by Maren Smith
“I never stopped loving you either.”
What? Had I heard correctly? Straightening, I cupped her chin with my fingers and tilted her head back. “Say that again.”
Her smile was shaky, but it was there. “I love you. I’ve always loved you.”
“Then why in the hell did you run?”
Thin shoulders shrugged, prominent cheekbones colored a darker pink, a smaller but still soft bottom squirmed on my lap. It was as if the last year hadn’t happened as the daddy in me rose to the surface.
“Not good enough. Use your words and tell me what caused you to write this,” I said, reaching into my jacket pocket and pulling out the envelope. Green eyes locked onto it before returning to mine, her lips forming a small “O” of surprise.
“You… you kept it?”
“Not only kept it, I read it daily,” I said.
Dear Daddy—I know this will be a surprise, and I don’t mean to hurt you, but I can’t do this anymore. Thank you for everything, but I just can’t be the person you want me to be. You deserve better and will make someone a wonderful daddy. I’m sorry it won’t be me…
Love, Your Savannah
I quoted the words on the still concealed note verbatim, having memorized them the first night I’d read them over and over again attempting to decipher the meaning behind each one. Looking at the author of that missive, I slid the envelope back into my pocket.
“Surprise was hardly the word and what you did didn’t hurt me, it ripped my soul in two,” I said softly. “Don’t you know that I love you for exactly who you are? Not who you thought you should be? Who you thought I wanted? God, Savannah, if you didn’t want to call me Daddy, if you didn’t want to give me so much control, don’t you know all you had to do was be honest with me? I’d rather never hear you call me Daddy again than to lose you.”
“It wasn’t that,” she said and then shook her head and sighed deeply. “Well, not really.”
“Then what was it? Just explain it to me.”
She hesitated and looking up at me, she said, “May I get up?”
The fact that she even asked told me so much more than words really could. Releasing my hold, I nodded and helped her to stand. When she walked to the sliding door that led out to the balcony, but then turned and walked back, retracing her steps again, I understood she was collecting her thoughts. I’d often watch her pace as she practiced her opening or closing remarks before a trial. Though I’d just assured her this was personal and had nothing to do with her career, I didn’t stop her. Instead, I stood and moved the ottoman back another foot to give her more room, allowing her to do whatever she needed to get to the place where she felt safe enough to give me the truth.
I walked across the room to the small kitchenette. Opening the minifridge, I pulled out a bottle of sparkling water and poured it into two glasses, carrying both back to the ottoman. On her next pass in my direction, I held out one of the glasses and she took it, taking a sip as she turned on her heel and strode back to the door. I sat again, silently drinking the water, just watching until she stopped pacing, took a long drink, gave a nod as if satisfied with whatever conclusion she reached and then turned back to me.
“Ready?” I asked, and at her nod, I set my glass aside and patted my lap.
Chapter Four
Savannah
It was funny in a way. Oh, not laugh out loud funny, but odd in that all it took for an entire year to evaporate into thin air was the utterance of a single word.
Ready?
Such a loaded question and the only reason I could nod was because it was asked by the only man I’d ever truly loved. I didn’t deserve him and yet the moment I’d heard his voice, the second I’d seen his face, I’d wanted to jump into his arms and beg him to take me back. And how screwed up was that when it was my fault I’d left those very arms in the first place? Jack owed me nothing, and I owed him the explanation he’d come all the way to Vegas to hear. Placing my glass onto the table next to his, I climbed onto his lap and the moment his arms came around me, I began to talk.
“My leaving had nothing to do with you, it was all about me. I know that sounds like some sort of cliché, but it’s the truth.” I paused, realizing how incredibly placating that had sounded. Sighing, I shook my head. “I’m messing this up, aren’t I?”
“You’re not in a courtroom, and I’m not going to judge you. You don’t have to make a case for me,” he said, sliding his hand up beneath my hair to cup the back of my neck, his fingertips massaging gently yet instantly easing the tension. When I sank against him, he said, “That’s right. Breathe and relax. Just talk to me, babygirl.”
Babygirl.
The endearment uttered a mere moment before he pressed a kiss to the top of my head was the key that unlocked the last lock on emotions I’d attempted to deny. Pressing a hand against his chest, my fingers playing with a button on his shirt, I told my story.
“That day beneath the willow tree when you first told me to call you Daddy was the day I finally felt like someone saw me—truly saw me. Not as the daughter who never was good enough. Not the college student who was always so exhausted taking extra courses in order to knock a year off of school because she knew student loans would take years to pay off, and definitely not the lawyer I’d become when we first met. You saw beneath all that to the very soul of me… you saw my heart. You allowed me to be free, to be the little girl I’d never been. It was a gift that no one can understand the value of unless they also receive it. And then… then I threw it away.” I looked up and saw exactly what he’d promised. No judgment, no anger, just eyes full of tenderness and concern. He didn’t jump in to speak, he simply continued to massage my neck and waited for me to continue.
“Do you remember Derek Hughes?”
“Yes, I remember meeting him at your office Christmas party and he attempted to convince me that since I not only received the best gift in that I got you, the least I could do was be a pal and fix a few of his speeding tickets. What has the douche… Sorry, I promised not to judge, but yes, I remember him.”
