Total pages in book: 112
Estimated words: 113272 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 566(@200wpm)___ 453(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113272 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 566(@200wpm)___ 453(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
Imagine how you’d feel if you got close to these guys and they did the same thing?
What if they left you after you fell in love? What if they’re not the men they seem to be?
She’d been burned once by a guy pretending to be caring and thoughtful . . . only he was a monster underneath.
And her own mom left her. Maybe she didn’t want to, it was hard to know. She’d never really been present in her life.
Didn’t mean that it didn’t hurt.
Rejection sucked. Even as an adult. She thought she’d built a thick skin but it seemed that it wasn’t thick enough.
“No one is taking your dog.”
To her surprise, it was Kellan who grasped hold of her chin and spoke. He was definitely more stand-offish than Eli. He didn’t often touch her. But right now he held her chin in his hand as he stared down at her firmly.
She gaped up at him.
“Do you hear me?” he asked.
She nodded slowly.
“Good girl. No one is taking that dog from you. Certainly not us.”
“Of course not. Why would you think that?” Eli asked as Kellan dropped his hand from her chin.
“You said that you had to learn to live together,” she reminded him. “You and Horse.”
“Well, yes, but you’ll be living there too,” Eli said as though she should have known that.
“But you really don’t have to stay with me,” she said.
“We’re not leaving you alone,” Kellan said, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Definitely not,” Eli said. “I get the feeling you’re going to be a terrible patient.”
“I am not!” she protested.
Eli shook his head. “Just as well we know how to deal with naughty girls who don’t do as they’re told.”
What was happening right now? Why were they looking at her like that?
“How?” she asked.
“We spank them, of course.”
Her mouth dropped open. “You do not!”
Yeah, she’d heard a few rumors about Haven. There was a popular BDSM club here called Saxon’s. She assumed a number of spankings happened there.
But that wasn’t happening to her.
Oh yeah? Like you can’t imagine being held over their lap and spanked until your bottom is hot and you’re squirming?
Shit.
“I’m not a sub,” she blurted out.
Eli raised an eyebrow. “Sure about that?”
She nodded frantically. “I don’t want anyone tying me up.”
No. Nope.
“Or doing things I don’t want to.”
“No one will do anything you don’t want,” Kellan told her with a scowl.
“That’s not the way BDSM works. It’s all about consent. You tell us your likes and dislikes. And you always have a safeword. So, really, you’re in charge,” Eli explained. “But you don’t have to think about this right now. It’s not a deal breaker.”
“And you don’t have to be a sub to get spanked in Haven,” Kellan said.
“Um, what do you mean?”
Eli raised his eyebrows. “You know that every woman in Haven has a guardian, right?”
“Yes, I know that. Jake is acting as mine. But he’s not going to spank me.”
“Well, no. Jake doesn’t spank anyone but Molly.”
“He spanks his wife?”
“If she broke the rules, he would,” Eli told her. “How do you think other women in Haven are punished by their guardians if they disobey the rules?”
“In fairness, they’re not all spanked,” Kellan said.
“True. There are other punishments. Especially if your guardian is a relative rather than your husband,” Eli said. “There’re lots of punishments that can be used if you use your imagination. So if spanking is a hard limit we can look at that.”
“I don’t . . . I don’t know what is a limit and I don’t have to talk about them because Jake is my guardian.”
“For the moment,” Eli replied with a grin.
“What does that mean?” A wave of exhaustion hit her. This was too much for her to deal with right now.
What did ‘for the moment’ mean?
And why did they want to take care of her? She’d kicked them out of her house after that kiss with Eli while Kellan watched on and gave orders.
The memory of that made her body heat.
However, she knew she still likely owed them an apology.
“I think we’ve talked enough for right now,” Eli said. “You need to rest.”
“And let us take care of you,” Kellan added.
“Nobody ever takes care of me.”
Shoot. She hadn’t meant to say that. It had slipped past her lowered shields.
“Well, now you have us,” Eli replied as he gently ran his fingers through her hair. Her eyes drifted shut and she felt herself starting to slip into sleep.
“That’s it, go to sleep, baby. I know that things have been rocky. We weren’t sure that we could do this, either. But these past few days apart . . . then seeing you collapse like that. It cemented things in our minds. You’re going to be ours . . . we just have to work on getting you to trust us. To know that we mean it. But we will . . . and then we’re going to spend our lives taking care of you.”