Daddy’s Wild Girl (Montana Daddies #16)

Chapter 11

11

H e was going to kill her.

That was if she didn’t die first.

Did the woman have no regard for her life? Or for her body?

The things she was doing . . . she could fucking well fall and break her neck.

And even then, he still might put her over his lap and spank her until she couldn’t sit for a week.

His heart leaped into his throat as she headed down the half-pipe and then up the other side into the air. She actually managed to flip the skateboard over and landed back on it before the board suddenly whooshed out from underneath her. She landed heavily, skidding her way down the steep side of the pipe.

Fuck!

Was she moving?

Was she going to get up?

Every other fall, she’d gotten up and laughed it off, but this time, she was just lying there.

Corbin started running. Her instructor, who was about fifteen years old, just stood there and yelled at her about how to improve her form.

Fuck that.

Fuck him.

What was that idiot doing?

Shouldn’t he be checking her for injury? How much did she pay this schmuck to teach her? And what was she actually learning? How to fall?

That was her fourth fall in less than half an hour and it was by far the worst.

She could be injured. She could have hit her head. She was wearing a helmet, but that didn’t mean she was completely protected from being harmed.

“Bebe! Bebe!” he yelled, running onto the concrete half-pipe.

“Hey, man! What are you doing?” the young boy yelled.

Corbin couldn’t call him a man when he looked like he was just out of diapers.

“I’m checking she’s not injured, you idiot!” he yelled back

Bebe was lying on her back, her eyes open. Shit. Shit. Shit.

She blinked up at him, her hand over her stomach as she opened her mouth. “I’m . . . I’m okay.”

“You don’t sound okay. Where are you hurt?” He kneeled next to her, running his hands lightly over her.

“Hey! Shouldn’t you take a girl out for dinner first?” she said breathlessly.

“Bebe, are you all right? Does anything hurt?” he asked urgently.

“Anything? Nope. Everything . . . that’s another story.” She closed her eyes. “Ouch.”

“Don’t close your eyes, sweetheart. If you have a concussion, you shouldn’t go to sleep.”

“I don’t have a concussion,” she said. “I just think that every inch of my skin is now bruised and that I’m not going to be making it to salsa dancing tonight.”

“Salsa dancing? Tonight? You know, when we asked you about a schedule, things like skateboarding lessons and salsa dancing should have been on it.”

“Oh. I thought you just meant boring things like jobs and appointments.” She coughed, then groaned.

“Hey, Bebe, you getting up? More people want to use the pipe.” The young boy sauntered toward them, and Corbin felt himself lose control of his temper.

It was like a cord that snapped.

Standing, he moved around Bebe so he stood between her and the idiot. Then he loomed over him, letting this dipshit feel every one of the eight inches that Corbin had on him.

“She will move when I ascertain that it’s safe for her to do so. And not a minute before. And since you seem to have little to no brain matter residing between your ears, I’m going to tell you this as well. You’re not gonna complain. You’re not gonna say or do anything. You’re gonna turn around and move away from her. Get me?”

“Hey! You can’t speak to me like that!” the boy protested.

“Did she pay you for this lesson?” Corbin asked.

“Well, ah, yeah,” he said, scratching his long hair. He probably had lice.

“Then you have a duty of care to her, don’t you? And if she’s hurt while you’re giving her a lesson, then I believe you’d be liable, wouldn’t you?”

“Hey, man, it’s just a casual lesson. Twenty bucks for half an hour. Bargain.” He held up his hands, backing away. “I don’t owe anyone anything. And I don’t own this place. Something happens to her here, it’s not my problem.”

“Hmm, tell me, do you declare the money to the IRS? Pay tax on it?”

Now the guy was pale, his legs shaking. “What? What are you trying to say? That you’ll tattle to the IRS on me? That’s low, man. Real low.”

“Then you better leave. Now. Before you really piss me off.”

The guy turned around and ran.

“That wasn’t very nice, scaring him like that with false threats. Pretty sure he pooped himself.”

Turning, he saw that Bebe was sitting up. He frowned as he crouched next to her. “You shouldn’t be moving. And it wasn’t a false threat.”

“I’m a bit winded and bruised, but really, I’m fine. I’ll be good as gold in a few minutes. Just need to get up and walk it off.”

“No,” he said firmly. “You do not need to just get up and walk it off. What you need to do is stay where you are until I’m sure you haven’t broken anything.”

“Um, Corbin, pretty sure the other people here want to use the half-pipe. And I’d rather not be sitting on it when they do.”

“They can wait.”

“Because skaters are known to be really patient,” she told him, raising an eyebrow. “I’m really all right.”

“I have a feeling you’d say that even if you were bleeding out.”

“Pretty sure you’d notice if I was bleeding out.”

He sighed, not feeling happy about any of this.

“Give me a hand up?” She held up her hand to him.

He knew it was a distraction. An olive branch of sorts. But he reached out and grabbed her wrist. He didn’t want to risk hurting her hand. He lifted her slowly up.