It was just like Jack to soften the coarseness of Derek’s actual words as my memory recalled a very drunken Derek shouting a far more vulgar declaration that Jack was obviously “fucking the tits off my co-counsel”. Nodding, I said, “That’s okay. You were right then and you’re still correct. He is a douchebag. We were assigned as co-counsel on a case which meant that I did all the work and he tried to take all the credit. Anyway, the trial date was getting closer and when several additional boxes of evidence were turned over in the discovery phase, we went into overdrive. One night we were at my apartment working and when it was clear that it was going to be a late night, I offered to cook something, but he said he wouldn’t dream of imposing on me and we could just order some food. I suggested pizza but he didn’t want that. I never even questioned why when he said he preferred to get Indian food though it meant one of us would have to go get it as the family who ran the restaurant didn’t offer delivery. He offered to buy if I picked it up and since he was already pulling out his wallet, I agreed. He said he knew I’d done most of the work and that he’d keep going through the papers and have everything sorted and ready for us when I got back. I’d been staring at papers for hours already so I actually thought it was nice of him. It only took about a half-hour before I returned and that’s when I discovered that being a douchebag wasn’t the worst attribute Derek had.”
I reached over to pick up my glass and realized that Jack’s entire body language had changed. His lips were tight, and the warmth had left the blue depths of his eyes. Instead they were filled with an icy stare that had a shiver run up my spine.
Muscles that had been relaxed were now bunched, rigid. The fingers that had been softly caressing my skin were now curled around my neck as if holding me in place. He reminded me of a wild animal ready to explode out of concealment to take down their unsuspecting prey. Forgetting the glass, I cupped the side of his face.
“No,
Jack, he didn’t hurt me,” I said softly, and watched a bit of the tension dissipate and yet his gaze remained wary as if not totally believing me. Again, he was right. “Not in that way, at least,” I clarified. Needing the pause, I did take a sip of water and thinking perhaps it might be better if there was a bit of space between us, I attempted to stand only to have his hand tighten on my neck and his other arm tighten around my waist. But it was the low growl he made that had my heart rate pick up and my insides liquefying. It was primal, the noise an animal made in warning… a sound that had me feeling both claimed and inexplicably safe. Settling against him again, I told him the rest.
“Derek did go through papers, but not any that had to do with the trial. When I returned, I found him standing in the middle of the living room with this smirk on his face and my journal in his hands. I hadn’t even put the food down before he was reading what I’d written… about how I was in love with my daddy. How I finally felt free to be me. He really seemed to enjoy how I loved those occasional weekends when the moment I got home and took off my big-girl lawyer clothes and put on my leggings and t-shirt with the kittens, I became little Hanna. How my daddy would make me pancakes that looked like bunny rabbits if I was good or would pull down my panties and spank me until I cried and my bottom was hot and red if I was naughty.”
I paused again, the memory of that horror running through me as if I could see him even now, hear him mocking everything that had made my world so perfect.
“He stood there making every word I’d written out of love sound so… so dirty.”
“And you were ashamed,” Jack said, his tone like steel. “I’ll kill the son of a bitch—”
“No!” I said quickly, cutting him off and then shocking the both of us by giggling. “I mean, don’t think that I’m defending the ass, because I’m not. What I mean is that no, he didn’t make me feel ashamed. Well, he did when I suddenly imagined everyone in the office pointing fingers and laughing at me, but then, I got mad… terrified really.” Shaking my head, I reached up and ran my fingers through my hair, gathering my thoughts so I could end this tale in a way that would keep Jack on the right side of the law.
“I wasn’t really surprised he’d obviously gone through my personal belongings because, well, we’ve already established that he was an ass. What infuriated me was that he was mocking the very things that meant the world to me. When he threatened to expose the fact that the prim lady lawyer was actually nothing more than a little girl playing dress-up, unless I agreed to play with him, I remembered that I was a damn good attorney and told him to go to hell. I told him that if he so much as attempted to ruin my career, I’d sue him for slander. I told him that even if I lost my position at Davis, Brooks and Williams, I’d already put feelers out to a group of women about starting our own firm. My mistake was in not acknowledging that sometimes even assholes can be smart. Instead, he decided to go after the one thing that he knew I’d never chance destroying—”
“Me,” Jack said, cutting in.
There was no use denying it, so I nodded. “Yes, you. I’d rather have died than to see you being dragged through the muck even though I knew you’d stand up for me. I know what we do with our personal lives as consenting adults is only between the two of us, but I also know this world is a cold, hard place where people love turning something beautiful into something sordid simply because they don’t understand or because they don’t have someone in their lives to love them the way you loved me. I couldn’t do that to you. So, I left”—reaching over to pick up the book he’d put on the table, I smiled—”and since I couldn’t have my daddy in my real life, I wrote about you in the world I created on these pages.”
“But wouldn’t you rather have your daddy back?”
“Of course I would,” I said instantly. “I know it isn’t the same, but don’t you see, it was all I could do. It broke my heart and hurt my soul, but I couldn’t let him ruin you. Writing about you… about us, gave me a way to be with my daddy that kept you safe.”
