Chapter 27
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Juliet
By the time I see the streetlights that line the main street through town, my feet feel like my shoes are filled with lead and it’s all I can do to put one foot in front of the other. If the docks aren’t close, I’m not sure I’ll ever make it.
Dropping down onto the sidewalk, I lean back against the brick wall of a building and try to catch my breath. But it’s difficult to get air in when my entire chest feels like someone has wrapped a rubber band around it and is just twisting it tighter and tighter.
Tears burn behind my eyelids as I sit there, and all I can think is that I want my Daddy. Even though I know my bottom will pay the price, all I want is for him to find me and take me home.
“Juliet? Honey, what are you doing out here?”
Forcing my eyes open, I look up to find a woman hovering over me. She looks vaguely familiar, and it takes me a moment to place her.
Myra. Solene’s Mommy, from when we went to the boutique my first day on the island.
“I don’t know.” The words burst out of me on a sob, tears streaming down my face. “I wanna go home.”
“Oh, you poor thing. Come upstairs with me and we’ll call your Daddy. The whole island is out looking for you right now.”
Guilt pricks through the relief that floods my system at her words. “I’m s-sorry,” I manage to sob out as she helps me to my feet and leads me into the boutique.
Upstairs, Solene is waiting for us, fury etched into every inch of her face. “I don’t want her here!”
“I know, baby. But Juliet needs our help. If you don’t want to talk to her, you don’t have to, but you will be polite. Am I understood?”
Crossing her arms, Solene stomps her foot. “No. She can wait downstairs for Mr. Jasper to come get her.”
Behind me, Myra sighs. “I don’t want to have to punish you tonight, little elf. But you are dangerously close to earning yourself a soapy mouth and a hot bottom.”
The threat is enough to have Solene pressing her lips together in a tight line, though it does nothing to quell the fury in her eyes as she glares at me.
“Thank you. Juliet, go have a seat on the couch there. I’m going to give your Daddy a call and let him know you’re safe.”
Myra hurries away, leaving me alone with Solene. And the guilt I’ve been feeling claws at me, until I can’t take the hostile silence any longer.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t a better friend to you back in New York. Well, I guess I’m sorry I wasn’t much of a friend at all.”
Solene’s expression softens, ever so slightly, and she jerks a shoulder. “It’s fine. It’s not like any of the other snobby bitches in the city were any better. I was just a commodity to you people, and I knew it.”
“That had to be hard.”
“It was. Honestly, I think if Myra hadn’t convinced me to come to the island with her, I would have flamed out hard in another year or two. I love designing clothes, but I’m not built for that life. It’s too… hard. Too cold.”
“I want to go back. No.” I shake my head. “I feel like I should want to go back. I didn’t really have a choice in coming to the island, and I miss having the freedom to just do whatever I want when I want. But I don’t really miss the people. Not like I should.”
Taking a small step forward, Solene lowers her arms. “Being Little is its own kind of freedom, don’t you think? There’s nobody to impress, no catty, backstabbing bitches to look out for. You don’t even have to work. You just get to… be. You really want to give all of that up just to go back to pretending you actually like the people you’re forced to talk to at every boring event you’re forced to attend?”
As her words land, I let them seep in. “No… I guess I don’t. But agreeing to stay here feels like, I don’t know. Like giving up who I am to be who Jasper wants me to be.”
“Trust me, I get that. I had to decide if I was more interested in being famous or being happy. Are you happy here?”
“Yeah. Well, when I’m not getting my ass busted for one thing or another. And Victoria may be the first real friend I’ve ever had.”
“Well… maybe if you stay, you could have two real friends.”
Raising my head, I smile up at her. “Really?”
“As long as you promise not to be bitchy New York Juliet. I like this Juliet a lot better.”
“Trust me, I don’t think my Daddy would let me be bitchy New York Juliet even if I wanted to. And I don’t really want to. I think I like this version of me better, too.”
The bedroom door opens, and Myra comes sweeping out, her fur-trimmed robe swirling around her. “Well, you didn’t kill each other while I was gone, so that’s something I suppose.” Turning, she pins me with a stern look. “Your Daddy is on his way, and he said to let you know that you won’t sit for a month by the time he’s through with you.”
“I kinda figured that.”
A sly smile replaces the stern expression on her face. “In the meantime, however, who wants chocolate milk?”
“Me, me, me!” Bouncing in place like Victoria so often does, Solene claps her hands together. “Thank you, Mommy!”
“Chocolate milk sounds great. Thank you, um…”
“Miss Myra,” she says with a wink. “And you’re welcome, honey.”
She disappears into the kitchen and returns a few minutes later with a bottle and a sippy cup, both full of chocolate milk. Handing me the sippy cup with a warning to be careful and not to spill—which I’m pretty sure is impossible with the cup she gave me anyway—she settles into an oversized armchair and pulls Solene down into her lap.
I watch, a little bit in awe as Solene curls up in her Mommy’s arms, her eyes fluttering closed as she sucks on the bottle. Lifting my cup to my lips, I take a tentative sip, humming loudly as the sweet milk floods my mouth.
