CHAPTER HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FOUR

SPENCER POV

Talking is so easy on the way home. Violet flicks through the spotter pamphlet as though it’s a treasured possession, reading me out the names in Latin to make sure she has the pronunciation right. Her sweet voice makes them ethereal. Magical.

      Wonderful.

      “Maybe you could teach me how to spot them in the wild,” she says. “It sounds fun.”

      “Harder work than the zoo.” I smile to myself. “It’s a different kind of fun, Violet, but no less enjoyable.”

      “I think I’d like it,” she tells me, and I do too.

      A few weeks ago I’d have struggled to ever imagine myself trekking into the countryside with jars and nets, but not today. Today anything feels possible.

      “Better than crosswords, right?” she asks.

That makes me laugh. “Yes, Violet, considerably better than crosswords.”

      “Better than TV, too,” she says.

      We stop for dinner at a fancy little restaurant on the outskirts of the city, and I stare at her as she scours the menu.

      “I don’t know what to choose,” she admits. “I don’t know what half this stuff is.”

      I slide my chair around to her side of the table and talk her through the options. Her hand rests on my knee under the tablecloth and squeezes, and she’s so close, so intoxicatingly close. I can smell her shampoo, and her, close enough to enjoy the flutter of her eyelashes as her eyes wander over the main courses.

      “I think we should go with the winter roast,” I tell her.

      She nods. “That sounds good to me.”

      I move back to my own side of the table before I give our order to the waiter, and already I’m missing her touch.

      “When did you know you first liked butterflies?” she asks, and it makes me smile to realise she’s still thinking about them.

      “A school project,” I tell her. “Infant school, I must’ve been only five or six. A conservation assignment, British wildlife and its habitat. We went out into the meadow behind the school and I spotted a monarch fluttering from leaf to leaf. I was mesmerised by its colours. Once I started watching them I never stopped. My father bought me a net for my birthday, I didn’t even ask. It was a surprise.”

      “That was nice of him, to encourage that.”

      “He was a fair man. Stern, but fair,” I tell her.

      “Stern,” she repeats with a smile, and I know exactly what she’s thinking.

      She’s picturing my father’s belt on my backside, the severity of the punishment I received in his old study.

      “As I said, stern but fair.” I pour her mineral water from the jug on the table. “As I hope to be. That’s what I aim for, Violet, that same balance.”

      “I haven’t seen you stern. Not yet.”

      I hand her the glass. “You will, given time. When it’s necessary, sweetheart, only when it’s necessary.”

      “I’ll always be good, Da-” Her voice falters, and I get it. She’s unsure how to address me in public. Daddy Spencer sounds so fucking creepy.

      Perverse and icky, as Violet would call it. Because it is. It is icky.

      Dirty.

      It’s fucking dirty.

But my cock’s already hard at the thought.

 I don’t care who hears us in this place, and that’s a new feeling too, the disregard for appearances. My professional conduct is the only thing in recent years I’ve had to concern myself with, and that’s for my father’s legacy and the firm’s reputation rather than anything personal.

      “It’s Daddy, sweetheart,” I tell her.

      She looks uncertain, her cheeks flushing. “In public? I thought this was…”

“You thought it was at home only?” I raise an eyebrow. “Is that what you want?”

  She shakes her head but she doesn’t seem entirely sure. “You said people wouldn’t understand… people like Maggie Connor…”

      “And they wouldn’t. The complexity is too confusing.” I lean closer. “In this place I can be your daddy or your lover. Or both.” I smirk. “It depends how devilish you feel.”

 I’m joking, but her eyes tell me she isn’t. They flash with dark amusement, and she wants it. I know she wants it.

      Interesting.

      My sweet little Violet is certainly interesting.

      “I’ll call you Daddy,” she whispers.

•

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VIOLET POV

I’m burning up as the waiter brings our meal. This is new ground, him being Daddy here, around people. It makes it seem so real and so tingly.

The waiter smiles as he places my plate in front of me, and I wonder if I should find a way to say it aloud. I wonder if that’s what Daddy Spencer wants.

      He doesn’t give me an opportunity to find a way. He does it for me.

      “Doesn’t that look lovely, sweetheart?” he asks. The waiter looks at me, waits for a reaction with a smile.

      My heart is racing. “Yes… it does, Daddy.”

      Daddy Spencer smiles so bright, and I feel like I’ve passed a test. I like it. I really like it.

      “It looks really yummy, Daddy,” I say, trying it out some more. It comes so much easier than I thought it would.

      I wonder how old the waiter thinks I am. Fifteen, maybe sixteen at most. Just the right age to have a daddy like Spencer .

“Enjoy your meal,” the waiter says, and leaves us, just like that. As though it’s the most normal thing in the world, a little girl eating out with her daddy on a Saturday evening.

 “Good girl,” Daddy Spencer says, and I feel it in my tummy.

  “I don’t look much like you,” I whisper.

  “Then I guess you look like your mother.” His eyes twinkle so darkly, and I wonder if he’s hard. I wish I could find out.

      Dinner tastes really good, but I hardly want to eat anything. I have to force it down, but my thighs are doing that clenching thing they do, and I’m squirming on my seat, hoping Daddy Spencer will take me again when we get home. Hoping he’ll do it fast and hard and make those horny grunts he makes when he loses control.

      “Eat up,” he tells me. “You’ll need the energy when we get home.”

      I eat every single bite.