Page 25 of Daddy Issues

  Salt made a soft sound at the back of his throat but didn’t try to in­ter­rupt so I went on. I could barely get the words out but I made my­self say them any­way.

  “My father left me when I was so young and I guess…I guess I missed that. Missed hav­ing a man I could de­pend on and trust—one I thought I could trust any­way—never to leave me.” I looked down at my fin­gers which were twis­ted to­gether in a tight knot. My knuckles were white with ten­sion. “I con­vinced my­self you felt it too,” I said in a low voice. “What a stu­pid fool I was.”

  “Andi—” he began again but I found I couldn’t look at him any­more. Now that I had ad­mit­ted my shame, I just wanted to get away.

  I walked quickly into the kit­chen and went to the counter where I had been pre­par­ing cel­ery and car­rots earlier. Blindly, I picked up the knife and star­ted chop­ping again, sli­cing heed­lessly, not pay­ing much at­ten­tion to what I was do­ing. How could I? My en­tire be­ing seemed to be one snarled knot of shame and pain and hor­ror at what I had just ad­mit­ted to my part­ner—to the only man who had ever mattered to me since my father had left when I was nine.

  He’ll think I’m sick, I thought. Sick and dis­gust­ing, ad­mit­ting I wanted that—no, that I needed it. Needed everything he did to me at the In­sti­tute. What man in his right mind would want a wo­man like that? Someone so weak? So needy and de­praved?

  My thoughts were a mil­lion miles away and I wasn’t watch­ing what I was do­ing. It’s hardly a sur­prise that the knife chose that mo­ment to slip in my grasp and slice my fin­ger in­stead of the stalk of cel­ery I’d been hack­ing at.

  I gasped and dropped it with a clat­ter on the cut­ting board. I didn’t know how bad the cut was and I didn’t want to know—I grabbed my bleed­ing fin­ger in my fist and squeezed tight, try­ing to stop the flow.

  I don’t know if you’ve ever had this hap­pen but some­times when your mind is a mess and your emo­tions are in tur­moil, all it takes is a little phys­ical pain to push you over the edge.

  I hadn’t cried when Salt sat in the Cap­tain’s of­fice and said he wanted an­other part­ner. I hadn’t cried while we watched the video of the two of us to­gether, even though I knew we never would be again. I hadn’t even cried when I told him my shame­ful secret—that I liked and needed the things we had been do­ing to­gether at the In­sti­tute. But now the sharp pain of my wounded fin­ger brought the tears that had been hov­er­ing like a rain cloud to the sur­face and I couldn’t hold them back any longer.

  I clutched my wounded fin­ger to my chest and bowed my head as the sobs shook me. I didn’t want to be like this—didn’t want to be weak and needy and sick but some­how I couldn’t help it. The events of my child­hood had left me raw and warped in­side—flawed in a way that seemed im­possible to fix. I was scarred…dam­aged and I didn’t blame my part­ner for want­ing noth­ing to do with me now. I didn’t want any­thing to do with me either.

  I wished I was dead.

  Sud­denly I heard Salt come up be­hind me.

  “Andi,” he said and his deep voice was wor­ried. “What happened—what is wrong?”

  “I…I’m fine,” I choked out, try­ing des­per­ately to get con­trol of my­self. I didn’t want him to see me like this. Didn’t want him to think I was even weaker than he already did. “I just…I cut my­self but only a little bit. It’s a really small wound—I’m okay—you can go now.”

  “Bull­shit,” he said. “Is not a small wound—there is blood every­where!”

  “Is there?” I looked down and saw he was right—the pale green cel­ery and bright or­ange car­rots I had been cut­ting were now spattered with gory droplets of scar­let.

  “Yes. So let me see.” He spun me around and tried to take my wounded hand but I backed away, keep­ing my dis­tance.

  “I told you, I’m fine,” I said, wish­ing my voice soun­ded stronger. “Now please, would you just go?”

  “I am not go­ing any­where un­til you let me look at your fin­ger,” he said firmly. “Come.” He held out his hand for mine but I still res­isted.

  “No.” I lif­ted my chin. “You’re not my part­ner any­more and you’re not re­spons­ible for me.”

  “I am re­spons­ible for you,” he growled. Then his voice changed—went low and soft and com­mand­ing. “Mishka,” he said. “Let me see your fin­ger.”

  “Don’t.” I looked up at him, my heart beat­ing so hard I thought it would burst. “Don’t do that.”

