Finally, when the table was empty, Callie swallowed nervously. “Sean and I have two gifts for you.”
Axel disappeared, then returned a moment later with a big blow-up doll that looked like a drag queen in tacky lingerie. Painted on the plastic abdomen with red lettering were the words “poke me.”
The entire room dissolved in uproarious laughter. Even Joaquin grinned, because there was no way someone as sophisticated and obviously adored as Thorpe would ever resort to sex with an inanimate object, especially such an ugly one. Joaquin’s smile became a laugh when he even tried to picture it.
“Going for double or nothing on those spankings, pet?” Thorpe drawled.
“Oh, I gotta have a picture of this.” Logan jumped closer, camera in hand.
Before Thorpe could protest, Sean shoved the doll beside his friend, working it right against Thorpe’s body. Logan snapped a photo, howling at the image in his viewer.
Thorpe muttered a good-natured threat Sean’s way. Callie stepped between them, and they both put their arms around her. He dropped a kiss on her lips. “You’re in so much trouble, sweet brat.”
“But I’m your sweet brat,” she quipped.
“That you are. You’re lucky I love you so much. Otherwise you wouldn’t sit for a month. As it is, I’m not sure you’ve recovered from last night, but I don’t mind adding a little more soreness to that backside so you don’t forget me on Saturday.”
“I never could forget you, Sir.” She turned, suddenly serious. “Ever. I know I never will. Your second gift?”
“Ah, yes.” He nodded. “What have you cooked up now?”
“We,” she corrected. “All three of us.”
Joaquin stared, a thought prodding him.
Thorpe froze, looking as if he had the same suspicion, as Callie handed him a box. “Open it.”
The man didn’t move a muscle for a moment, just stared at the outpouring of love from her blue eyes, then flipped his gaze to Sean, who nodded, clearly holding his joy in.
Tearing into the gift, Thorpe tossed the bow and paper aside, then ripped the box open. Inside lay a tiny little garment in pristine white with black lettering inside a big red heart.
“I love Daddy,” he muttered, everything except shock sliding off his face. Then he jerked an urgent, searching stare to Callie. “You’re pregnant?”
She took his hand and led it to her flat stomach with a soft nod. “Seven weeks. I think when the three of us slipped away to the beach . . .” She looked really uncertain now, her eyes tearing up. “I hope this makes you happy. All I’ve ever wanted was to fill your heart and—”
Thorpe crushed her against his chest, halting her speech. He cupped her face, his stare searching. “In forty years, I’ve never been this happy. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me.” He reached out to clap Sean’s shoulder. “Both of you. Thank you. A baby is the best gift you could have given me.”
As he kissed Callie passionately, Joaquin wondered whose baby she carried. Did she even know? Even if she didn’t, none of them looked as if they cared. They were just happy to be together and soon to be a family.
A glance at Bailey proved that she’d welled up, happy tears that wished them joy—while quietly revealing how desperately she wanted a family of her own. A thought blindsided Joaquin: What if he planted life inside her? He blew out a breath. Hell of a thought . . . but for some reason, he wasn’t rejecting it outright.
Hunter sidled up to him, staring as Thorpe and Sean shook hands while cradling Callie between them. “That even tugs at me a little.”
Joaquin refused to admit the scene had affected him, too. “Maybe you can find something at the drugstore to take for that.”
“You want to be an asshole? Fine. My concern is my wife. She’s about to have a baby and she wants to be closer to her family. She wants our son to have an uncle besides Logan.” Hunter looked at his younger brother, who poked his finger into the gaping mouth hole of Thorpe’s blow-up doll with a howl, and shook his head. “Right now, I understand why. Jeez, he’s acting like an idiot.”
Hard to disagree with that. “What’s your point?”
“I understand missions and being out of pocket and feeling somewhere between detached and on edge. But that’s not a real life. Yeah, national security is important, but you need a personal stake, too, or none of this shit really means anything. Kata wants you around, but I won’t let you continue to hurt her. If you want to visit when you’re available and be a stand-up brother, I’m all for it. That would make my wife happy. And your mom would sure love to hear from you. Since she’s my stepmom now, I feel more than a little protective. But if you want to continue isolating yourself and being a prick, go the fuck away. And stay there this time.”
Chapter Ten
AN hour later, Bailey hovered in a corner of the dungeon and watched everything around her with wide eyes.
London looked far too pregnant to breathe, much less engage in any sort of dungeon play, so her husbands had simply curled up with her on a sofa across the room. Xander massaged her shoulders while Javier rubbed her feet and slightly swollen ankles. They punctuated the pampering with kisses. Unfortunately, Morgan had been exhausted after a busy week with a kicking fetus and a toddler, not to mention a little queasy, so Jack had taken her home. Thorpe had already bestowed forty of the sexiest possible swipes of his hand across Callie’s backside and fed her cake from his fork. After some very passionate kisses and Sean sneaking a hand up her skirt, the three of them had disappeared, supposedly to work on replenishing the snacks. Right . . .
