ahead, Daddy,” I say softly. “I do it, too. I get ten steps ahead of myself and worry to death about things that might never happen.”
He rubs his hands up and down my back, like he’s soothing me. “You do, huh?”
I nod into his neck. “You just have to take it one step at a time.”
“She won’t even take the first step,” he responds. “She refused, point-blank, to take a damn paternity test. She says she’s sure Colin’s the father.”
Colin who threatened to kill the baby, if I heard right. How horrible. That’s got to be crazy-making all on its own for someone as protective as Logan.
“Can you force her to get tested?” I ask.
“I have no idea,” he says. “And I don’t know if it makes any difference that I’m over here and they’re in England. There might be different laws. There’s too much I don’t know.”
“You can find out. I bet there’s lots of stuff on the internet. I can help. I have mad research skillz, Daddy.”
He chuckles brokenly. “Mad skillz, huh? Well, I’d be nuts not to take you up on that offer, my little bestselling author.”
I should never have shown him my book. I’m glad my face is buried in his neck so he can’t see me roll my eyes.
“Baby, I can’t cut into your free time any more than I already have—”
I lift my head and look into his face. He’s not as tense as he was, but the pain’s still there. I see it in his eyes, the tight set of his mouth. I wish Miranda could see him now. There’s no way she’d have done this if she could see what she’s inflicted on him. Not if she ever cared about him at all. Not if she has a soul.
I cup his cheek, which feels freshly shaven. He shaved while I was napping so we could play when I woke up. My wonderful, thoughtful Daddy.
“This is important. I want to help. I know I’m your little and you take care of me, but this is something I can do for you. There’s not a lot I can do for you because you’re all domly, but this is something I can do. Please let me help, Daddy.”
He hugs me tighter and coaxes my face back down into his neck. “Thank you, sweetheart,” he says, pressing kisses to my temple. “And so there’s no doubt, you do a lot for me. Every time you submit to me, you make me feel like a million bucks. I have no complaints. But I’d appreciate you helping me with this.”
We sit for a few minutes, hugging, stroking, silently supporting each other.
“Fuck, sweetheart, you’re still plugged. C’mon, we need to get that out of you.”
He remembered, thank the Lord.
“Okay, Daddy,” I say, like it’s no big deal. In the face of his pain, it’s really not, although my butt’s getting extremely sore.
Logan leads me to my bathroom and bends me over the sink. I shudder with dread at what he’s seeing. He put a condom on Morris but didn’t use one on Stanley. I’ve had Stanley in all while I slept. It must be disgusting, but you’d never know from the way Logan deals with it. He folds back my pirate nightie, piles a little toilet tissue on the small of my back, and rubs his hand up and down my spine as he removes the plug.
“Is it okay for me to ask a question?”
“Of course, sweetheart.” He wipes me, helps me straighten up, and turns on the water to wash the plug and his hands.
“Why would she, um, try to make you the father?”
“I have no idea. She knew how I’d react.”
If his response was so predictable, did she do it on purpose? To make him break up with
her? Or was it the opposite? Was she trying to make him break his own rules to prove how much she meant to him? I know some subs test their Doms like that. Even though I don’t think it’s the healthiest thing, I understand the impulse.
“What the fuck was she even thinking?” Logan continues. “Her husband’s a poster boy for the frigging Aryan Nation. So’s Miranda. What was she planning to tell him if she gave birth to a baby with brown hair and brown eyes? He knows what I look like. And she went to fucking medical school, so it’s not like she doesn’t understand genetics.”
I rub his arm as I process this. “Could she have wanted to get pregnant by you as a way to get out of her marriage?”
That’s the only motivation I can come up with. And after creating motivations for hundreds of characters, it’s something I’m pretty good at.
He shakes his head. “She didn’t need to do anything like that. If she’d wanted out, all she had to do was say the word. I’d have supported her every step of the way.”
That’s not the same thing as an eject-button.
“She’s a submissive, right?” I ask. “It can be really, really hard for a subbie to end a relationship. I know. I should have ended my marriage years before I did. Maybe she couldn’t see any other way to get out.”
Logan shakes his head as he dries his hands. He pockets the clean plug and I wonder when I’m going to see it again. The very achy-bottomed part of me hopes it’s not for at least twenty-four hours, but the part of me that fell asleep before I had another orgasm kind of hopes it’s sooner.
“Sweetie,” he says. “I don’t have it in me to empathize with her right now.”
Of course, he doesn’t. It’s too soon to get him to see her perspective. And why should I? I was well on the way to hating her already, stupid, perfect sub that she was. Although, it’s looking like she’s really very far from perfect.
“I’m not saying you should feel sorry for her. Not at all. What she’s done is terrible. How did you find out? Something about an email?”