  “I must.” Salt cupped my cheek in his big hand gently. “Mishka,” he said again. “Show Papa your hurt fin­ger. Let me make it bet­ter.”

  For a mo­ment a blind­ing rage filled me—how dare he do this to me? How dare he use my weak­ness against me? Then I looked up at him, looked into his eyes. They were filled with ten­der­ness and de­sire—he was look­ing at me the same way he had at the In­sti­tute. The way he had when he rocked me and bathed me and read me bed­time stor­ies. There was no lie in his eyes—no de­cep­tion. Only the de­sire to heal and pro­tect me.

  Word­lessly, I held out my wounded hand.

  “Hmm.” Salt ex­amined me wor­riedly. The bleed­ing had mostly stopped be­cause I’d been put­ting pres­sure on it but it was still a long, ugly cut right up the middle of my ring fin­ger. How in the world I’d man­aged to slice my­self in such an awk­ward way I didn’t know but there it was and it hurt like hell.

  “Salt—” I began but he shook his head.

  “Call me Papa. And come to sink—let me tend you.”

  He walked me over to the kit­chen sink and ran cold wa­ter over my cut. This made it bleed again but Salt wrapped it firmly in a pa­per towel and had me hold it tightly while he went for the first aid sup­plies. By the time he brought the Neo­sporin and bandaids, the cut had mostly stopped bleed­ing again. Salt ten­ded the wound and band­aged me care­fully.

  “There,” he said at last, eye­ing his handi­work with ap­par­ent sat­is­fac­tion. “Should heal with no prob­lems now.”

  “Thank you,” I said, not meet­ing his eyes.

  “Thank you, what?” Salt asked sternly. When I wouldn’t an­swer him, he lif­ted my chin so that I had to meet his eyes.

  “Thank you…Papa,” I whispered at last.

  “That’s good. Very good, my little mishka.”

  Without warn­ing, he swung me up into his arms and car­ried me back to the liv­ing room.

  I wanted to protest but be­fore I could, he had settled on the couch with me in his lap. I thought he was go­ing to kiss me but in­stead he pulled me against him and po­si­tioned my head on his chest. Then he stroked my hair and held me close. His big hands felt won­der­ful, mov­ing over my trem­bling back and shoulders, pet­ting my hips and arms and thighs, al­most as though he couldn’t bear to stop touch­ing me.

  For my­self, I felt like I could never get enough of his touch, enough of be­ing close to him. But I still wasn’t com­pletely com­fort­able with what seemed to be hap­pen­ing.

  “Salt,” I said in a low voice. “Please, you don’t have to do this—don’t have to act this way just for me.”

  He stopped strok­ing me and let me sit up for a mo­ment.

  “You think I am do­ing this only for you?” he asked, rais­ing an eye­brow at me.

  “Well…aren’t you? I mean, the whole ‘Papa and mishka’ thing? What could you pos­sibly get out of it?”

  “The chance to hold you,” he said ser­i­ously. “The chance to care for you and pro­tect you the way I have wanted to al­most from the mo­ment I first saw you.”

  “You…you really feel that way?” I asked, my breath catch­ing in my throat.

  Slowly, he nod­ded.

  “When the Cap­tain first put us to­gether, you re­minded me of my young­est sis­ter. Not in looks—she has black hair and blue eyes, like me,” he ad­ded hast­ily. “But in size. You were so tiny—so del­ic­ate. I wanted at once to pro?
?tect you. But then…” He shrugged, his broad shoulders rolling with the move­ment. “Then I learned that you do not need pro­tec­tion. Nor do you want it. You wish only to be in­de­pend­ent wo­man who does not need any­one—who does not need a man. So what could I do?”

  “I don’t know,” I whispered. “I guess…just be my friend?”

  “This is what I did,” he said, nod­ding. “I did not think you would let me treat you in the way I wished to.”

  “What way was that?” I whispered. I thought I knew but I needed to hear it from him.

  Salt sighed. “I know you do not like to hear this but you are so little. So…per­fect. I wanted al­ways to pick you up and hold you—to cuddle you and stroke your hair as I am do­ing now.”

  He stroked one big, warm hand over my hair and I shivered at the depth of need that simple touch stirred in me.

  “Really?” I whispered.

