Page 72 of Daddy’s Hunted Bride

Staring down at my mutinous Little girl, I bite back the urge to sigh. “If being extra careful with your health makes me a mean Daddy, then I guess I’m mean. Now, march yourself back up those stairs before I decide your naptime would be better spent in the corner.”

“Ugh.” Turning on her heel, she stomps up the steps, making her discontent known with every footstep. “This house is a prison!”

Great. Lanie’s favorite phrase is catching on. Ignoring it for now, I call up the stairs after her. “And keep that television off, little girl!”

“Whatever!”

Before I can take more than a single step toward our rooms, a hand lands on my arm and I turn to find Eli standing beside me, amusement twisting his usually grumpy features into something almost resembling a smile.

“What do you want?” I snarl, more out of a need to release some of the pent-up aggravation in my system than anything he’s done.

“Come with me.”

“Elias, I don’t have time for whatever this is. I have a cranky Little girl in obvious need of her Daddy’s attention.”

“And that’s exactly what we need to talk about.”

On that cryptic note, he turns and walks away. I glance up the stairs, torn between marching up there and putting the largest plug I can find in my naughty girl's bottom before sitting her in the corner to think about her behavior and following my brother into whatever he has planned.

In the end, I decide Vanessa and I could probably use a few minutes apart to calm down before I punish her, so I turn and follow Eli down the hall. Into… the den?

What is going on?

My confusion only grows when I step into the room behind him and find myself confronted with every single one of my siblings, save for Bram. Who is, I assume, somewhere off keeping the other Little ones busy so the rest of my family can ambush me with whatever this is.

“Hello, Dane.” From her seat in the center of the gathering—of course—Gray smiles at me, a too-serene gesture that has my hackles rising. “Have a seat.”

There’s an empty armchair just to Gray’s right, so I settle there, doing my best to look more nonchalant than I feel. “What’s up? Is this an intervention or something?”

“It is,” Axel says with a grunt, his arms folded and his brows drawn together in a glower. “You’re driving everyone crazy and it has to stop.”

“What are you talking about?”

Colt picks up where our eldest brother left off. “It’s been almost three weeks since Nessie’s accident and you’re still treating her like she’s made of glass. You can’t keep her locked in her nursery forever, Dane.”

Feeling a bit like a bug under a microscope, I resist the urge to squirm in my seat. “Not forever. Just until I’m sure she’s better.”

“She’s been better,” Ford says, his tone at least more understanding than Colt and Axel’s have been. “Honestly, I held off on giving her the all-clear as long as I did mostly because I could see how worried you were. But you need to accept that it’s time to let her get back to being a normal Little girl, Dane.”

“That’s easy for you to say. You weren’t the one who found your baby passed out and bleeding on the ground. You weren’t the one who had to sit and wait and worry if she was going to be okay.”

“You’re right.” It’s my sister now, leaning over to squeeze my arm. For once she doesn’t seem like she’s trying to intentionally aggravate or needle me. Sincerity pours off her in a way I’m not used to seeing that makes me feel both comforted and wary.

“We don’t know,” she continues quietly. “Not exactly. But you’re a dumbass if you think every fucking one of us wasn’t terrified of what you’d find in those woods. If you think Eli didn’t pace a hole in the goddamn floor waiting for you to return from the hospital or that Axel wasn’t kicking his own ass for letting her get away from him. She may not be our Little girl, but she’s still ours and we love her just as much as you do, Dane. So when we tell you that you need to back off her a bit, it’s because we love her and want what’s best for her.”

Gray’s words slowly sink in as I look around the room at my family. And I see her sentiment reflected on all their faces. Worry, concern.

And yeah. Love.

Blowing out a breath, I run my hand through my hair. “All right. What do you think I should do?”

Nessie

Stretched out on Daddy’s bed, I glare up at the ceiling as I wait for him to follow me up the stairs. Not that it matters, really. The worst he’s going to do is sit me on my “naughty girl stool” in the corner for a few minutes while he lectures me about how I still need to heal and blah, blah, blah.

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine I’d ever miss spankings. But right now, I’d give just about anything for Daddy to take his belt to my bottom before he fucks me good and hard. My insides feel all twisted up and knotty and I just know that would make things all better.

What if he never spanks me again? What if this is just my life now, being held captive in this stupid house with nothing but board games to keep me occupied?