Being Their Baby (32 page)

He even enjoyed being the guy from whom she was constantly looking for approval. Not that he’d ever deny her his love, or his affection, but she was always trying to get him to say “yes” about everything, because she truly did care about his opinion.

That was probably why she was acting like he’d just given her enemas with lava as the main ingredient, and not soap. She was embarrassed. She had never seen one’s whole body blush before, but hers was now.

He tried not to let her humiliation turn him on too much, but he was having trouble with it.

After cleansing her bottom with a wipe, he picked her up and carried her to the oversized changing table. She was easy to handle now; she was contrite, quieter, and of course she was still tied at the hands and feet.

“All right, sweetheart. Let’s get this diaper on you. Are you going to be a good girl so I can untie you?” He looked at her wearily as he rested her gently down on the changing table. All she had to do, and she knew it, was to kick his right shoulder, which she could reach with one of her feet in this position, and he’d be on the floor. His shoulder was already throbbing because of being beaten with a doorknob during Sophie’s flurry of escape attempts.

Sophie nodded, and swallowed. It looked like her throat was hurting her, and he was unsurprised. She’d done a lot of screaming and yelling, and for what purpose, he didn’t know. She had to have known that Josh and Liz weren’t going to help her, not this time.

“You know this isn’t a punishment for everyone,” he told her calmly as he began to untie her feet. “Some girls love baby time. They like not having any responsibilities, they like reverting back into trusting someone will take care of them.”

“Back?” She shook her head. “I don’t revert back. There’s nothing to
revert back
to.”

“You were a baby once. Surely, you wore diapers.” He put the silk binding aside and then began to use another baby wipe on her bottom.

“I had a day school teacher who potty trained me because my mother and grandmother used to ignore me so bad that I kept getting infections,” Sophie told him, a coldness in her tone. He froze. “I don’t remember much of it,” she added, looking toward the window. “I remember sleeping in the bathtub until I was six. I kept wetting my bed, and my mother used to keep slapping me for it—I’d wake up to her slapping me. So I stopped sleeping in the bed for… a couple of years. Why would I want to go back to that?”

Charlie had frozen still, his heart twisting in his chest for her. “Oh, sweetheart.” He shook his head. “I can’t imagine how that must have felt. Thank you so much for trusting me enough to tell me about that.” He took a deep breath. “So are you opposed to being our baby because you think we’ll
neglect you
or because it brings up some bad memories? Or both?”

Sophie looked completely confused. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I guess… because of both. But it’s not just that. I never said I was…
opposed
. It’s not… it’s not that.”

Charlie took a deep breath, realizing that she was talking about something she viewed as very embarrassing and very awkward. He couldn’t miss this opportunity; apparently he had broken down one of her major barriers. “Do you
want
me to treat you like a baby?” he asked, and saw her face twist with an amalgamation of fear, panic, and utter humiliation. “Are you ashamed about wanting it?” He pressed forward, carefully reading her expression.

Her eyes, which had been more focused on the window, or anything else except him, suddenly met his own. They were glassy, filled with tears. “It doesn’t make sense that I’d want it.” She sniffled, and there was a tremor in her bottom lip. “It doesn’t make
sense
!”

“Sometimes, baby girl,” he told her, “a broken bone needs to be reset so it has the chance to heal properly. I think you yearn to trust someone to give you the affection and care you’ve always wanted, and that you want us to force you to take it so that you don’t have to ask for it. People are drawn to some experiences that will help them like that.”

Suddenly, her taking Josh’s car was making sense. She’d
wanted
to get caught. She’d
wanted
to be disciplined for it.

“I’m so scared,” she whimpered, not arguing with any of his assertions.

She was the most adorable little thing on the planet. He leaned down and rubbed his nose against hers. “Don’t be, little one. Daddy’s here.” He kissed her cheek, and then her lips. “I love you, baby girl. There’s nothing you can do that will keep me from being your daddy and loving you to death. Nothing you can say. Nowhere you can go. So, if this ends up being too painful for you, we never have to do this again. You don’t even have to give me a reason. But I don’t want you to worry that we won’t take care of you because we will, Sophie. I promise you.”

