Chapter 8
FRANKIE
Tears ran down Frankie’s face as Daddy held her close to him, rocking back and forth as they sat on the couch.
“What happened?” Daddy asked.
Frankie gripped onto his shirt more, not wanting to speak or let go of him.
Dominic, Michael, and Trent were in the room with them.
So many people who could watch her shake and make fun of her.
The blanket was still tightly wrapped around her so her face was the only thing people could see.
But with how tightly Daddy was holding her, no doubt anyone in the room could see how much she was shaking.
It probably wasn’t from her Essential Tremors but the adrenaline rush or drop from it. Everything was getting to become too much for her.
“Shhh, I’ve got you,” Daddy whispered in her ear. “Daddy is just talking to Trent and Dominic.”
“From the beginning?” Trent asked.
“Yes, from the beginning.” Daddy sighed. “I want to know every detail.”
“I knew you were here with Frankie, and I knew she loved chocolate chip cookies,” Dominic started.
“So I got Trent to make some. I had a feeling that Frankie might be looking out of your one-way window so I decided to pull Trent into this. I originally was going to grab a cookie and bring it to her, but I wanted to see if she would come out of the office.”
He... he had done that?
Frankie slightly pulled away from Daddy’s chest to look at Dominic.
“I’m sorry, Frankie. I didn’t think you were going to choke. I just wanted to push you a little to see if you would be willing to come out of the office at the club.” Dominic gently spoke to her before turning back to her Daddy.
“Choked?” Daddy tightened his arms around her.
“I’ll get to that in a minute,” Dominic mumbled. “Michael said she was fine and just needed some sugar, water, and rest until she felt better.”
“I was here when he told her that,” Daddy growled.
Frankie placed her hand on his chest, rubbing gently to try and calm him down. Daddy sighed and kissed the top of her head.
“Go on,” Daddy urged him.
“We both grabbed a cookie and stepped out of the kitchen and in her line of sight. I didn’t think she would actually leave the office to get some but we made sure no one would be out in the hallway in case she decided to,” Dominic explained.
That was why she had seen no one. Her shoulders slumped a little bit. If only she had known that in the beginning, she wouldn’t have been so nervous and uptight about it all.
“I thought she knew I would come in and talk to her, but she didn’t hear me and I scared her. I didn’t mean to,” Dominic quickly added. “That’s when she choked on the cookie I used the Heimlich maneuver to get it out. Then Trent came in and scared her even more.”
Silence filled the office after Dominic finished speaking. What was Daddy thinking?
“This should have never happened.” Daddy’s voice was deep and calm.
Frankie’s whole body locked up. Daddy meant business when he used that voice.
“I didn’t think anything bad was going to happen.” Dominic gently spoke. “If I had known, I wouldn’t have had done any of it.”
“Unacceptable,” Daddy muttered.
“Daddy.” Frankie looked up at him.
Was she a little frustrated that he had purposefully done that? Yes, she was. But they didn’t know she was going to get scared. Frankie should have kept a better eye out to see if anyone was coming.
But she had been enjoying the cookies.
“No, Little One. None of that should have happened.” Daddy looked down at her.
“But it did,” she whispered.
She couldn’t go back in time to change it. If she could, she would have gone back a long time ago and never gone to the store to get butter. But everyone had to live with the consequences of their own actions. Dominic was probably feeling worse than any of them.
“No, it is my fault. I never should have done any of this,” Dominic chimed in. “I am willing to take any punishment for what I did. If you want to fire me, I understand.”
Her mouth fell open as he said those words. Was he really saying that?
“Whoa—“ Michael started.
“You can’t fire him,” Frankie interrupted.
Everyone looked at her, making her shrink into Daddy’s chest. She didn’t think she was going to speak so loudly.
“No one is going to get fired.” Michael’s voice boomed in the office.
Frankie’s eyes moved over to Michael. He was breathing heavily as he stood next to Dominic, his eyes trailing around the room and looking at everyone.
“Noah, calm down. Yes, you have every right to be mad, but you also knew she was leaving your office when we were working,” Michael pointed out.
It was her turn to look at Daddy, shocked. He had watched her over the camera to see what she was doing?
“And you two, yes, what you did wasn’t the best. But we can’t change the past. We can only learn from it and hope we don’t do something in the future,” Michael continued, “but no one is going to get fired over this. We knew Frank went down to the kitchen and decided to carry on with our work.”
Daddy looked down at her. “Yes, we did see you coming down the stairs with the blanket covering you. Very cute, but you are in trouble for doing that. Do you know how dangerous that was?”
