Nick

 

She’s so small in my arms. Her dainty little limbs holding me so tight. Her hair smells of apples, nestled under my chin as she snuggles under the bedcovers.

Her breathing is so even. A sweet calmness I’ve not seen in her before.

I guess three orgasms do that to a girl.

The beauty of this… this tenderness I feel with her beside me, goes someway to disarming the uneasy feeling in my stomach.

I’ve crossed a line. A big line. A line that makes me feel like a depraved excuse for a man.

And yet little Laine rests so peacefully, presses her body to mine with a devotion I’ve missed for so long.

She moves, and her hair tickles my chin. I feel her eyes on me in the darkness.

“You should be asleep,” I tell her.

She sighs, and her little fingers stroke my arm. “Was I ok?”

I hold her tight. “You were more than ok, you were perfect.”

She presses her lips to my collarbone. “You were perfect, too. You were everything.”

Everything.

I’ve waited so long to be someone’s everything.

I stretch out my legs, her toes rub against them and she sighs a sweet little sigh, and there’s a part of me that wants to draw a line under this murky half-light between lover and father. A part of me that wants to pick her up and carry her through to my actual bedroom, with its big double bed, and its neutral decor, and close the door to Jane’s room forever.

But I can’t. The need to love her as the captivating, innocent little soul in pink is far too strong.

“Daddy…” she whispers. “I’ve always wanted a daddy.”

A thrill of lust ripples through me, more than enough to counter my self-revulsion.

“I’ll take care of you, like any good father should,” I tell her. “You’re safe here. You’ll always be safe with me.”

“I know,” she says. “I like it… I like calling you that…”

I’m done for, my dick twitching at the desire to hear her say it again.

“Daddy.” Her voice is nothing but a breath. “Can I really call you that?”

“Do you want to?”

She nods, and I feel her smile against my skin. “Yes.” She pulls away enough to search my face in the darkness. “As long as that doesn’t… change anything… because I want… I want…”

“Shh,” I say and brush my fingers through her hair. “Nothing will change anything. We’re just…” I struggle to find the words. “Different, Laine. We’re different. Two people who find what they need in each other. In the most… unusual of circumstances.”

“Fate,” she says, and it sounds so simple. “It’s fate. I know it is.”

“Fate,” I repeat.

I want to believe her. I find no fate in numbers, or balancing books, or managing a business. I find nothing but cold hard logic behind every aspect of my life. Apart from in her. In her beautiful innocence. In her wide eyes, and her sweet smile.

I find fate here, in my arms.

“Daddy,” she whispers so softly.

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“When will we… you know…”

I seek out her lips and kiss her gently. Tasting her breath. Breathing in apples and innocence.

“Soon,” I say. “Now go to sleep, like a good girl.”

She wriggles against me with a contented sigh.

“Yes, Daddy.”

 

* * *

 

Laine

 

I wake to an empty bed, but it smells of him, all woody and dark and musky. I pull the covers to my nose and breathe him in, and there’s a thrill all the way to my toes.

Daddy. Daddy Nick. And he loves me.

I can still feel his hands on me, and his mouth, the way it felt so good. The way he made it feel. He makes everything feel good.

“Wake up, sleepyhead! Breakfast’s up!”

His voice is so loud from downstairs. It makes me smile, and I can’t move fast enough, jumping out of bed and throwing on my dressing gown. I laugh to myself as I realise I’ve still got silly socks on. Toasty feet.

He’s dressed for work as I join him at the table, and he’s smiling his serious smile again, looking so dapper and fine with his hair so slick.

“Bacon and eggs. Yummy.” I take my knife and fork, and his eyes burn my cheeks.

“You look cute,” he says. “Like a dishevelled little elf.”

I brush my hair down with my fingers. “You look like a Rolex advert.”

He laughs. “I do, do I?”

I nod. “I like it.” I can’t stop looking at him, and my clit feels tingly, wanting more, wanting his cock inside me for the first time, wanting to stay in bed and do it all over again, all day long.

He must be able to tell, because his smile turns dark, his eyes stern.

“Eat your breakfast all up, little Laine,” he says, “never any waste in this household.”

“Ok.” I smile as I cut up my bacon, and he’s still staring as I take a swig of juice.

“Ok, what?”

My heart flutters. And I don’t know. I don’t know if I’ve got it right but I say it anyway.

“Ok, Daddy.”

I got it right. His smile tells me so.

“That’s my good girl,” he says.

It feels the best thing in the world to be his good girl.

I eat my breakfast all up, just like Daddy wants me to.

 

* * *

 

He kisses me on the head outside the college gates, and part of me is disappointed, wanting to feel his tongue in my mouth and his hands in my hair.

“I’ll call you at lunchtime,” he tells me. “And I’ll pick you up at the usual time. Don’t be late.”

I nod. “I won’t. Thanks, Daddy. See you later.”

It still feels so weird, still gives me this tingle in my belly every time I say it.

I’m grinning as Kelly Anne catches me up in the corridor, lost in my own little world as she shunts into my back.

“Hey!” she says. “Earth to Laine! I’ve been yelling after you right through the fucking car park.”

I shrug. “Didn’t hear you, sorry.”

She groans. “Your head’s too busy floating away after the creepy old guy. Urgh, I saw him kiss you.” She pulls a face at the lunchbox in my arms. “What you got today? Human spleen on wholemeal?”