“What I see is that while I love you for loving me enough to walk away, it was at a cost of hurting me. And you just admitted it hurt you, correct?”
“Yes, but—”
“Oh, there are no buts,” Jack said in a tone that suddenly had me become the animal hiding beneath the camouflage of a tree acutely aware that my movements had caught the attention of the lion.
“Jack—”
“No more Jack,” he said, shaking his head even as his arms loosened from around me only to pluck the book from my fingers before placing his hands at my waist. “It’s Daddy who loves you. It’s Daddy who told you what would happen if you ever do anything to harm yourself.”
“Wait!” I said, even as I felt myself being lifted as if I weighed nothing more than a feather.
As if I hadn’t spoken, he continued, “And it’s Daddy who is going to give you the spanking you’ve earned by not trusting him enough to come to him the very moment that bastard dared to touch your journal and step into our lives. Isn’t that right, babygirl?”
Sighing, as my view changed from looking at him to staring at the carpet, I understood that I’d sealed my fate the moment I’d admitted the truth. “Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
Despite the fact that I knew what was about to happen, I couldn’t help but smile. “Yes, Daddy,” saying the word I’d missed for so very long as a delicious heat flooded through me.
“That’s right. I was your daddy then and I’m going to be your daddy until the day I die.”
I could hear the love and warmth in his tone as well, and even when I felt my skirt being lifted and his fingers slipping into the waistband of my panties, I felt like I’d come home. And this time when he asked, “Ready?” I placed my palms flat on the floor in front of me, braced on my toes and nodded.
“Oh, yes. Yes, Daddy, I’m ready.”
Chapter Five
Jack
This was exactly where Savannah belonged. Bottom up over my lap, my fingers sliding into the lacy edge of the waistband of her panties, pausing to caress the very beginning of the cleft that divided the beautiful cheeks I was about to reveal, knowing this was exactly where I belonged as well. I could feel her quivering and yet she wasn’t protesting the fact that inch by inch her panties were being lowered. Nor was she attempting to get up, at least not yet. Not even bothering to conceal the grin that spread across my face, I finally released the silk at her knees and laid my palm on her ass. My grin died a bit when I realized that I could cover entirely too much of her bottom with just one hand.
“Babygirl, after I’ve heated your ass, I’m going to take you to lunch and then dinner with snacks in between. You’ve lost entirely too much weight.”
“Okay, Daddy,” she said, and my grin returned.
I was her daddy and knew all this cooperation wouldn’t last forever, but damned if I wasn’t going to take advantage while it lasted.
“Tell me why you’re over my knees, your panties at your knees, my hand on your bare bottom about to give you a spanking,” I said, the ritual one I’d begun with her very first spanking. It not only assured there was never any doubt as to exactly why she was being punished, it helped settle her, putting her in the proper mindset to not only accept the spanking, but to learn from the experience.
“Because I didn’t come to you when I was in trouble,” she said softly. “Instead of trusting that you’d help me figure out how to handle Derek—”
“Douchebag Derek,” I corrected, loving the sound of her giggle before her head bobbing up and down in agreement had my mind instantly going to how I’d much rather see that gorgeous curly mane moving up and down my cock instead. Tearing my mind away from that titillating image, I squeezed her buttock and said, “Continue.”
“Um… oh, right. Instead of trusting you, I ran away,” she said and then my babygirl came home for real as her head turned in order to look back at me. “But, remember, I really was only concerned with keeping you safe and—”<
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“And you are not Attorney Savannah right now,” I said, cutting her off. “You are my Hanna and need to know that as much as I appreciate the thought, instead of coming to me which would have allowed us to work together,” I said, emphasizing the word with another firm squeeze of her flesh, this time hard enough to have her give a mewl. “You left which only served to hurt both of us, correct?”
“Well, yes, but what if I promise never ever to do it again?”
I chuckled. “Why is it that those words sound awfully familiar? Oh, right. I remember. They are ones I often hear when you are in this position. And I also remember the answer I always gave you. Do you?” When she didn’t answer, I lifted my hand and gave her the first smack right in the center of her ass.
“Yes, Daddy!” she squealed.
“And what was my answer?”
She sighed and then smiled. “That it was nice of me to say, but promises made when over your knees would never keep my pretty little bottom pale.”
I grinned down at her, loving the color the answer brought to her face and the light I saw in her eyes.
“That’s right. Little girls seem to learn from their mistakes far better after they’ve paid for them with a spanking that turns their bottoms a nice shade of scarlet.”
With that, she nodded a final time, took a steadying breath and lowered her head as I lifted my hand and began.
I’d silently bet it would take ten strokes before she protested… it only took six. Her hand came back as my palm landed on the same spot it had for the fifth swat.
“Naughty. Go ahead and give me your other,” I instructed and though she hesitated for a moment, her palm lifted off the floor and she brought her hand back. Taking them both in mine, I pinned them to the small of her back. “That earned you extra.”
“But, it hurts!”
“Spankings are supposed to hurt now, aren’t they,” I said with another smile.