“This is delicious. Is it… you know. Real milk or…?”
Laughing, Miss Myra pats Solene’s hip with her free hand, rocking her gently as she drinks. “It’s my milk. Found a recipe online for making chocolate milk out of breast milk and now I’m afraid my little elf is a bit addicted to it.”
I sip again, and we sit in silence for a bit before I have to ask the question nagging at me. “Did my Daddy sound really mad?”
“Mostly relieved, I think. But you are definitely in a lot of trouble, little girl. What on earth possessed you to go wandering around the island in the middle of the night?”
“I’m an idiot, I guess.”
Miss Myra’s expression hardens again. “Talking poorly about yourself is a spankable offense in this house, Juliet. Do I need to go get my hairbrush?”
Heat rushes to my cheeks as I shake my head emphatically. “No, Ma’am. I’m sorry.”
“Good girl.” She cocks her head to the side. “I think I just heard a car pull up. I’m betting that’s your Daddy.”
Sure enough, next comes the sound of the front door opening, then Jasper’s footsteps running up the stairs. He stops at the top of the stairs, looking around frantically until his gaze lands on me.
“Juliet.” The relief is clear in his tone as he rushes over to the couch, scooping me up into a hug so tight it threatens to cut off my oxygen. “I was so fucking worried about you, princess. How did you even get here? What were you thinking? I swear to god I’m tempted to bend you over and whip your bare bottom right here until you never even think of sneaking out of the house again.”
“I’m sorry, Daddy. I wasn’t… I don’t know…” Unable to explain myself, I burst into tears, clinging to him for all I’m worth.
“I think that’s our cue to give you both some privacy.” With a grace I can’t help but admire, Miss Myra rises to her feet with Solene still in her arms. “Just lock the front door behind you when you leave, please.”
She carries Solene into what I assume is their bedroom, shutting the door behind her.
Daddy pulls away, his expression fierce, and suddenly I am feeling very small. Exactly like a naughty Little girl caught doing something she shouldn’t. “Hi, Daddy.”
“Really? You just scared fifty years off my life and all you have to say for yourself is ‘Hi, Daddy’?”
“Um, I’m really sorry I worried you.”
“Trust me, princess. You don’t even know ‘sorry’ yet. But you will by the time I’m through with you.”
A delicious, familiar fear races through my veins. “Yes, Daddy.”
“But first, you are going to sit your naughty bottom right there and tell me why you snuck out in the first place.”
Nodding, I sit back down on the couch, twisting my fingers together in my lap. “Um, well. I was looking for the docks.”
I’m fairly certain if I told him I’d gone out looking for an alien spaceship to abduct me, he couldn’t look more shocked than he does at this moment. “What? Why the hell were you going to the docks?”
“Well, I kinda had this plan to stow away on the ship so I could get back home.”
“And why the hell would you do that?”
Some of the boldness I’d felt sneaking out of the house earlier comes trickling back, and I jerk my chin up. “Maybe I’m sick of being treated like a baby all the time.”
I half expect him to haul me up and paddle my bottom red right then and there. But it’s my turn to be shocked, because his response is the farthest thing from what I ever would have predicted.
He just… laughs .
And not the low, wicked kind of laugh I’ve come to expect when he’s about to do something depraved to me. But a full-on, head thrown back, from the gut kind of laugh.
I can only sit and stare as he laughs until tears stream down his cheeks and he inhales deeply. “Oh, princess. I hate to tell you this but you never would have made it back to New York.”
Irritation runs prickly little fingers along my spine. “Why the hell not?”
“Because.” He laughs again. “You never would have made it all the way back to the states without being discovered. And then you would have been at the mercy of a bunch of mountain men with my same proclivities and none of my… elegance, we’ll say.”
Again, I can only stare in shock. “They’re… like you? With the whole Daddy thing?”
“Yes.”
“How many of you are there?”
“More than you’d think, though most prefer to keep that part of themselves in the shadows. That’s why we built this island, so we could live as we wish without condemnation. Our lumberjack friends are much the same, though they don’t have an entire island to themselves. I can promise you, princess, as soon as they realized who you were, they would have been on the phone with me. And I would have let them spank your naughty bottom every day until I was able to retrieve you.”
The thought of complete strangers, mountain men of all people, laying hands on me should terrify me. And it does, though there is a part of me that thrills at the idea of my Daddy ordering someone else to punish me in his stead.
But I’m not about to let him know that, so I huff and flop back against the couch. “Yeah, well, I changed my mind anyway. I’m not leaving.”
“Is that so?” His tone is slightly mocking, and my bottom clenches in response as he leans down, his hand wrapping around my throat. “I’m happy to hear that, princess. But just so you know, it was never your choice to begin with. You are mine , Juliet Blackwood, and there is nowhere on Earth you could hide where I wouldn’t find you. And as soon as I get you home, I’m going to make sure you never, ever so much as think about running from me again.”
Oh. I am so fucked.