Page 39 of Daddy's Wild Girl

Turning, he saw that Bebe was sitting up. He frowned as he crouched next to her. “You shouldn’t be moving. And it wasn’t a false threat.”

“I’m a bit winded and bruised, but really, I’m fine. I’ll be good as gold in a few minutes. Just need to get up and walk it off.”

“No,” he said firmly. “You do not need to just get up and walk it off. What you need to do is stay where you are until I’m sure you haven’t broken anything.”

“Um, Corbin, pretty sure the other people here want to use the half-pipe. And I’d rather not be sitting on it when they do.”

“They can wait.”

“Because skaters are known to be really patient,” she told him, raising an eyebrow. “I’m really all right.”

“I have a feeling you’d say that even if you were bleeding out.”

“Pretty sure you’d notice if I was bleeding out.”

He sighed, not feeling happy about any of this.

“Give me a hand up?” She held up her hand to him.

He knew it was a distraction. An olive branch of sorts. But he reached out and grabbed her wrist. He didn’t want to risk hurting her hand. He lifted her slowly up.

“Thanks,” she said. “See? Right as rain.” She took a step forward, then let out a low cry of pain and stumbled.

“Fuck! I knew it! You’ve hurt yourself. What’s wrong?” He leaped toward her and she turned to wink at him.

“Gotcha.”

“W-what?” He stumbled over the word as he gaped at her.

“I’m fine. Lighten up, man.” She walked over to where her stuff was. Some other skater ran over to hand her skateboard to her.

She smiled at the younger guy and he nearly tripped over his feet.

Yeah, Corbin understood that.

Her smile could make you feel like you were a hundred feet tall. As though you could do anything.

But the rest of the time . . . you either wanted to shake her or spank her.

Right now, he was leaning toward the latter.

That brat.

She’d pretended that she’d hurt herself. Lord, if anyone needed some discipline, it was her.

And then a long hug afterward.

Yep. That was exactly what she needed.

Corbin wasn’thappy with her.

Guilt rode Bebe hard. She’d just been playing a small joke. The truth was, she felt like one giant bruise. And she actually had been worried that she’d truly hurt herself when she’d fallen.

For the first few minutes, she couldn’t breathe and panic had welled inside her. The only reason she hadn’t slipped into a total panic attack was because of him.

Corbin.

When she’d seen him hovering over her, immediately her body had started to relax and she’d finally managed to take a small breath.

---