“Thanks,” she said. “See? Right as rain.” She took a step forward, then let out a low cry of pain and stumbled.

“Fuck! I knew it! You’ve hurt yourself. What’s wrong?” He leaped toward her and she turned to wink at him.

“Gotcha.”

“W-what?” He stumbled over the word as he gaped at her.

“I’m fine. Lighten up, man.” She walked over to where her stuff was. Some other skater ran over to hand her skateboard to her.

She smiled at the younger guy and he nearly tripped over his feet.

Yeah, Corbin understood that.

Her smile could make you feel like you were a hundred feet tall. As though you could do anything.

But the rest of the time . . . you either wanted to shake her or spank her.

Right now, he was leaning toward the latter.

That brat.

She’d pretended that she’d hurt herself. Lord, if anyone needed some discipline, it was her.

And then a long hug afterward.

Yep. That was exactly what she needed.

Corbin wasn’t happy with her.

Guilt rode Bebe hard. She’d just been playing a small joke. The truth was, she felt like one giant bruise. And she actually had been worried that she’d truly hurt herself when she’d fallen.

For the first few minutes, she couldn’t breathe and panic had welled inside her. The only reason she hadn’t slipped into a total panic attack was because of him.

Corbin.

When she’d seen him hovering over her, immediately her body had started to relax and she’d finally managed to take a small breath.

Because she’d known that she was safe. That he would take care of her.

And it wasn’t because he was her bodyguard. It was because she liked him. She was beginning to trust him.

Which was so darn stupid.

She shouldn’t trust anyone.

“Come on, let’s get you back home. I should call Hayes and have him come get us,” he said.

“I can walk.”

He shot her a look but moved beside her as she began strolling back home. He was even carrying her helmet and skateboard.

“I can carry those.” She tried to reach for them, but he drew them away with a frown.

“Don’t even think about it, Bebe.”

“It’s my stuff, though.”

“I just saw you fall through the air and slam to the ground. I am not in the mood to have you argue about carrying your things.”

Okay.

He was still a bit grouchy, then.

“I’m sorry,” she blurted out.

Shoot.

What did she do that for?

Um, maybe because it’s your fault he’s mad at you and you want to fix it.

She hated the idea that he was upset. It felt like having worms were in her belly.

Why must I always correct you, Belle? I don’t want to, but you force me to punish you in order to help you remember to be better.

Fuck. She’d taken up skateboarding to get his voice out of her head. But now he was back.

Awesome.

“What are you sorry about?”

“Pretending to be hurt when I wasn’t. That was uncalled for. Sorry,” she added again hastily.

She hoped that would be enough.

Did he want her to do more to atone?

“Hey, Bebe. Stop and look at me a moment.”

She stilled at his words and turned to look up at him.

“I’m not upset at the joke. I mean, you did give me a minor heart attack when you started limping, but that wasn’t the thing that really worried me.”

“It wasn’t?”

“Bebe, you gave me a heart attack when you fell! I thought you might have broken your neck!”

“Oh.”

Wait.

“Are you upset because you thought I was injured? You were . . . you were worried about me?”

Well, of course he was, idiot.

He’s in charge of your safety.

“You needn’t have been. I’ve been taking lessons for a while. And I’m sure that my father won’t hold it against you if I injure myself doing something I choose to do.”

He frowned down at her. “First of all, yes, your father will hold me accountable if you hurt yourself on my watch.”

Why?

It’s not like he ever cared if she hurt herself while a nanny was taking care of her.

But she didn’t say that out loud. She didn’t want to sound like she was feeling sorry for herself.

Poor little rich girl.

All that money and privilege and she still finds something to moan about.

Pathetic.

She took a slow, deep breath, fighting off the voices.

“Second, yes, I was worried about you. You sound so shocked by that. I know we haven’t known each other long, but I definitely don’t want to see you injured or in pain. And that isn’t because it’s my job.”

Wow.

Okay, wow.

“I, um, I didn’t hurt myself. But I’m sorry I worried you.”

He eyed her for a long moment. “I don’t think you should take lessons from a pimply faced, smelly, lice-ridden teenage boy. He doesn’t seem to know what he’s talking about or care that you were hurt.”

“Lice-ridden?” she squealed, ignoring the rest. “He had head lice? Oh my God.” She slapped at her hair as though she could feel the lice creeping through the strands.

This was terrible.

“That’s the part that upsets you?” he asked incredulously. “The head lice?”

“Head lice is very upsetting!” she cried. Reaching for his arm, she grabbed it and started to drag him along the street. “We need to get the car and go to the pharmacy. Now!”

He sighed. “Bebe, I don’t know if he had head lice.”

“What?”

“He was scratching his head, but it probably wasn’t lice.”

“Then why would you say that?” she wailed. Was he trying to give her a heart attack?

She couldn’t believe he would do that.

Corbin just shook his head and wrapped his arm around her. “Let’s get you home and in a bath. You’re going to be sore tomorrow. Maybe it will stop you from doing anything else crazy for a while.”

Yeah.

She hoped he didn’t bet anything on that.