Chapter 28
twenty-eight
saúl
Cam was sitting on the porch when I came back with Swiftheart to the main house. I hadn’t had anything to do other than checking in on the horses today, so I’d just shared the truck with one of the hands in the morning.
I’d finished up earlier, too, which meant I’d been coming up with plans on how to spend the time with Cam. I’d expected he’d be here unless something had happened.
I hadn’t expected him on the porch, where he never spent any time if there wasn’t someone keeping him there, and cradling his phone like it was both precious and a bomb about to explode on his face.
I jumped off Swiftheart and took the saddle off her back. Gave her a piece of apple, too, before taking her and her things to the smaller stable here. Sofía could complain about it for her check-up next month; she was always telling me I didn’t need to give her so many treats.
Cam either didn’t notice me there or didn’t think to acknowledge my presence. I doubted his mood would have to do with me, with us, but discomfort settled in my gut.
“Wait here, pretty girl.”
Other horses might have kicked up a fuss, but Swiftheart was used to spending the night in the main house.
Today, I could feel her unhappy with it, her body shifting in Cam’s direction.
I gave her some more pats before leaving her there.
I’d see about taking him for a ride to make up for it tomorrow.
Right now, the priority was figuring out what was going on with him.
“Everything okay, darlin’?”
“Um. Hi. Sorry, I’m…”
His voice sounded oddly scratchy, his eyes watering when he caught my gaze.
“What happened?”
Cam averted his gaze for all of two seconds. I noticed more freckles across his face that hadn’t been there when he’d first joined us.
“Kara texted.”
Fuck.
Truth be told, I hadn’t taken the time to come up with a plan for this.
I hadn’t thought his friend would reply.
I thought he’d have to deal with the uncertainty of not hearing back.
I hadn’t figured out how to make him live with it yet, but it had seemed closer to the realm of possibility at the time.
Clearly, I misjudged her and their relationship.
“Want to head inside, and you can tell Daddy about it?”
Cam whimpered. I’d referred to myself in third person for this reason.
Things might be moving slowly between us, but Kara’s text must’ve sent him back to square one, thinking he didn’t deserve a Daddy or anything else.
I wouldn’t be doing a good job as one if I didn’t remind him I was still here to take over, would I?
“You read it first.”
Given that he shoved his phone in my hands, I didn’t have a choice not to.
The screen was unlocked, showing Kara’s text.
And his response.
waffles_and_whips
i’m sorry
cats are awesome. what are their names?
my boss just let me adopt three dogs
they’re awesome too
two of them are babies
okay, sorry, i’ll stop
sorry
I sighed.
All in all, I supposed it was better than I could’ve predicted.
Then again, I didn’t know Kara—or, soft_and_sweet.
I couldn’t tell if her nickname was an accurate representation or a random choice.
I didn’t know what tone Cam would’ve read beyond the words on the screen, and I didn’t have a way to convince him it was the wrong interpretation.
“Let’s get you inside, darlin’.”
“Why?”
I ignored the question. The bubbly tone said everything I needed to know—everything I’d already gathered from his reply—about where his head was. I just lifted him up and pretended I struggled more with the action than I did just to hear the tiny snort that came out of him.
He wrapped his arms loosely around my neck and didn’t make a fuss because someone might see.
It was a good thing. Besides, if someone happened to be driving around here and got a glimpse of it?
And they wanted to give him trouble? They’d have another thing coming.
I couldn’t quite stop them, but I could enforce consequences.
“I’m useless.”
The words were mumbled against the neck of my shirt. The mumbling didn’t stop the lance digging into my heart.
For fuck’s sake, no one should be affecting me this badly.
“You’re not, darlin’.” I sighed, just nuzzling the side of his head while I walked us to his room upstairs. “Here’s what I want us to do. You nod or shake your head, okay?”
“Okay, Daddy.”
“That’s my good boy.” He didn’t question it as I got us into his room.
I hadn’t set foot in here since the disaster of finding him wearing diapers.
Even after arriving, he’d been sneaking into my room instead.
I didn’t think it was intentional, but my room wouldn’t do for what I needed.
“I want to change your diaper, and then I want to bottle feed you your milk. Then you can snuggle or take a nap on my lap. Okay, darlin’? ”
Cam’s breath hitched. I didn’t take it as a no, but I gave him a second to sort his thoughts out before I barreled through with my plans.
