Page 23 of Learning Little Lizzie

Kylie blinked, her brows wrinkling with confusion. “What?”

“My shoes. I was wearing these gorgeous stilettos earlier and he made me change into these.” Fully embracing her sulk, Eliza lifted one foot off the ground.

“Oh. Well. At least they’re cute. He could have made you wear those shiny black Mary Janes the school-aged Littles usually wear.”

In unison, they shuddered at the thought. “Don’t give him any ideas,” Eliza said darkly.

“Is that the only reason you’re walking around with a black cloud over your head?”

“Yes. Maybe. I don’t know.” Closing her eyes against a wave of threatening tears, Eliza let her head fall back. “I may have told him he was ‘fucking ridiculous’ and slammed my bedroom door in his face when he told me to change my shoes.”

“Oh, El.” Kylie sighed, the sound filled with disappointment. “How are you even sitting right now?”

“He didn’t spank me. Not yet, anyway. I sorta demanded to come to breakfast and he told me that was fine because he ‘doesn’t mind making naughty Little girls squirm all day’. And I think I might be coming down with something because I sorta feel like I might throw up.”

“Honey, I think what you’ve come down with is a case of the guilties.”

Lifting her head, Eliza opened one eye enough to glare at her bestie. “You take that back. I have nothing to feel guilty over.” Other than the heels hidden away in her backpack, just waiting to be worn again.

Shit.

“Uh huh. Well, your tummy seems to disagree. Come on.” Jumping to her feet, Kylie held out a hand. “We should get something to eat. You might actually feel better, and if your Daddy is like all the other Daddies around here, skipping breakfast is a surefire way to get yourself in even more trouble. Which you obviously do not need.”

Kylie’s words rang in her head during breakfast, which Eliza only managed to eat a little of, and all the way over to the college campus. And when she slipped away to the bathroom to change back into the heels she’d smuggled out of the apartment, she didn’t feel the sense of triumph she’d expected to feel at getting one over on her strict guardian. Standing in front of the full-length mirror, she waited for that feeling to come as she twisted from side to side examining her sexy-as-fuck outfit.

But all she felt was that same heavy weight in her stomach. And as she turned to make her way to her only class of the day, she wondered if maybe Kylie was right about the source of that knot in her tummy.

CHAPTER 9

He should have just spanked her.

Sitting in the weekly staff meeting with the other Rawhide University professors, Samuel’s mind kept drifting to his naughty little charge. Maybe if he’d just spanked her and gotten it over with this morning, she wouldn’t be consuming his every thought now. Like the way she was going to look with that skirt flipped up and her pretty tights pulled down for Daddy’s paddle.

Because she was absolutely getting her bottom paddled tonight. Not only had she thrown a tantrum just because he’d asked her to do something she didn’t want to do, she’d cussed at him. Again.

Obviously his hand was not making much of an impression. Which wasn’t surprising, given her history at the Ranch, but he’d—perhaps naively—hoped it would be more than twenty-four hours before he would need to escalate her punishments.

“Samuel? Earth to Professor Eaton.”

The sound of his name jolted him out of his internal musings. “Sorry. I was… distracted.”

At the head of the table, Grant Chambers, Director of Discipline and the closest thing the University currently had to a dean, grinned. “By your charming new ward, I take it?”

Laughter rippled through the small crowd at the table and Samuel sent them all an easy smile. “So you’ve heard.”

“Derek sent out a memo this morning. Which you were probably too busy to read. How’s your hand feeling?” Grant asked with another low chuckle.

“Just fine, thank you. Eliza isn’t quite the hellion I expected from Derek’s descriptions of her.” It wasn’t a lie that his hand was feeling just fine, and if it allowed the rest of the staff to assume that was because Eliza had been exceptionally well-behaved, that wasn’t really his fault now was it?

Seated beside Grant, Dalton Rogers raised both eyebrows in a clear show of surprise. “Really? You’ve already managed to tame the untamable brat?”

“Ah, but can you ever truly tame a brat?” Samuel shrugged. “I believe Eliza and I have come to an understanding. I’m not so bold as to say she won’t be causing you all any issues, but if she does, please let me know so I can discuss them with her at home.”

From Samuel’s right came a snort of laughter from a pretty redheaded woman. Her hair was pulled up in a tight ponytail that reminded him a bit of a cheerleader, but he’d already heard whispers from the students that Professor Addison Renard was not a woman to be trifled with. “If you could get her to finish even one homework assignment, I think we’d all be appreciative.”

“Noted.”

“There’s also the talking in class,” Gray Remington added, his brows furrowed in clear annoyance. “I had her in Intro to Law last year and I spent half the class trying to get her to stop chatting with her friends. The only thing that ever seemed to work was sending her to Grant and even then the punishment only curtailed her behavior for a day or two.”

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