Kata, faced with the same challenges as London, spent the evening curled up on Hunter’s lap in an overstuffed chair, watching Sweet Pea kneel at Axel’s feet. He looked like a mountain beside the dungeon’s petite receptionist.
He peeled off his tee and ordered her out of her retro shirtwaist dress and berry-pink bra. Once she’d complied, he affixed nipple clamps to her pert breasts and engaged her in a kinky game of Simon Says, rewarding her when she followed his specific, exacting commands. If she failed, he punished her by eliminating sensations and praise. Sweat sheened on their skin. Axel watched the girl with absolute concentration as he walked slow circles around her, just waiting for his next opportunity. She concentrated, breath held and desperate to please.
Their game turned Bailey on, but the other scene going on a few feet away held her in thrall.
Logan had stripped Tara down to a sturdy nursing bra and her tiny thong. He kissed her mouth softly, then worshipped her with a brush of his lips over her collarbones and breasts before inching down to caress the handful of reddish stretch marks bisecting her stomach.
“Don’t, Logan.” She squirmed to get away as his tongue traced the lines low on her belly.
He grabbed her wrists. “We’re going to cover this again, huh? I’m not perfect, you know. I have scars.”
“That’s different,” she murmured, avoiding his gaze.
“Look at me.” He waited until she complied. “It’s totally different. Your stretch marks are a beautiful badge of honor to me. I have two perfect daughters because of you. So don’t be self-conscious. And don’t make me paddle you again.”
When he bent to kiss her marks once more, Tara winced and squirmed. “I just don’t feel—”
“You are beautiful, as much as you’ve always been,” he vowed. “And I warned you. Now you’re in trouble. Again. This is one argument you’ll never win, Cherry.”
He grabbed a sputtering Tara and flung himself in a nearby chair, then spread her facedown across his lap. His big hand sailed down to smack her backside. She yelped, jerked, tensed. A bright red handprint appeared on her pale skin. Without missing a beat, Logan did it again.
Bailey stared, jaw hanging open. Was everyone going to let this man hit his wife simply because she’d had a self-conscious moment? She understood that her self-debasement wasn’t healthy and why it displeased him, but . . .
Clutching her spiked punch in hand, she sneaked a glance around the room to find the others either watching with interest, like Joaquin, or not paying attention at all. No way would she stand by idly while Tara endured.
Bailey stood and headed over to stop them. Someone had to.
Kata shoved up from Hunter’s lap and waddled in her direction, cutting her off. “Don’t.”
“Are you crazy?” Bailey knew what that spanking felt like. Slightly painful, primal. Disturbing. Hot.
“Never been around BDSM?”
“I’ve read a book or two. I pretty much get it.” She gestured to Tara. “But it’s obvious—”
“So the answer is no. Your head tells you that what you’re seeing is wrong, but some other part of you responds?”
Bailey whipped her gaze around to Joaquin’s sister. “How did you know?” The words slipped out. Horror spread through her. She closed her mouth, then sighed. “It looks abusive.”
“That’s how I felt when I first found the lifestyle.” Kata smiled. “I knew almost nothing about it until I met Hunter. I was both attracted and terrified. Everything he did to me seemed like something I should hate and protest. But when I almost lost him, I got honest with myself. I loved everything about it.” She cast a glance over her shoulder. “Look at them now.”
Bailey followed suit and somehow witnessed a whole different scene. Logan still spanked Tara’s ass at a brisk, almost blistering pace, but everything else had changed. The woman was no longer tense, but had melted into him, muscles lax, skin flushed. Her cries rang with passion, rather than weeping with pain. Heck, the two of them even seemed to breathe together, seemingly symbiotic, connected by his desire to touch her and her need to feel his concern.
Bailey let loose the breath she’d been holding. “What I’m seeing . . . it doesn’t make sense.”
“It does if you’re in Tara’s shoes.”
“I have been, but—” She looked Joaquin’s way, then realized what she was saying to the man’s sister and winced. “Sorry.”
“My brother spanked you?”
Kata sounded downright fascinated. Wasn’t she weirded out by that knowledge? Then again, if she watched her brother-in-law discipline his wife, maybe they were all beyond that.
“Yeah,” Bailey admitted softly. “But I stopped him in the middle.”
Kata sneaked a glance at Joaquin. “He’s interested, you know?”
“In me?” Kata and Callie both thought that. Why hadn’t they figured out that men like him, locked in life-and-death struggles, didn’t want silly little ballet dancers. “Not really. I’m important to his case, but—”
“You’re important to him as a woman,” she assured her. “Look, I’ll be honest. I haven’t seen much of my brother in years. When we were kids, our dad passed away after getting caught in a domestic dispute in the line of duty. He took a bullet to the chest. Doctors tried to perform surgery to repair the damage to his heart, but he bled out too fast.