  “Da.” He nod­ded. “You said over and over how sick it was, this ‘Age Play’, while we were on our as­sign­ment. But then…you changed. At first I thought you were simply act­ing as we must in or­der to avoid sus­pi­cion. But then I began to hope…to be­lieve that you were act­ing in a way you truly wanted to act.”

  “I was,” I ad­mit­ted in a low voice. “But I thought the same about you—that you were just act­ing.”

  “I was at first.” He shrugged again. “But then I found that I liked it. I liked be­ing able to hold you and pet you as I al­ways wished to. And of course…” He looked at me dir­ectly, his eyes cap­tur­ing mine. “I have al­ways wanted to touch and taste you. Oh yes, I liked it—liked it very much.”

  I felt my breath catch in my throat.

  “I…I didn’t know you felt that way.”

  “Now you do.” His eyes still held mine. “What do you wish to do about it…mishka?”

  “I…I don’t know,” I con­fessed. I felt like I had been given a present I had never ex­pec­ted and most cer­tainly didn’t de­serve. The idea that my part­ner was really into this kind of re­la­tion­ship seemed strange and un­likely but I wanted badly to be­lieve it was true.

  Salt must have seen the ques­tions and doubts in my eyes be­cause he brushed his knuckles lightly over my cheek and mur­mured, “What is it, my darling? Tell me, what is the prob­lem?”

  “There’s no prob­lem only…” I bit my lip. “You…you’re really into this? I mean, the whole ‘Papa and mishka’ thing? You’re not just go­ing along with it for me—be­cause of what I told you?”

  Salt pulled me closer—so close our fore­heads touched and we were look­ing deeply into each other’s eyes.

  “I love be­ing your Papa,” he mur­mured, slip­ping his hand un­der my t-shirt to stroke the small of my back. “In any way you need. I love to hold you and cuddle you, to bathe you and wash your hair and take care of you in every way, if only you will let me.”

  “And what about…other ways?” I whispered breath­lessly, pulling back so I could study his whole face. “What about the other ways you took care of me while we were at the In­sti­tute?”

  He raised an eye­brow. “You mean the way I take care of you sexu­ally?”

  “Well…yeah,” I said. “Don’t you think it’s, I don’t know, weird for me to call you ‘Papa’ while you go down on me or…or do other things?”

  He shook his head.

  “Not at all. We are two con­sent­ing adults—why should we not play this way if it gives us pleas­ure?”

  “But maybe it shouldn’t give us pleas­ure,” I ar­gued. “Maybe it’s wrong…sick…”

  “Andi,” he said ser­i­ously. “Are you think­ing of your bio­lo­gical father while we are do­ing these things? An­swer me hon­estly.”

  “What? No!” I shivered. “Of course not.”

  “Of course not,” he re­peated. “Which is one reason we de­cided you would call me Papa and not ‘Daddy’ as you called him. But you are want­ing a man to act in the way he did—to be pro­tect­ive, to give you se­cur­ity, af­fec­tion, safety. To give you love,” he said gently.

  My heart began to beat harder but I tried to stay cas­ual.

  “Well, I guess so.” I shrugged.

  “And when are you able to open your­self to these other feel­ings?” Salt asked reas­on­ably. “When are you able to re­lax and let your­self feel sexual? When you feel safe, se­cure, pro­tec­ted and loved. Would you agree?”

  “Yes. Yes, of course.” I was sur­prised that he’d ana­lyzed our situ­ation in such de­tail but maybe he had been think­ing about this as long as I had. “But what about what you told Berkley?” I asked, re­mem­ber­ing his words to the Dir­ector of the In­sti­tute. “You said everything they did there was sick and that it dis­gus­ted you.”

  “I was speak­ing of the Please pro­duc­tion,” Salt said pa­tiently. “Of the way they were pump­ing out poison date rape drugs. This is what dis­gus­ted me—not the Age Play. Though they did take it to—how do you say? To the ex­treme.”

  “Yes, they did.” I re­membered the thick black plug he had put in­side me and shivered a little.

  In that un­canny way of his, my part­ner seemed to read my mind.

  “You are think­ing of the plug,” he mur­mured, strok­ing a strand of hair away from my heated cheeks. “Or maybe the spank­ings I gave you—the ones where I used only my hand.”

  “Yes,” I ad­mit­ted, bit­ing my lip.

  “Tell me ex­actly what you are think­ing, mishka,” he dir­ec­ted in a low voice. “Tell me about the spank­ings first. Did you dis­like them?”

