Chapter 20
Brooklyn insisted on attending his trial.
The evidence presented to the judge was so overwhelming on the first morning that his court-appointed lawyer asked for a recess to talk to Brent before they resumed in the afternoon.
When the judge reconvened court after lunch, Brooklyn gasped as Brent’s lawyer announced a plea deal.
Standing with slumped shoulders, Brent didn’t turn to glare at her.
His gaze remained fixed on the table in front of him.
She listened to him plead guilty to multiple charges of robbery and assault.
Stalking her hadn’t landed him in jail; his illegal actions during the long months while he searched for her had put him away for years.
“Is it over, Daddy?” Brooklyn whispered as they dragged Brent from the courtroom.
“It’s over, sweetheart. He won’t ever bother you again,” Caden reassured her. “Max had a talk with him during the break. Brent understands he’ll be safer in jail than walking around.”
It wasn’t like the other promises she’d heard from the police and lawyers. Caden’s words rang with truth.
“Max talked to him?” she repeated in astonishment.
“Yes. I couldn’t trust myself to be that close to him. Let’s go home, little girl. Max and the guys are waiting for us there.”
She stared at the door where Brent had disappeared. Could it really be over? Her daddy placed a hand on her lower back and guided her toward the door. Brooklyn remained silent until they exited into the fresh air.
The breeze helped her understand that this was actually happening.
Brooklyn had met three times already with a counselor who worked near the base.
With the therapist’s help, she was working through the frightening memories that Brent had subjected her to before and after she’d left.
Feeling lighter than she had in years, Brooklyn looked up at her daddy and asked, “Is this what freedom is like?”
“I can’t wait to show you how amazing your life is going to be now, Brookie. Ready to go let the team celebrate with you?”
“Let’s go, Daddy.”
“Brooklyn?”
She turned to see Brent’s mother, Suzanne standing a couple of feet away. Brooklyn wrapped her hands around Caden’s arm, clinging to him for support.
“I didn’t mean to scare you,” the woman said quickly, not getting any closer. “We wanted you to know that we tried to get him to stop coming after you when several months passed. He wouldn’t listen to us. Hopefully, he’ll get some help in jail.”
“As long as he’s far from me, I don’t care what happens to him,” Brooklyn said bluntly. A small part of her noted that his family hadn’t helped him pursue her after the initial months. That made her feel better—slightly better.
“Our family wishes you well, Brooklyn. I’m glad you found a man who treats you right,” Suzanne told her and left with a nod to rejoin her husband and daughter.
“Barbecue time, little girl. Let’s get on the road. Koa has a bad reputation for torching food. We don’t want him to cook without supervision,” Caden told her.
“Wait. Giana’s a firefighter.”
“You’ll have to ask her how they met,” Caden suggested, steering her off the sidewalk to the parking lot.
“Okay. I’m going to ask Aspen and Pippa, too.”
“Good idea,” Caden said, lifting her up into his truck.
“I’m really glad I found you,” Brooklyn whispered as her daddy fastened her seatbelt.
“Me, too, little girl. I can’t imagine my world without you.” He kissed her softly and stepped back to close her door.
Caden drove carefully through the traffic back to the house Brooklyn now considered home. As the truck turned onto their street, Brooklyn leaned forward to peer through the window. Trucks and SUVs lined the road.
“Is Max carrying a ladder?” she asked, spotting the large man from several houses away. “He’s got paint splattered on his shirt.”
“Max has been busy, little girl.”
“Really? What’s he been doing?”
“I think this is something you need to see rather than me telling you,” Caden suggested as he pulled into the driveway next to Max’s huge SUV.
It took forever for her daddy to circle around the hood to let her out. Brooklyn decided not to wait. She flung open the door and jumped out. A cry burst from her lips as Brooklyn caught her heel in her skirt and tumbled into the grass.
“Are you okay, Brooklyn Marie?” Caden said, running his hands over her.
“I’m fine. Just clumsy,” Brooklyn said as her face heated with embarrassment.
“You’ve scraped up your knee. Let’s go clean and bandage that,” Caden said, scooping her up in his arms.
“But Max did something inside. I want to see,” she whined.
“Knee, spanking, surprise.”
“Spanking?” Brooklyn said in surprise as he entered their house.
“We heard what happened,” Giana said excitedly.
They shouted their congratulations as Caden continued walking through the family room toward their bedroom.
“Thanks for coming, everyone. Carry on without us. I have a little girl to talk to privately. We’ll be back in a few.”
Caden carried her into their bedroom and closed the door before entering the bathroom. He set her on the vanity and braced a hand on each side of her. “Who opens the truck door, little girl?”
“Me when I’m alone,” she sassed.
“Are you alone, Brooklyn Marie?”
“No. But you were going so slowly. I wanted to see what Max had done.”
“And you hurt yourself because you were going too fast. Which was wiser?” he asked, pinning her in place with a stern look.
She pouted for several long seconds before finally answering, “I guess slower.”
“I agree. Now, what hurts other than your knee?”
“I banged my elbow, too,” she admitted, guessing that Caden would strip her naked to check for himself if she didn’t tell the truth.
Caden nodded and kissed her forehead. “Does your head hurt?”
“No. I’m okay,” she reassured him. Zale had cleared her of any restrictions because of her concussion. She hadn’t had any headaches for several weeks.
“Good.” Caden immediately got to work, cleaning and bandaging her scrape. He checked her elbow and promised to get the frozen peas out to treat her. Then he lifted her from the vanity and stripped off her panties.
“Daddy, no! People are here. You can’t spank me,” Brooklyn protested.
Caden didn’t answer. He took a seat on the bed and draped Brooklyn over his hard thighs. Flipping her dress up, he smacked her bottom hard. “You are not to open the door, little girl.”
