Page 121 of Melt For Us, Daddy
“Shh, it’s okay,” Ivy murmured, running her fingers through his hair. “You’ll get used to all the noise eventually.”
“Sorry.” Pink blossomed on his cheeks. “I wasn’t expecting it to be so… much.”
“Hmm. I know Braden keeps earplugs down at the front desk. If you want, I can run down and get you some. Help block out the noise a bit until you get used to it.
Glancing over at them, Cordelia frowned, worry drawing her brows together. “Are you okay, baby boy?”
“Yes, Ma’am. Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize to me unless you’ve done something wrong.”
Annoyance pricked at the back of Ivy’s skull. “You don’t have to be so mean, Dee.”
The silence at their table took on a more expectant feel as Cordelia raised a brow. “Careful, blossom. I have zero qualms about putting you over my knee right here in front of all our friends.”
Heat rushed to Ivy’s face at the thought of being punished so publicly for her disrespect. “Sorry.”
“Try again, little girl. How do you address me?”
Nobody but Holden knew Cordelia was her Daddy, and this wasn’t exactly how she’d planned on dropping that particular bomb. But looking at the resolve in her woman’s eyes, she wasn’t being given much choice.
And it wasn’t like their friends were going to judge her, right? Every single one of them called their Dominants ‘Daddy’. So there was no reason for them to feel any differently about her using that title with Cordelia.
Still, it felt so… big. Bigger than it had back at the safe house, and she almost chickened out.
But then she looked into Cordelia’s eyes, saw the silent demand there in the dark green, and the thought of disappointing her Daddy was worse than any reaction her friends might have.
“Sorry… Daddy.”
Approval lit her woman’s eyes, and everything inside her settled. “Good girl.”
“Okay, seriously, you have got to tell us what happened at that fucking safe house,” Lottie demanded. “Starting with the Daddy thing, obviously, because we need to know everything.”
With her gaze still locked with Cordelia’s, Ivy grinned. “We should order some food. We’re going to be here for a while.”
Jacob
* * *
He was a big fat liar.
When Ivy had asked if he was okay and he’d told her he was a ‘little overwhelmed’ he’d lied through his teeth. Everything about this night, from the way they’d prepped him for the club, to the protestors, and now sitting with their friends listening to Ivy and Cordelia tell them about their time at the safe house like it was all some big adventure instead of the most terrifying thing he’d ever lived through seemed to pile on top of him, threatening to suffocate him with every word.
And then there were their friends. Not that they weren’t all really nice, because they were. But seeing the way the other men in the group behaved, the way they commanded their women with just a look or a touch or a word…
Shouldn’t that be him? Shouldn’t he be Daddy instead of Cordelia?
His entire life he’d been taught that it was a woman’s job to submit. And yet, here he was, wearing the clothes they’d picked out for him, his cock in a cage and a plug in his ass, sitting silently by while they spoke for him. Soft, submissive, the way a woman was meant to be.
Every now and then, Ivy would shift on his lap, the soft weight of her pressing against his cock and he was reminded yet again of how much control they really had over him. How much control he’d given them, of his own free will.
What kind of man did that?
The same tightness he’d felt after seeing his mother in the street wrapped around his chest. Pressing in on him as the conversation around him faded to nothing more than a noisy buzzing.
He couldn’t have another one of these panic attacks—as Cordelia had called them—in front of everyone. That would be more humiliation than he could stand.
Pushing Ivy off his lap, he shoved to his feet. The conversation around him stopped completely as everyone turned to look at him and the band around his chest tightened even further.
