Page 11 of Daddy's Little Patient

He could hear the tiny hitches in her breathing as she looked everywhere but at him. After several long seconds, she lifted one shoulder in a half-hearted shrug.

“Is that how we talk to Daddy?” he warned.

She sniffled and shrugged again.

“Turn around.” He let his tone dip into notes of stern disapproval. “Look at me.”

He loved her eyes. They were big, a lovely shade of pale gray. Sometimes, he thought he could see flecks of blue or green, but right now, they were only a beautiful, sad hue of silver-gray. “What can I do, babygirl? Except go away. I’m not going to do that.”

“Yet,” she said darkly.

He arched his eyebrows. “Exactly what, little girl, doesthatmean?”

She looked at the wall again. “Nothing.”

His palm was itching so hard to deliver a sound swat to her thinly-covered bottom.

“We talked about this. I will leave when you are able to take care of yourself.” When she predictably wheeled around to confront him, he pointed a silencing finger in her face and quietly said, “Don’t push me, sweetpea. You are a strong, capable, independent woman most of the time, but at the moment, you have two broken arms.”

“Wrist and hand,” she snapped. “Don’t make it worse than what it is. Drama llama.”

“If getting your mouth washed out with soap is what you’re looking for, you are heading in the right direction.”

“You’re the one who won’t stop talking to me while I’m in the corner!”

“And you’re the one who won’t stop pushing for a spanking.”

“And you’re the one who won’t give me one!” she shouted, stomping her foot. “So, why don’t you save us both the headache and just walk away now? We both know it’s going to happen! Everybody walks away eventually, and you know it.”

That accusation hit him like a punch to the gut. “Excuse me?”

“Never mind,” she said hoarsely and would have walked away from both him and the corner if he hadn’t caught her elbow.

“Now, hold it right there.”

“No. I want coffee. I’m fine.” Her tone was all Little girl; her words, laced with petulance and defiance, a poor disguise for deeper hurts he was just now catching glimpses of.

“Knock it off,” he cut in, harsher than he intended, but he didn’t soften. “You’re not fine, so stop saying that.”

“I can if I want to!” She clenched her fists and anger abruptly gave way to pain, and still she railed, “It doesn’t do any good, no matter what I’m feeling, so why not just let me be fine?”

“Because you’re doingthis.This isn’t what fine looks or sounds like!”

She stomped her foot again, and he immediately raised a staying finger, struggling to keep his own temper in check. “Now, you hold on right there, little girl.”

“No!” She jumped, stomping both feet. “I don’t wanna hold on! This sucks and you suck and it’s not fairand I don’t wanna do it!”

She burst into noisy tears, startling them both with the suddenness of her emotional storm. He felt the corresponding snap that broke through her because it echoed all the way through him, too.

“Corner,” he said abruptly, pointing to it. Catching the back of her neck when she only cried louder, he turned her forcibly around and pushed her back into it before he marched out of the house to his truck.

The distance he put between them was exactly what he needed. Not to cool down, his temper wasn’t really spiking, but he was thrown. He’d never seen Kelly so upset, but even if it was manifesting as anger, he recognized the fear and insecurity at its core. She’d always been very independent and hated having that taken from her. He could understand her frustration, but it wasn’t him doing the taking, and if she’d just stop getting in her own way, she’d heal enough to take her temporarily lost independence back again. So why was she this determinednotto understand that? She was smart enough to know that people needed rest after surgery and that wiggling her fingers around at this stage would only slow her recovery, at the very least. At worst, she could do permanent damage to herself and lose some of the use of her hands for the rest of her life. And somehow, her refusal to acknowledge that was still less maddening than her suddenly lumping him in with all the ghosts from her turbulent past who had failed her.

She really thought he was going to walk away?

Was he supposed to do that before or after he spanked her?

Or maybe this idea was cementing itself in her headbecausehe wasn’t spanking her?

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