Page 31 of Melt For Us, Daddy
For a long while, she simply lay in the bed she shared with the woman she loved, watching her sleep.
Her babygirl had been absolved of her part in all this. The strapping she’d taken was one of the hardest and longest spankings Cordelia had ever given her. But she’d taken it so well, and by the time Cordelia had tucked her into bed, she’d seemed like her usual light, happy self again.
Now, Cordelia was the one living with the heaviness of unresolved guilt in her chest.
“I’m so sorry, baby,” she murmured, brushing a thumb over her sweet girl’s cheeks, flushed with sleep as she breathed deep and even. “I’ll fix this. I swear.”
Slipping from the bed, she crept out of their room to their office-slash-closet. She grabbed a stepstool from the corner and climbed up onto it, reaching for the box at the very back of the top shelf. It took a little juggling, but she eventually got the box down and carried it out to the living room. Seated on the large, plush couch she and Ivy had recently splurged on, she took a deep, bracing breath and lifted the lid from the box.
Memories, ones she’d kept buried as neatly as that box in the back of the closet, threatened to overwhelm her as she stared down at the pile of pictures in her lap.
She wasn’t sure why she’d kept them. This was the first time since she’d left that she'd actually bothered to look at them.
And as she picked up a picture from her wedding day with trembling fingers, she remembered why.
God, she’d been so young. She knew that, of course, but seeing herself with baby fat still in her cheeks, standing next to a man old enough to be her grandfather was more jarring than she’d expected it to be.
But she made herself take each picture out, one by one, and look it over before setting it aside. If she was going to have a panic attack about something, she damn well wasn’t going to do it in front of Ivy. So for nearly an hour she went through those memories, reliving the worst years of her life alone in the dark. Letting herself feel the terror and heartache and the anger she’d carried with her for as long as she could remember. Here in the dark, she could let the tears come, could let herself sit with all the horrific things she’d lived through without worrying about upsetting her girl.
It surprised her that the memories weren’t all bad. A few of them even made her laugh as she remembered afternoons playing in the sun, pranks she and the other kids had pulled on each other in secret. Even in the midst of their own personal hell, they’d managed to carve out some sense of happiness.
Had Jacob ever had that chance? As a man within The Prophets, he would have been afforded opportunities she’d never had. But as the only son of Harlan Redding, he also would have shouldered an impossible amount of responsibility.
She’d find out soon enough, she supposed. She just wasn’t sure how the hell to feel about it.
Chapter 11
Ivy
When her alarm woke her again the next morning, Ivy smiled as she reached over to turn it off. Unlike the day before, she felt lighter, happier, more like her usual self. She hated being at odds with Cordelia, and yesterday was hands down the biggest fight they’d ever had.
Hopefully the worst of it was behind them.
But when she tried to slide from the bed to begin her day, she found herself trapped in Cordelia’s iron grip.
“Aren’t you forgetting something, blossom?” Her woman’s voice was thick with sleep and tinged with amusement.
Shit. Was she? “Umm, I don’t know.”
“Mmm.” Pulling Ivy back against her, Cordelia pressed a kiss to her neck, sending a delicious shiver down Ivy’s spine. “What are you supposed to be doing this week while you’re on restriction?”
You will ask permission to eat, to use the bathroom, to go out with your friends. Every single move you make will be at my discretion.
Apparently, Cordelia was taking that part of her punishment very literally. “May I please get out of bed, Ma’am?”
“Good girl. You may, and you may use the bathroom, but after your bathroom routine I want you to come kneel beside the bed.”
“Oh, but…”
Gripping Ivy’s cheeks, Cordelia turner her head, her eyes blazing with a possessive light that had Ivy’s breath catching in her chest. “I know it’s not your normal routine. And I know you don’t like it when I spring these changes on you, which is why I don’t do it often. But this is important, and it would please me very much if you did this for me.”
Not an order. She could tell from the words and Cordelia’s tone that if she told her, in all sincerity, that the sudden change in routine would be too hard for her, Cordelia would let it drop.
And because she knew she could refuse without consequence, the vice around her chest loosened a bit. “Yes, Ma’am.”
“Good girl. I’ll be right here when you get back.”
She hurried through her bathroom routine and then back to the bedroom, where she found Cordelia sitting on the edge of their bed, Ivy’s necklace dangling between her fingers. Heart pounding, Ivy lowered herself down to her knees beside her. And tried not to think about all the things she was supposed to be doing.