She nodded.

“You trust me to take care of you today?” he asked her.

She nodded again. “Yeah.”

“You have nothing to worry about, nothing to be ashamed about, okay?”

She nodded again. “Okay,” she said with a raspy voice.

“Okay.” He pulled back and continued to prepare her for her diaper.

He did notice the reddening of her pussy, and the couple of bruises on her inner thighs. He locked his jaw, thinking how Josh should have been gentler with her in her first time. He pulled her legs up and squeezed some lube on her cute little puckered bottom hole. “I’m going to be putting something up your bottom, honey, and you’re keeping it up there for a couple of hours. You know
why
?”

“Because I was a bad girl?” she guessed, her eyebrows twitching with regret.

He couldn’t help grinning. “Yes, baby. And I want you to trust me with this little bottom hole of yours, too. I know I put it through a lot already today, but when I eventually take you there—
not today.
” The look of concern in her eyes made him waver. “But I will one day, and it will feel better if you’re trained nice and slow, level by level.”

“You’re too big to go up my bottom, Daddy,” she quavered.

“Right now, I think you’re right. That’s why I have to bring you up level by level,” he repeated calmly, then opened a drawer near him and pulled out the smallest bottom plug, one about the size of his finger. She was more used to the size, since he had penetrated her bottom with his finger before, and had already today. He didn’t want her to fear it, after all. He smeared some lube across the tip, then lined it up to her bottom. “Deep breath in,” he told her.

She hesitated, but eventually, she took a deep breath in and held it.

“And breathe out.” She loudly exhaled, and he firmly pressed the plug into her bottom. Her sphincter accepted the little ball hilt near the end with a pop as Sophie let out a whimper.

“It hurts!” she whined.

“Give it a second and relax,” he cooed at her as he cleaned some lingering lube off his hands. “Relax your bottom,” he directed again, a bit chidingly, when the little crinkle that appeared above her eyebrow when she was in pain didn’t disappear.

Slowly, the crinkle faded. He cleaned away any remaining lube, then rubbed lotion all over her red bottom. “See? It’s just something to keep your attention, isn’t it?”

She nodded slowly, and he picked up her bottom and put a diaper under her. She was back to not looking at him, but that was perfectly okay. She was trying to get herself together, especially because being diapered was embarrassing to most of the even most hard-core age-players. This one was a little big for her. She was going to waddle when she walked, for certain, and it probably felt awkwardly bulky as well.

He sat her up, and she looked down, apparently thinking what he was thinking: that she was a little too small for the furniture. She seemed rather high up. “All right,” he said, petting the back of her neck for a second before opening another drawer and pulling out an extra-large pacifier. “Babies don’t get to talk, little one, so once I put this pacifier in your mouth, that’s it until tomorrow evening.”

She sniffled. “But—but what if—”

He pinched her chin gently between his thumb and forefinger. “There are no ‘what ifs.’ We’ll take care of everything for you,” he told her. “You’ll be with one of us the whole time. Forget about class, forget about what happened yesterday, or future jobs, or whatever it is you worry about. Those are big-kid concerns, okay? Not baby concerns.”

She frowned and pouted, “But what about my homework?”

“You’ll have time to finish tomorrow,” he assured and lifted a tissue to her nose. “Blow.”

She did, but as soon as he threw away the tissue, he put the pacifier to her lips and she drew away, dodging the pacifier. “I’m thirsty, Daddy,” she informed him, looking concerned like she thought he’d say something like liquids only being for adults.

He’d already figured that she was. She’d probably cried all the liquid out of her. “Thanks for the tip.” He put the pacifier in her mouth.

She looked like she didn’t like it at first, and then she began to chew on it. Eventually her eyebrows moved upward, as if surprised that it wasn’t all that bad.

“Good girl.” He helped her down on the floor and she went to her knees immediately. He grabbed a long-sleeved t-shirt from her dresser and then dressed her in it.

He watched her wander on her knees toward the bookshelf filled with books and DVDs and then walked to the kitchenette to make her a bottle filled with apple juice. By the time he came back, she seemed to be making a mental itinerary of everything she had in her room.