“After that, Joaquin began to disconnect from everyone around him. Sometimes, it feels like I lost more than one family member that day. He didn’t attend my high school or college graduations. Hunter and I eloped, but Joaquin only attended our family ceremony for an hour. He didn’t even know that our mother had married Hunter’s father last fall. To see him interested in anyone is heartening.”
It was probably stupid, but a pang hit Bailey’s heart. He’d lost someone he must have loved dearly at a young age. How solitary had he been since? How much had he been hurting because of it?
Bailey wished she could help Kata—and Joaquin—because she knew what it felt like to be without family. She knew the pain of holidays spent around a Christmas tree by herself, about passing the milestones of life and not having the people she loved to share them with. Just like she knew that Kata was subtly asking her to help heal Joaquin. It hurt even more to shake her head.
“He’s trying to solve a case. He might want to sleep with me. I’m available and not a total troll. But he’s not trying to make any sort of emotional connection with me.”
“Why did he spank you?” she demanded.
“I made him mad.”
“Because . . . ?”
“He thought I’d risked myself too much by going into the public area of Dominion one night. I was with Callie and no one saw me, but—”
“He was worried about you,” Kata argued with a smile. “He didn’t want you to get hurt. That tells me he cares.”
Bailey hated to burst her bubble. “He didn’t want to lose the only person who might be able to help him understand why people are dying.”
Kata wagged a finger in her face. “If he didn’t care at all, he’d have locked you in a room and ignored you completely until he wanted to question you. Instead, he tossed you over his lap and put a bare hand to your bare ass, am I right?”
“Yeah.” So what was her point?
“That’s a very personal way to punish someone. He wanted to discipline you himself. He wanted to feel you as he did. A lot of Doms would have chosen isolation as a punishment, especially since it would keep you safe. Instead, he put his hands on you. You’re here at this party, talking to his sister. And he’s watching you right now . . . It grosses me out a little that I can see how much he wants you, but I’ll take that any day over his indifference.”
Bailey swallowed down a knot of lust. She didn’t want to want him. And she didn’t want to be responsible for Joaquin’s emotional state or whatever Kata was suggesting.
“My wife is very smart. And very right,” Hunter murmured, approaching in her blind spot and wrapping an arm around Kata’s waist.
Bailey whirled, then took a half step back to include him in the conversation. The look on Hunter’s face didn’t hold the slightest hint of teasing. He genuinely believed, as Kata and Callie did, that Joaquin wanted her as something more than a witness.
“I would have only administered a spanking in that situation if I had some visceral need to feel a sub’s reaction to my discipline.”
Why would a Dom need that? Her brow wrinkled with confusion. Kata smiled.
“In other words, Joaquin would have only punished you that way if he wanted to see and feel for himself that he’d gotten through to you,” Hunter explained. “Drinking in your pain and pleasure, experiencing you lowering your walls and surrendering to him, would help him believe that you wouldn’t foolishly risk yourself again. Isolating you would have been easy, probably even effective. But it would have given him absolutely no assurance that you understood. If he didn’t care, that wouldn’t matter.”
Hunter’s words slapped Bailey. Kata had said the same thing, more or less. For some reason, maybe because Hunter was a man interpreting a man’s actions, everything he said made more sense. Carried more weight.
Bailey lifted her fingers to her throat, her head racing. Joaquin didn’t just want to take her to bed, but she mattered in some inexplicable way? But if the only way he could show caring was to spank her, she should resist—no matter how sexy he seemed.
As she cast her gaze across the room, she saw that Logan had pulled Tara against him, chest to chest as he cradled her on his lap. She sobbed and he held her tight, crooning in her ear. But the woman didn’t look at all angry. Instead, she appeared somewhere between grateful and ecstatic.
Bailey thought back to the scene she’d witnessed in the dungeon with Callie the other night. That woman had worn a shockingly similar expression. Their tenderness looked so achingly poignant.
No way Bailey could deny that she wanted someone to care for her. No, not just someone. She cast a clandestine glance at Joaquin, only to find him watching her with a laser-focused stare. He watched her every gesture and nuance. No doubt, he’d be asking her questions later about what she’d seen and how it made her feel. She didn’t know what to say.
Kata let out a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness Logan finally helped Tara cry.”
“Yeah,” Hunter ad
ded grimly.
“She’s been bottled up since giving birth,” Kata explained. “She’s trying to be supermom and superwife. She’s gone back to work in the last few weeks and isn’t getting enough sleep. She’s so worried about letting everyone else down. Logan has been trying to get her to open up, release her stress, and lean on him more.”
“That ought to do the trick.” Hunter smiled.
“You mean . . . he spanked her for her benefit?” Now Bailey was really confused.
“I doubt Logan was complaining,” Hunter drawled. “But yes. He had to get past her walls and reach the woman underneath. Now that she’s opened up, they’ll be able to better communicate and work