Just like she called it. She was going to get in trouble for leaving the office.
“But I am proud of you for going out,” he quietly said to her. “I bet that took a lot of courage.”
She nodded. It did. She had been clutching the blanket so hard the whole time.
Daddy looked away from her. “Like Michael said, you two aren’t going to get fired. You aren’t going to get punished in any other way either. Let’s all take this as a learning opportunity and never do it again.”
“They don’t get in trouble, but I am going to get spanked because I went down the stairs in my blanket?” She looked at Daddy, clearly annoyed. “That’s not fair at all. If they aren’t going to get punished, then I shouldn’t get in trouble either.”
Chuckles rang out around the room.
Frankie flinched. Right. She kept forgetting that people were in the room with them.
“I don’t think she should get in trouble either,” Michael chuckled. “Let’s all just wipe the slate clean and move on. Nothing too serious happened. We are all learning.”
“I agree,” Trent finally spoke up. “We are all sorry for what happened, but it got her out of the office. We won’t do it again.”
Silence filled the room once again, and Frankie didn’t dare look around this time. She was exhausted and wanted to go to sleep.
“Let’s all go back to work and let them be,” Michael quietly said. “We can talk to them later.”
Daddy guided her head back to his chest, and she closed her eyes, taking a deep breath and allowing her whole body to relax against his as everyone left.
“I’m so proud of you,” he gently whispered in her ear as he ran his hands through her hair.
“I know it must have been scary to leave the office without me, not knowing whether anyone was going to see you or not. I’m proud of you for being brave and going out of your comfort zone. How are you feeling now?”
How was she actually feeling? Frankie didn’t know, and she didn’t know if she wanted to really think about it.
“Frankie.” Daddy had a warning in his tone. “You are not getting out of this. It is important to think about how we feel after something exciting or nerve-wracking.”
Sighing, Frankie pulled away and looked at Daddy. “I don’t know,” she mumbled.
“Nope. We are not going to do that. We are going to sit here and think about how we feel and talk through it.” He gave her a pointed look.
Clenching her jaw, she looked away for a couple of seconds. Right.
“Everything. I’m feeling all sorts of emotions,” she whispered. “I’m worried, happy, sad, overwhelmed, and annoyed.”
She was feeling all of the emotions, and she didn’t really know what to do with them. She had already cried several times, and now she wanted to hit a things, but that wasn’t like her.
Frankie didn’t do things like that.
“And those are all valid feelings. Do you want to talk about it more?” Daddy asked.
She thought about it for a couple of minutes before shaking her head. Frankie grabbed her hair on either side of her head and started to pull, trying to get all of the emotions out of her. She didn’t want to feel any of this. She wanted to be happy and content like she normally was.
“Wow, Little One.” Daddy took her hands and stopped her. “We do not pull our hair. What is going on?”
Tears pooled in Frankie’s eyes once again as Daddy gently moved her hands out of her hair.
“No,” she mumbled.
Pulling her hair was helping her release all of the emotions she didn’t want to feel at one time. Why couldn’t he just let her do it? It would make everything so much simpler.
“No.” Daddy’s voice was stern. “We are not hurting ourselves to help regulate our emotions. We can talk about it and get through this together.”
Frankie shook her head. “I don’t want to talk,” she wailed.
Why couldn’t Daddy understand that sometimes a person couldn’t talk about it? That they needed to let it out in some other way. This was the only way Frankie knew she could do.
“Okay, then what do you want to do?” he asked. “Nothing that is going to harm you. We do not do that.”
Frankie looked off to the side and thought about it, but she couldn’t make herself say the words. It wasn’t her. What would Daddy say if he knew what she wanted to do?
“Come on, you can tell Daddy anything. I’m not going to judge you,” he gently said. “What do you want to do?”
She opened and closed her mouth several times, trying to get herself to utter the words, but she couldn’t. What if it did nothing and they wasted money? She also didn’t want to go out and be on camera or have other people see her.
Yeah, she wasn’t going to suggest that to Daddy.
“I can’t,” she whispered.
Daddy cupped her face and brought their foreheads close together. “It’s okay. One day you will be able to tell me.”
If she were ever able to go outside without any thoughts. Sure, she was out right now, but she was in his office, and no one else could see her. It was safe.
“I’m going to call Trent real quick,” Daddy said as he placed her on the couch and walked over to the window, his phone already up to his ear.
Silence filled the room. Why was Daddy calling Trent?
“Do you still have those plates you were wanting to get rid of, Trent?” Daddy asked.