Each swat from his powerful hands left a stinging spot on her skin. Brooklyn flailed her legs, trying to avoid the punishment, but Caden held her pinned firmly in place.
She tried to stay quiet as the heat and pain built.
Each stroke of his hand erased a bit of the worry that had built inside her from the stress of Brent’s court appearance.
She couldn’t think of anything but the small space that surrounded them.
Finally, sobs burst through her lips as she slumped over his lap.
Her punishment continued until she whispered, “I’m sorry, Daddy. ”
At those magic words, Caden’s touch switched from punishing to soothing. His hand rubbed over her bottom as he praised her. “There’s my good little girl. I knew she was in there.”
Caden lifted her back to his arms and rocked her gently on his lap. “This has been a tough week for you. I think you needed Daddy’s attention. Do you feel better?” he asked.
She nodded against his chest. “So much better.”
After clearing her list of delayed spankings and earning new ones, Brooklyn had learned that she hated and loved spankings.
The good-girl spankings were wonderful and always preceded a flurry of reward orgasms. The others?
Well, she hated to admit they created another kind of release she needed just as bad.
Somehow, her daddy could read her as easily as he entertained her with storybooks.
After several breaths, Brooklyn pushed away from his chest, hissing as her weight settled fully on her bottom. “They all know I got a spanking, don’t they?”
“Yes.” Her daddy followed his rules completely and never lied to her.
“Like Aspen who got a spanking at the last gathering,” Brooklyn suggested, remembering the sound of her friend’s cries from her nursery. All the Littles had welcomed her back with hugs when Aspen had returned. No one commented on her blotchy face at all.
“Let’s go erase these tears and greet our company properly,” Caden told her.
With her face clean of the makeup she’d worn to court, Brooklyn clung to her daddy’s hand as she followed him to the kitchen. Aspen, Giana, and Pippa crowded around her in a flurry of greetings. Brooklyn turned from the last embrace to meet Max’s kind gaze.
“I think your daddy has a surprise for you,” the large man suggested.
“Let’s go check out your nursery,” Caden said, sweeping a hand toward the hallway.
Brooklyn forced herself to walk to the closed door. Turning the knob, she peeked into the room and gasped. She pushed the door open and bounced inside, turning to look at the walls.
Ever since Brent had been inside her nursery, it hadn’t felt the same.
Like his presence had somehow left a shadow over the beautiful room.
No darkness could exist in this area ever again.
The walls were a bright sunny yellow with flowers, cute animals, and smiling insects.
It was like being in the middle of a gorgeous meadow.
She walked forward to touch one grinning ladybug. Caden caught her hand. “It’s wet, little girl. You don’t want to smudge Max’s work.”
Whirling to stare at the large man now standing in the room with the others, Brooklyn asked, “You painted all of this?” Her first impression of the burly soldier aligned better with cutting firewood with an axe than holding a paintbrush.
“I did. I almost skipped joining the military to go paint pictures in Paris,” Max told her with a wink.
“Thank you so much.” Brooklyn ran forward to throw her arms around his waist. The impact with his hard body felt like running into a wall. “Oof!”
“Careful there, Brooklyn. You don’t have to thank me. I was glad to paint you an army of cute friends to guard you,” Max told her.
Brooklyn turned to scan the room one more time. He was right. She could never be scared in this room with all these creatures to back her up.
“I love this so much,” she whispered.
“You’re going to have to name them,” Pippa suggested.
“Want to help me?” Brooklyn asked, grinning at her friends.
As the Littles debated different names, Brooklyn overheard the men talking behind them.
“I decided to take an art class at the local community college,” Max told the guys.
“Are you going to sit around and paint fruit?” Koa asked.
“No, it’s a human figure drawing class. We’ll have models,” Max explained.
“Clothed?” Hank asked.
“Sometimes,” Max answered.
“Maybe I should take this art class with you,” Hank said.
“You’ll have to qualify by showing them your portfolio,” Max told him.
“I’ve seen you sketch wiring plans for explosives,” Jerico said. “They’ll bump you back to art history.”
“Probably. Looks like you’ll have to excel on your own, Max,” Hank told him. “Let’s go eat. All this talk about models makes me hungry.”
“Alright, Littles. Let’s go raid the food,” Caden suggested, holding a hand out for Brooklyn’s.
She skipped to his side. “Let’s go, Daddy! I’m starving.” As they walked, she whispered, “Can I sit on a cushion?”
“No way, little girl. Sitting on your hot bottom might remind you to make better decisions.”
Brooklyn pouted for the rest of the way to the kitchen. When he settled her at the kitchen table with a plate of her favorite foods and chocolate milk, she couldn’t help but smile at him. He showed her each day how much he loved her.
Her gaze fell on the pile of presents Caden had moved to a low shelf by the table.
She’d struggled to walk back into the pantry after that last encounter with Brent.
While they worked on erasing the bad memories in the small room, Caden had stored the gifts where she could easily reach them.
She’d opened one more the last time during his last, thankfully quick, deployment.
Even her sore bottom reminded her how her dreams had come true.
“Thank you, Daddy. I’m the luckiest little girl in the world.”
“And I’m the luckiest daddy.” He kissed her lightly before scooting her chair up to the table. “Eat. I want to see that plate empty.”
“Your daddy takes good care of you, Brooklyn,” Pippa told her, waving a fork laden with macaroni and cheese.
“He does. He makes everything better,” Brooklyn said.
“That’s what daddies are for. Who do you think will find their little girl next?” Aspen asked. “My vote’s on Hank.”
“No, it has to be Max,” Brooklyn said. “I think he’ll be a great daddy.”
The End