He smirked and then grimaced as his shoulder pulsed with revised pain. He walked over to Sophie and stood behind her. She picked up a book and blinked at him. He grinned, glad she liked him reading to her as much as he enjoyed doing it.

“All right,” he grunted, as if he wasn’t looking forward to snuggling with her. “But only
one chapter
, baby girl, and then I’m putting you down for a nap.”

He didn’t actually have to put her down for a nap. She accepted the bottle with only a slight whine in response and then snuggled into him. As soon as she was halfway done with her juice, and he was only a couple of pages into
Trumpet of the Swan
, she was out like a light, curled up on his lap.

Charlie closed the book and petted her hair adoringly.

“She’s napping while
plugged
?” Josh whispered from the doorway. If Charlie wasn’t used to years of Josh sneaking up on him like a goddamned ninja, he might have startled and awoken Sophie. “Impressive.”

“Not really. It’s not a big plug. Besides, she was exhausted. Perhaps if someone let her sleep last night instead of humping her to death, she might have had more trouble.”

The blame in his tone hadn’t landed with Josh. He came in and walked to the kitchenette. “Yep. Good thing I humped her to death; at least one of us is getting a good nap in. Liz is pissed at me about it. She cut me off cold turkey until her next dungeon session. Apparently, I’m not even allowed to choke my chicken until she says so. She’s a hard-ass.”

Charlie winced at the influx of far more information than he wanted. He wanted to turn his head around enough so he could see what Josh was doing, but his shoulder was screaming with pain.

Suddenly a pack of ice was pushed against his bad shoulder. Charlie gritted his teeth, but then relief flooded into him. “You got to start wearing your shoulder brace more often,” Josh lectured, coming around the edge of the sofa and plopping down just in front of Sophie’s feet. “Your shoulder’s swollen practically to deformity. You gotta take it easy. The last thing you want is another surgery before you get to go on your honeymoon. You won’t get to do half of Liz’s favorite positions.”

Charlie grinned. “So Liz told you?”

“She didn’t fit in that news around the lecturing of taking a girl who might have been in shock from a car accident, but while she was slapping my arm, I
did
notice something shiny on her finger.” He grinned. “Good for you, man.”

“Thanks.” He looked down at Sophie. “I do worry about how
she’ll
take the news.”

“Sophie? I think she’ll have a little bit of jealousy, but she’ll be happy about it at the end of the day. I’ll tell her for you, make sure it sets in right. I’m way better with talking with her than you are.”

Charlie raised an eyebrow at him.

“I am,” Josh assured, “always have been. Besides,” he added, looking over at Sophie, “I’m sort of in love with her. Not just in a daddy dom way, either.” He played with a loose string at the frayed bottom of his shorts. “In a different sort of… can-you-come-to-my-hockey-games-for-the-rest-of-my-life kind of way.”

“Was sex
that
good?” Charlie asked after digesting this.

Josh shot him a glare. “I’ve been thinking about it since Liz brought her home and she was just so… perfect for us. She fits, you know? Only I think about her all the time, like an obsession. I don’t have nightmares about normal stuff anymore. I just have nightmares where she’s
gone
. Either died or ran away or was never born. And then when the cops last night only said that she’d been taken to the hospital—not even letting me know which one get went to because I wasn’t anything to her—I just felt this desperation. I thought I had walked into my nightmare. Now, if I was married to her, then she’d be a Hobbes. She’d have my last name, we’d be together, and because I was her husband nothing would ever be kept from me.”

Charlie understood; hell, it’s all he’d ever wanted to have Liz joined permanently to him. He wanted to officially be part of her family. Still, protectiveness over Sophie was eating at him; he didn’t want her to have to grow up too quickly or be tied to something she wasn’t ready for. “She’s got a lot of trust issues to get through, bro. Not to mention that she’s only eighteen,” Charlie warned, his voice low. He did not want Sophie to wake up and listen to the conversation.

“Undoubtedly she has trust issues; she grew up in hell,” Josh replied, leaning back and turning on the television in front of them to a hockey game, skillfully and quickly setting it to mute. “One of the things I like about her is that she’s a tough little bunny.” He shrugged. “She talk to you about some of what she went through?”