Page 113 of For Her Own Good

“Second—” Oh my, he’s not done yet. “Second, you’ve done all the hard work already. If she inherits your depression, we’re not starting from ground zero. She’ll be different for sure, but we wouldn’t be flailing around in the dark, grasping at anything. You’ve shone a light on how your depression works and that will be helpful. We’ll recognize the signs because you went through it all. We’ll be able to offer help sooner and I think your dad, as much as he loved you, also bought into the stigma of getting help for mental health. We don’t have that barrier. Also, you keep saying ‘she.’ Are you certain it’s a girl? I thought it would be too soon to know.”

Mmm, yes, that’s a little embarrassing. “I don’tknowknow.Like, it hasn’t been confirmed by science or anything, but I…I can’t explain it. I just know. From the second I found out, I’ve thought of her as, well,her.”

He smiles at me, a turning up of the corner of his mouth. Slightly lopsided but none the less handsome for that. This man, he kills me.

“All right then. She. Her. I’d count myself lucky to have you both. If that’s an option.”

I think, foolish or not, it is.

“Do you… When we have the baby,ifwe have the baby, do you think…”

I bite my lip because I hate to ask, but it matters. Not that I’ll change my mind about wanting to be with him, but it might take some more negotiating our precise relationship, where I’m getting which of my needs.

“Do you think I can still be your little girl? Even when we have our own little girl?”

“Oh, is that what you were worried about, love? I don’t think you need to. I can be someone’s father and still be your daddy. Now that I’ve had a taste of what we can be like together, I don’t think I could give it up. We’ll have to see how we feel because things can change, but yes, I have no intention of giving up my little girl. You’re too sweet. I think if I bit you, sunk my teeth into your flesh, I’d end up with a face slick with juice, like I’d bitten into a perfectly ripe peach.”

I have to giggle, and when he looks at me, a question in those blue eyes, I flush. “I, um, don’t know if you’d get a mouthful of peach juice if you bit me, but maybe if you…”

There’s a flash in his eyes, and he knows what I’m saying. Of course, he’ll want to hear it anyway. Make me blush and stutter and get me slick and swollen between my legs.

“If I what, sweetheart? Hmm?”

“If you licked me.”

“Like this?”

His tongue dances over the side of my neck, from my shoulder to my earlobe where he nips and sucks.

Just like that I’m jelly in his arms, soft and pliable while being squirmy with need.

“No, Daddy,” I whisper, and he bites, sending a bolt of desire straight from where he’s mouthing my body to where I’d like him to be. “I want you to lick my pussy. Please, Daddy?”

He fairly growls in that sweet spot between ear and jaw.

“I’ll do more than that, little girl. I’m going to tie you up with your legs spread wide open for me and you’re going to come half a dozen times, only the first time with my mouth. I’m going to lick at that sweet little pussy of yours until my mouth is covered with you, until you come all over my face. And that will be just the beginning.”

I squeak because dear god, there is nothing I’d like better, but I really ought to not be getting so aroused here of all places. And god, what if Dr. Gendron comes in? Or one of my nurses? This is a rather, um, compromising position, for the both of us.

“Yes, please, Daddy. Take me home already. Please.”

“I will. As soon as you get checked out and they say you’re good to go. You seem fine, but I’m not going to risk my little girl. What kind of daddy would I be if I didn’t take care of you?”

“Not a good one, and you’re the best.”

I give him one of my little smiles. Not that it’s small, because it’s not. It’s one of those completely free, adoring, full of worship and trust and yes, love, which reminds me. I’m kind of awful.

“Daddy?”

“Yeah, sweetheart?”

“I love you. I should’ve said it before and I hope you haven’t been wondering if I don’t love you back. Because I do. Bunches and bunches.”

I slip my arms around his neck and bury my face in his neck because if I think about precisely how much I love him, I might start to cry again. It’s…a lot. More than feels safe, to be honest. But he’s not going to let anything bad happen to me. He’s going to protect me and keep me safe, and I’ll do my best to return the favor.

I know from the way he holds me so tight against him that he knows how much I love him and he’s doing his best to take it all in, to hold it, but it’s going to overflow because that’s how full of it I am. It cannot be contained. And spilling all over the place doesn’t feel so scary anymore.

Epilogue

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