Page 67 of Bet On Me, Daddy

“Ask me if I care about being fair, Ruby Red.”

“Bastard.”

“Tsk tsk. Keep up the name calling and I’ll show you how much of a bastard I can really be, little girl.”

In his room, he placed her on her feet as he settled on the edge of his bed. Her cheeks were flushed with a mixture of righteous fury and excitement, the deep brown of her eyes burning with it.

The caregiver side of him wanted nothing more than to tuck her into bed so she could get plenty of rest. It was late, and they both needed to be up early.

But those other parts of himneededto see her submit, even if it was just for a moment. So he looked closely for the exhaustion he’d seen in her earlier, but for now at least she looked more than capable of handling whatever he threw at her.

Good.

“This really isn’t fair, Sir.”

Keeping his gaze locked with hers, he took his time unbuttoning and rolling his sleeves to his elbow. It didn’t escape his notice that her attention kept drifting to his arms before she snapped it back. Every now and then, her tongue would dart out, wetting her lips.

Adorable. Impossibly sexy. And all his.

At least for tonight.

“Why are you getting spanked, Ruby?” Despite this being a playful punishment, he put a bit of steel behind the words. Just enough to make her squirm, which she did, much to his delight.

“Because you’re an unreasonable?—”

Holding up a hand, he cut her off. “Let me stop you right there, little girl. One more disrespectful word out of you, and you will be going to bed with a sore bottom both inside and out. As luck would have it, there is a large, fresh chunk of ginger sitting in my fridge and I’d be all too happy to repurpose it. Now. Why are you being spanked?”

Her sharp intake of breath was accompanied by her pupils going dark with need. “Because you can’t take a fucking joke,Bex.”

So, she wanted to play the brat, did she?

Very well. He was more than happy to play with her.

Rising to his feet again, he wrapped a hand around the back of her neck, watching in amusement as the first flickers of feardanced in her eyes. “My naughty, naughty girl. Now Daddy’sreallygoing to have to punish you.”

Ruby

Oh,shit. She’d definitely pushed him too far.

The playful smirk he’d been wearing was still in place, but it had taken on a hard edge that matched the steel in his gaze.

But despite all that—or, if she was being honest, probably because of it—need flared to life between her thighs. And she couldn’t resist poking him just a little bit more because of it.

“You don’thaveto do anything, you know,” she said, flashing him a sassy smile.

“Oh, but I do. How else will my naughty girl learn where the lines are so she can keep crossing them every chance she gets?”

Her heart tripped painfully in her chest. How did he always seem to know exactly the right thing to say? This wasn’t about punishing her because he couldn’t stand to be disrespected, or to force her compliance.

He would punish her, yes. But he was making it clear he not only expected her to continue being a brat and breaking the rules, but he welcomed it.

Dangerous, dangerous man.

“Before we get started, is ginger a limit for you?”

“No, Daddy.” Anything anal was usually off limits to her play partners but, well, he wasn’t her usual play partner, either.

He was Daddy.

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