Page 97 of Bound By My Father's Best Friend

We’d had our fun this morning, and it seemed like Hector really wanted me to be good.

When I jumped up onto the couch, Hector disappeared into the other room. I toyed with a knitted red blanket that Hector used as a throw on the couch and tugged it around my shoulders, waiting in anticipation.

A couple of moments later, Hector walked out from the hallway with a black gift box.

My eyes widened, and I chewed on the inside of my cheek. I didn’t know what it was, but I was beyond excited. I hadn’t felt this excited for a gift since I had been a child. While Christmas morning had come and gone, this felt more like it than anything.

“So,” I said, “what is it?”

He set it on my lap. “You’ll have to open it to find out, but first”—he grabbed one of my ankles and undid the strap of my heel—“let’s get you out of these.” Once he undid the other and pulled them both off me, he nodded and sat next to me. “Okay.”

While Hector was the most confident man I knew, there was something about him, sitting underneath the twinkling Christmas lights, that made him so vulnerable right now. I clutched the box in my hand and leaned in to kiss him again.

Because I honestly didn’t care what was in the box. I’d love anything from him.

“I love you,” I whispered.

“If you love me, I think you’ll love what’s in the box more.”

My lips curled into a smirk. “I doubt that.”

I opened the box and pulled out the black tissue paper, revealing nothing other than a thick black collar that read the wordsHector’s Brat. My eyes widened, and I looked between him and the collar several times.

“This is … this is for me?” I said, voice barely above a whisper. “Really?”

“Of course it’s for you, Heather,” Hector said. “Do you like it?”

“Hector …”

Tears welled in my eyes, and I tried to form a response—I really did—but so many emotions were rushing through me right now. My fingers were shaking, and all I could think about was … how much he really loved me.

Hector tucked some hair behind my ear. “Heather, are you okay?”

I burst out into a fit of tears and sobbed loudly, burying my face into his chest and hugging him tightly. I didn’t know what to say, and I didn’t think something like this would ever mean so much to me.

But with Dad not even messaging me today, I … I felt some type of way.

A way that I didn’t think I would be able to fix, to heal, to fill.

After placing the box and collar on the coffee table, Hector wrapped his arms around me and pulled me closer to him, his warm breath on my hair. “If you don’t like it, I can get you a new one. We don’t have to?—”

“I love it,” I cried, pushing away tears with the back of my wrist. “I’m sorry. I’m a mess.”

He gently released me from his hold and smiled. “You’re not a mess.”

My lips twitched into a frown. “I don’t deserve you.”

“Don’t say that.” Hector captured my chin in his hand and lifted it so I’d meet his gaze. “Understand?”

“Yes.”

Though I was still getting used to loving myself despite what everyone else thought of me. It was hard and terrifying, but I knew that it’d be so freeing. One day, I would have to face Dad and tell him that I was Hector’s full-time submissive, and I’d have to be okay with that.

“Pull your hair back,” Hector said, taking the collar from the box.

My heart raced, and I pulled my hair up so he could fasten it around my neck. Gently, he wrapped it around my throat and buckled it in the back. Then, he drew his fingers against the letters, and his smile widened.

“You’re mine now,” he said.

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