“Don’t be stupid.”

She laughs, like it’s funny. “He’s a bit Hannibal, don’t you think? My sweet Clarice… are the lambs still screaming…” She groans again, an over the top sound that grates at me. “Just because he drives a flash car and buys you shit doesn’t mean he’s not a Class-A weirdo.”

It’s her expression, one I haven’t seen on her before. I guess it’s a little in the shift of her feet, too. The way she shuffles, the scowl beneath her stupid jokes.

She’s jealous.

And I can’t believe it, I can’t believe Kelly Anne is actually jealous of me.

“He’s nice,” I tell her. “He’s really nice.”

“Nice and creepy…”

“Nice and nice. Kind and strong and considerate and thoughtful and loving.”

“Loving?” She raises her eyebrows. “Oh my God, did he… touch you? Major gross-out.”

I’m a bad person, I must be, because I want to tell her everything, want to tell her all about how amazing he made me feel, and how good he was and how much he loves me. I want to tell her that it’s fate, and I love him and he loves me, and he’s going to take care of me, hold me tight, and make my lunch every day, and take my virginity and it’s going to be everything I ever wanted, not some crappy fumble with Kyle Vickers behind the school bins like hers was.

“Laine…” she prompts. “Did he..? Are you..? Jeez, don’t tell me you finally ditched the V-card?”

I tug her elbow and pull her to the side of the corridor. “No. Not yet. But I will.”

She rolls her eyes. “For real? You and Hannibal? So many hot guys out there and you pick the creepy old dude. Daddy issues much?”

My cheeks are on fire. My whole body feels on fire.

“That’s what this is, right?” She laughs. “Daddy issues.” She pretends to suck her thumb and I get an icky rush of butterflies. “Ooh, Daddy, that feels so nice, Daddy. I’ll be a good little girl, Daddy.”

“Stop it,” I say. “It was nice. The whole thing was amazing.”

She props herself against the wall, acts like the big, cool girl. “The whole thing? So spill, oh virginal one, what is the whole thing?”

She’s ruining it. My only friend, my only confidante, even if she’s always been a shit one, and she’s ruining it.

“Forget it,” I mumble, and make to move past her.

She grabs my arm. “Hey, Laine. Chill, I’m only goofing around.”

“It’s not funny.”

She looks so shocked as I scowl as her, and it’s about time. It’s about time I let her know she’s being a fucking asshole.

“It’s a fucking joke, alright?” She sighs, like I’m the unreasonable one. “I’m serious, I want to know. If it’s a big deal for you, it’s a big deal for me.”

If only that were true. That’s never been true.

I shrug, and why not. She’s the best I’ve got.

“It was nice,” I say. “He was really considerate, and really respectful, and took it really slow…”

“And…” Her hands are egging me on. “Juicy gossip, please…”

I lower my voice. “He kissed me…”

“Yes, and…”

“And it was amazing.” I can’t stop smiling. “He was amazing. He kissed me, and touched me, and…” I check there’s nobody close. “And he put his mouth on me, and sucked my clit until I came, and then he put his dick there, and it was massive… really big…”

She laughs. “How would you know?”

I laugh right back. “I’m not a total baby, you know. I’ve watched pornography, just like you do.”

“The very fact you call it pornography says it all.”

“But he is,” I continue. “He’s big. And it felt amazing.”

“But he didn’t fuck you, with this big giant cock of his?” She raises an eyebrow.

I grin. “Not yet, but he will.”

She groans. “So what did he do with it?”

The memories come back, and so do the tingles, the feeling of him, rubbing, and making those noises. The sound of the bed creaking.

“He rubbed me… right against my clit… and I came… and he came…”

“He fucking dry humped you?!”

I shrug. “It wasn’t so dry…”

“Gross,” she says, but she’s lying. She’s scowling again.

I sigh, hug my lunchbox to my chest. “I love him.”

“Excuse me? You fucking what?!”

I smile. Simply. “I love him.”

She stares at me like I’m a simpleton. Mum stares at me like that, too, and I hate it. I always hate it. “I mean it,” I tell her. “I love him, and he loves me.”

“You don’t even know him,” she snaps.

“I know enough,” I snap back. “It’s fate.”

“Not those fucking horoscopes again…”

“I don’t need horoscopes to tell me it’s fate,” I insist. “I already know. And he knows it, too.”

“Then you’re both fucking cray cray.” She spins a finger in the air.

“He’s going to be the one,” I say, and I don’t give a shit anymore. Not what she thinks, nor what she says. Not at how she looks at me, or how Mum looks at me, or how anyone else in the whole world looks at me.

None of it matters, not now I have Nick. Daddy.

Not now I have someone who loves me.

“Fine,” Kelly Anne says finally, and lets out a sigh. “If you insist on being cray cray with Hannibal-old-guy then you do that. Just let me have all the juicy gossip, deal?”

I think I’ve won some invisible battle, and I’m not even sure what I was fighting.

“Sure,” I say. “But his name’s Nick.”

“Daddy Nick,” she laughs, and I’m sure my burning cheeks are going to give me away, but she slaps me on the back and doesn’t even notice. “Alright,” she says. “Now, let’s talk about blowjobs, I’ve got some great techniques…”