“Um. But…” He tugged his bottom lip between his teeth, and I cursed not having a free hand to pull it out. “Kara.”
“We can talk about it later, darlin’, but I think this head of yours needs a bit of a break, don’t you?”
He must’ve been going at a million thoughts per minute. Exhibit A was that he couldn’t even think of a retort or a protest about the myriad of reasons why he didn’t deserve to take it easy on himself.
He didn’t have the energy to protest much as I plopped him down on the bed and asked him where he kept the diapers, either.
He even told me where the powders were without me prompting him.
Of course, he wasn’t hard either as I took off his pants and underwear, but I hadn’t expected him to be.
This wasn’t sexual for him, so I didn’t linger with teasing touches or anything else that would make other Littles squirm and pant and giggle.
“Lift up your hips, darlin’.” I was already doing it for him as I spoke, but talking him through everything quickly became the norm and what felt the most natural. “I love how Little you are. Do you know that?”
“Hmm?”
I smiled at him as I went through the motions of covering his groin in powder before buckling the diaper.
It wasn’t one of the pull-up ones with an elastic, but I had him perfectly bundled up in a minute or two.
It looked tight, too, so I gave myself another minute to watch him flushed while on a diaper with illustrations of puppies with their tongues lolling out of their mouths and their tails wagging.
“I do.” I hummed. “You look so soft, and I love that you make yourself so vulnerable around me, that I’m responsible for taking care of you.”
Like a cat, Cam blinked slowly as I showered him with praise.
He didn’t answer beyond that. I didn’t expect him to. I just ran my hands through the padded fabric to ensure there weren’t any wrinkles that would irritate his skin if he wore the diaper for too long.
“Do you want to keep the hoodie or take it off, darlin’?”
Cam shook his head. I hadn’t gotten the feeling that words left him when he was Little. It wasn’t a question to be asked right this minute, though. It made sense, anyway. He’d made it clear he regressed more than most.
I was too distracted by how fucking adorable he looked with the diaper and his hoodie still on, too. Most of all, it was the way his face was completely open to me, free of every other thought, every other worry. He could ask me for anything, and I’d do it just to keep him there.
Which included grabbing him again so that I could get him the milk I’d promised. Now that he’d settled more into the headspace, he wrapped around me more easily, curled fists around my neck while he sat against my hip.
“Such a good boy, letting Daddy take care of him.”
Rummaging through one of the cupboards in the kitchen, I found one of the sippy cups I knew I’d kept under some delusion that there might be hope for me in the future.
Cam simply buried his face against my neck as I moved around the kitchen to heat his milk some in a glass before pouring it into the cup.
The sunroom I moved us to—less likelihood of someone walking in because they’d forgotten what doors were for—was a reprieve. And it had Cam pawing at my shirt right away. I’d barely gotten us seated in the old ratty couch I kept there to bond with the animals I let inside the house.
“You want Daddy’s shirt off, darlin’?”
No words yet, but Cam nodded with enough enthusiasm that there wasn’t a need for them.
“All right,” I snorted. As if there was a need to answer or a scenario in which I’d tell him no to dragging my shirt over my head and letting him claim my body heat all for himself. “There you go.”
Cam’s mouth clung to my nipple right away, suckling as if he were a baby going on instinct. I stiffened right away, my breath held. The way he pressed his tongue against the skin had all my blood flowing there.
It took me a second to process that we weren’t here for suckling on my pecs. We were here to give him his bottle.
“Open up, darlin’.”
It was so… Fuck. My heart beat loudly as he alternated between kissing and suckling on my chest and letting me tilt his head back so that he drank the actual milk.
Peace settled within my bones at the sight, at the feelings I could feel blooming.
Who was I kidding? They had already bloomed.
Slow burn had never been my speed.
“Such a good boy.” Once the bottle was halfway done, I dropped it on the floor for a minute so that I could tuck a strand of hair off his head. “You’re drinking your milk so well, darlin’. So well behaved and sweet, aren’t you?”
Cam let out a soft moan. I didn’t think it was pain. More like pleasure buried deep within.
“Do you want the rest of your milk now, baby boy?”
He nodded right away, his lips dropping to my chest once more. I didn’t know that my nipple could grow overly sensitive from all the suckling, but I saw the redness surrounding it.
It didn’t matter. There was no way I was putting a stop to this.