The Daddy P.I. Casefiles: The First Collection by Frost, J (great novels .txt) 📕

“You have no idea what it’s like to want something so badly. It was all I could think about. All that mattered. Don’t you remember those first months, when I was all you could think about?”

It was never like that for me. I always enjoyed my time with Miranda. She’s smart, sophisticated, and witty, when she’s not being a conniving witch. We had a number of things in common besides our shared kinks and sexual chemistry. I looked forward to seeing her, but it was never all-consuming. If anything, those first few months, my focus was on my other sub, Luisa. We were pushing the boundaries of her emotional masochism to see if I could fulfill her deeper needs; it was becoming clear I couldn’t and that we’d need to find her another top. I was pretty preoccupied by that, actually, so if Miranda thought I was distracted because of her, she got it all wrong.

“Mir, you might have felt that way at the beginning, but I never did. I’ve never let my relationships eat up that much of my headspace.” Not until Emily. “And you don’t need to say any more. If having a baby was all that mattered to you, then there’s nothing more to talk about.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I see her face crease, the pout becoming something like real pain.

“Darling, it was an obsession. Haven’t you ever been obsessed?”

I’m not sure I have. Loving Emily, wanting to marry her, is a deep, primal drive, but it’s not an obsession. I’m most concerned about what Emily needs and wants. If she tells me she doesn’t want to get married, I’ll accept her decision. It’ll hurt, but I respect her limits.

“No, I haven’t,” I tell her. “Certainly, never enough to trample the boundaries of someone I loved.”

“Love,” Miranda says.

“No, past tense.” I slide my arm behind my head so I can see the outfield better. The Indian batters are knocking them deep, racking up the runs. Pakistan’s going to be hard-pressed to catch them at this rate. “I’ve put those feelings behind me.”

Miranda makes a little choking noise, which I ignore.

“I don’t believe that,” she says after a minute. “We were together for five years. You don’t just set aside five years of feelings.”

Her emphasis on the amount of time we were together makes my stomach shrivel. They’re not five wasted years. Not entirely. I learned a lot about myself, and about topping, during those five years. It’s probably due to those five years that I’ve been able to mold myself into a daddy for Emily. And if I hadn’t been with Miranda all that time, refusing to commit to any one relationship, I might have missed meeting my little girl.

Still, there’s a rock rolling around in my chest at the thought of those five, mostly-wasted years.

“Be honest with yourself, Mir. We weren’t together for five years. You were with Colin and you saw me occasionally when you wanted kinky sex. I was with literally a hundred other women, and I saw you when you could be bothered to make time for me—”

“That’s not fair,” she hisses. “I thought about you every day.”

“I didn’t,” I say, honestly but probably too brutally. “I’m sorry, Mir, but it was never like that for me. I did care about you, but now when I look at you, all I feel is anger.”

I rub my hand over my sweat-tacky face. The morning’s rain has burned off and it’s getting hot and sticky again. I take another draw on my beer to cool down before I continue, “Emily told me once that she’d stopped loving her husband after the divorce, but even years later, she still feels betrayed. I didn’t really understand it then, but I do now. When I look at you, all I can think about is how you lied to me for months. All those times you let me have sex with you without a condom. Knowing I could get you pregnant. Knowing it was a hard limit for me while you were married to Colin. That’s consent-violation. It’s rape, Mir. I don’t understand how anyone could do that to someone they profess to love. All I can think is that your desire for a baby was stronger than any feeling you had for me.”

I glance over at her. She’s kneeling on the couch, hands on her belly, two shiny lines running down her face. Unlike Emily, who turns beet-red and swells like an adorable little balloon when she cries, Miranda cries without even turning pink.

“Sorry,” I say, although I’m not. I’m actually proud of myself for getting all of that out without exploding. “You know where the bathroom is if you want a tissue. I didn’t want to get into this. There’s no point. Let’s just drop it and watch the match.”

She touches the backs of her fingers to her cheeks to blot away the moisture. She doesn’t sniffle.

“I made a mistake not talking with you about it,” she says softly. “About how much it had come to matter to me.”

“Talking wouldn’t have changed anything.”

“But it can change things now.” She holds her hand out towards me. I shift slightly away from her and she lets it drop back to her belly. “Lo, I know what the test is going to show. My marriage to Colin is over. But we don’t have to be over. This could be our second chance.”

My jaw tightens until my teeth creak. “We’re very over. I couldn’t ever trust you again. I don’t know how you think I could.”

“I’ve made mistakes before. You punished me and the slate was wiped clean. That’s what you always said. I know it’s not safe when I’m pregnant, but after the baby’s born—”

I rub my free hand over my eyes, trying to lessen the ache that’s building. “You’re missing the point. I can’t be your master again because I don’t trust you. I won’t ever trust you again, Mir.”

“You don’t mean