  “I don’t know…” I looked down at my hands, feel­ing sud­denly shy. “I thought I did but…but they made me feel so…” I didn’t know how to put it. “They made my body re­act,” I ad­mit­ted softly.

  “Did your pussy get wet?” Salt asked dir­ectly, his voice a low growl.

  “Yes,” I whispered. “But I don’t know why.”

  “Maybe be­cause Baby­girls need to be pun­ished at times.” He stroked my cheek. “But I do not think I wish to pun­ish you for a while. Not un­til you are over what I did with my belt.” He looked sud­denly ser­i­ous. “I still re­gret that deeply, you know.”

  “I know,” I whispered. “And it hurt. But it was all you could do at the time.”

  “I will not do this to you again,” he vowed grimly. “I would rather die than give you such harsh pun­ish­ment again, my darling.”

  “Well…there are other ways to pun­ish,” I poin­ted out, feel­ing my face get hot again.

  “So we are back to the plug.” He looked at me spec­u­lat­ively. “How did you feel about that, mishka?”

  “I felt…” I cleared my throat, feel­ing nervous. “I was scared at first,” I ad­mit­ted. “But then you made me feel so good…”

  “You mean when I tasted you?” he mur­mured.

  “Yes,” I whispered. “Yes, when you tasted me.”

  “And do you like it when your Papa goes down on you, mishka?” His voice was a deep, soft growl. “Do you like to spread your pussy for your Papa and let him lick and suck your sweet little clit?”

  “Oh God…” Sud­denly I could hardly breathe, I was so turned on. My nipples were tight little points at the ends of my breasts and I could feel my­self get­ting wet and hot un­der the jeans and white silk panties I was wear­ing. I wanted to look away from Salt’s burn­ing eyes but some­how I couldn’t—I was caught in that pale blue gaze and un­able to free my­self.

  “An­swer me, mishka,” he mur­mured. “Tell me if you like it when your Papa licks your pussy.”

  “Yes,” I whispered, hav­ing a hard time get­ting the words out. “Yes, Papa, I…I like it very much. I love it.”

  “And would you like to take off your jeans now and let Papa ex­am­ine your pussy and see if it needs to be licked?” he mur­mured.

  “Ex…ex­am­ine me?” I whispered un­cer­tainly.

  “Da—it will not hurt, I prom­ise. I sim
ply need to see if your sweet little pussy is get­ting wet and swollen—ready to be tasted.” Salt traced a slow, lazy pat­tern with his long fin­gers on my in­ner thigh as he spoke. I shivered as sparks of pleas­ure shot down my spine at his gentle touch.

  “Well…I guess that would be okay,” I whispered. “If…if you really think it’s ne­ces­sary…Papa.”

  “I do.” He nod­ded gravely. “Come, why do we not go into the bed­room?”

  Without wait­ing for my an­swer, he stood with me still in his arms and car­ried me out of the liv­ing room and up the stairs to my bed­room.

  I had a blue and green and gold quilt on my queen sized bed. Salt laid me on it and turned on the bed­side lamp. It bathed the dim room in a warm golden glow.

  “Mmm…” Salt sat be­side me and stroked a hand between my breasts. “You’re so beau­ti­ful ly­ing here on the bed, my Baby­girl,” he rumbled. “Tell me, would you like to un­dress your­self or do you want your Papa to un­dress you?”

  “You do it…Papa,” I whispered, look­ing up at him. I wanted more of his hands on me, more of his touch all over my body.

  Salt seemed to un­der­stand. Slowly he pulled my red t-shirt over my head, bar­ing my lacy white bra.

  “This is very pretty, my darling,” he mur­mured, tra­cing the curve of one breasts with his fin­ger­tip. “But Baby­girls do not need to hide any­thing from their Papas. I think we will take this off.”

  “Okay, Papa,” I whispered, arch­ing my back to thrust my breasts up to him. The lacy bra snapped in the front and Salt had it un­fastened in no time. Slowly, he peeled it open, bar­ing my breasts for him and re­veal­ing my tight, achy nipples.

  “Look at these pretty little nipples,” he mur­mured, tra­cing one with his fin­ger­tip and mak­ing me shiver. “Tell me, mishka, would you like your Papa to suck your pretty nipples and make you feel good?”

  “God, yes,” I whispered, and some­thing low in­side me clenched with de­sire. “Please, Papa—I want your mouth on me.”