Page 22 of Daddy Devious

I’m still not sure why it matters to me so much if he’s upset with me. I mean, I certainly don’t want another spanking. But it’s more than that. Something deeper, almost like a longing inside me I can’t pinpoint or begin to explain.

“You promise you aren’t mad?” I ask, peeking up at him through my lashes as he carries me back to my bedroom, where he settles into a chair.

“No, little one. I’m not angry.”

Relief washes over me, unraveling the knots my stomach had tied itself into when he’d scolded me. “Why did we come back to my room? I thought we were having dessert.”

“We are.” Leaning to the side, he fiddles with something I can’t see. “This is a very special dessert, just for Little girls. Your Auntie Cat has worked very, very hard to make this for you, so I want you to drink as much as your tummy can handle.”

“Who’s Auntie Cat?”

Wait.Drinkas much as my tummy can handle?

And then I see what he has in his hand. A bottle, full of milk.

Please, please let Auntie Cat be the name of his cow.

Mr. Stone pops the lid off the bottle, and I watch in fascinated horror as he brings the rubber tip to my mouth. When I press my lips into a thin line, pulling my head back and shaking it in clear denial, his expression hardens.

“Victoria. Auntie Cat will be very disappointed if you refuse her milk. Do you want to start your relationship out on such a sour note before you even meet her?”

No. I don’t want that. For reasons I yet again cannot explain, the thought of disappointing this complete stranger nearly brings tears to my eyes.

I already know I’m going to drink the damn milk. But maybe I can get something out of it, first. “If I drink it, will you tell me who Auntie Cat is? And about the others?”

A sigh rumbles in his chest. “I don’t make a habit of negotiating, Victoria. But yes, I will tell you about your new family if you drink your milk.”

I can’t quite bring myself to actually say the words, so I simply open my mouth. The rubber tip feels a bit funny in my mouth, like it’s not supposed to be there.

But then I give the nipples a tentative suck, and sweet, cold milk floods my mouth. Sweeter than any milk I’ve had before, I can understand why Mr. Stone referred to it as dessert.

Holding the bottle to my lips as I suckle, he begins to rock us back and forth in the chair. “Let’s see. Where should we start? I suppose we’ll just go clockwise around the island. Which would be… your Uncle Jasper, first. He’s our real estate mogul. When we first started talking about building ourselves a safe haven, he was the one who went hunting for a place for us to settle. I believe you’ll come to think of him as the ‘fun uncle’, but don’t let that fool you into thinking he’ll put up with any naughtiness. He’s just as strict as he is fun.”

Jasper… real estate mogul… the information teases something at the back of my brain, but again that answer hovers just out of reach.

“Next would be Uncle Evan. I’m not sure I should tell you too much about him. I wouldn’t want my little girl to have nightmares. But while some people might consider him a very bad man, you’ll be perfectly safe with him.

Uncle Gideon and I actually grew up together. We went to the same schools from preschool all the way through college. Gideon is very quiet, especially around new people, so don’t be surprised if he doesn’t talk much when you first meet him. Some might call him shy, but they’d be wrong. It’s more that he likes to watch people. So if you think you can get away with anything around Uncle Gideon, you might want to think twice, little one. Nothing gets past that man.”

There’s such easy affection in his tone, I already feel as though I know these people. Like I can trust them, at least as much as I trust Mr. Stone.

Well, perhaps not Uncle Evan, whoever he might be. But the rest of them, maybe.

“And finally, we have your Auntie Cat. I think you’ll probably like her the best. She’s been waiting longer than any of us for a Little girl of her very own. Even if you aren’t hers, I fear she’s going to spoil you plenty. But just like Uncle Jasper, don’t thinkthat makes her an easy mark. She is the strictest of all of us, and she keeps a hairbrush in her purse at all times, just in case a naughty Little girl requires some correction.”

Between the milk in my tummy and Mr. Stone’s soothing voice, the exhaustion I’ve been fighting since we left the plane drags me under. I push the bottle away, whimpering and shaking my head to tell him I don’t want anymore.

“Such a good girl. You drank nearly the whole bottle,” he murmurs, setting the bottle aside and rising from the chair. “Sleep now, my sweet little thief. We have a big day in the morning.”

I fall asleep as the side of the crib comes up, caging me in, and my dreams are filled with unicorns and fountains of the sweetest milk I’ve ever tasted. And Maxwell Stone, watching from the shadows, waiting for just the right moment to pounce and make me his.

Chapter Nine

Maxwell

I could sit and watch Little Victoria sleep all night. But I have a call to make, and as I told her, we do have a very big day tomorrow. And with the light sedative I had added to her milk, there’s no chance she’ll wake before morning.

So I force myself from the room, switching the lights off but leaving the single unicorn night-light on in the off chance the sedative does wear off before I can wake her. I pass the mostly empty bottle off to one of my staff and head downstairs to my office.

---