Daddy’s Wild Girl (Montana Daddies #16)

Chapter 16

16

B ebe swung the sledgehammer back.

Damn.

This thing weighed a ton. How the heck was she supposed to get it into the wall with force?

Just as she tried to swing it, something grabbed it and she let out a scream.

Looking over her shoulder, she cried out again as she saw Corbin standing there.

“You scared me to death! Shoot! I think I might have peed myself.”

Great.

That was the sort of sexy thing you wanted to say to the guy you liked.

No.

No, nope.

He tugged the sledgehammer out of her hold and handed it over to Hayes who she hadn’t even noticed standing behind him.

Uh-oh.

Double trouble.

This wasn’t good. Especially since they were both frowning.

Well, Hayes was always frowning. That was just who he was. But when Corbin frowned . . . yeah, she was really in trouble.

Then Corbin went straight to level four and crossed his arms over his wide chest.

Double uh-oh.

She drew off her goggles. Ahh, that was better. They were smudged with dirt and dust.

She plastered a wide smile on her face and took a step back. “Good morning. I didn’t know you guys were up yet.”

“Well, if we weren’t, we soon would have been when the house caved in on us,” Hayes grumbled.

She frowned. “What are you talking about? The house wasn’t going to cave in.”

Hayes glared at her, then at Corbin. “You explain it.” Turning, he walked off.

With her sledgehammer.

“Hey! I need that!” she told him.

“No, you’re don’t,” he replied.

“Where are you taking it?”

“Outside.”

“Why?” she asked, puzzled.

“To hide it.”

Her mouth dropped open as she heard the front door shut.

“Hey! He can’t do that! It’s my only sledgehammer!” She tried to get past Corbin, but he put out an arm to stop her. She froze as she felt his arm brush her stomach.

Oh heck.

Why did her body react every time he touched her?

Oh hell, even got close to her?

It was infuriating that she couldn’t just ignore him or walk past him.

That she wanted to lean into him.

“Let me go,” she said in a hoarse voice.

Crap.

“No. You and I need a chat.”

“I need my sledgehammer. I’m in a time crunch. I need to get that wall down today and the mess hauled out. It’s going to be dusty and messy, and I can’t make too much noise once the neighbors are back from work. I can’t believe that Hayes took my sledgehammer! I love that sledgehammer.” She bounced up and down on her toes, needing to move.

“What you need to do is pause and take a breath for me,” he said in a low, commanding voice.

What?

“Look at me, Bebe.”

Crap.

He was using his ‘I’m the boss’ voice. She didn’t like that voice.

“Why are you pouting?” he murmured.

“Because you’re using your bossy voice. And I always end up doing things I don’t want to do when you use that voice. Even when I tell myself not to do them!”

“That’s because your body knows who’s boss,” he told her.

She narrowed her gaze. He was so arrogant sometimes. “You are not my boss.”

“Think again. Now, you need to sit down so we can have a talk.”

Huffing out a breath, she moved to the sofa and perched on the edge. She’d shoved it up against another wall to keep it out of the way of falling debris.

But honestly, if the thing had been destroyed, she wouldn’t cry.

To her surprise, he grabbed the coffee table and dragged it over so he could sit in front of her. Then he leaned forward, elbows on his thighs, his face earnest.

“Are you all right?”

Bebe blinked at him. “What do you mean? I hadn’t even started.”

Which was disappointing.

She couldn’t wait to destroy that wall. She’d always hated it.

“Um, Bebe?”

“Yes?”

“Why are you glaring at the wall and muttering?”

“Because it’s standing in my way of a decent-sized living room. I want to smash through it to that tiny study behind it and create a big living room.”

“Right, I understand that. But can you look at me for a moment? Giving that wall the death ray stare won’t bring it down.”

One could wish.

She turned to look at him. He studied her closely. “You look tired. Didn’t you get any sleep after your nightmare?”

Damn it.

His voice had grown all soft and concerned. And it hit her hard.

Why did he have to be like this? So caring.

She thought he would immediately start scolding her, but instead, he was asking how she was.

“I’m fine.”

“That’s not an answer to my question.” His voice had grown firmer.

Urgh.

“No, I didn’t get any sleep.”

“I see. Were you scared the nightmare would come back?”

“I don’t really want to talk about this.” She moved her gaze back to the wall. This room would be so much lighter when she knocked through that wall.

There was silence, and eventually, she turned her head to look at him.

“Okay, I can’t make you talk to me even though I wish you’d talk to someone. I can’t make you sleep either. But I do want you to try to nap this afternoon.”

Now she was blushing.

Was he going to put her down for a nap? Tuck her in? Kiss her forehead?

Sheesh, chill.

You don’t really want any of that.

The problem was that she was pretty sure that she did.

“What I don’t want you doing is smashing a hole in your wall.”

“I wasn’t smashing a hole in the wall!” she protested.

He raised his eyebrows.

“I wasn’t,” she insisted. “I was trying to tear the entire wall down. That’s not just a hole.”

“Did you make sure that the wall wasn’t structural first?”

Her mouth opened, then closed. Then, opened again.

Oh. Shit.

Why hadn’t she done that?

Well, maybe because you don’t know how to do that. But also . . . shit.

If she’d knocked it down and it was load-bearing, she could have compromised the structure of the house.

And that wouldn’t have been good.

Perhaps that’s what Hayes had meant when he said he was worried the house would cave in.

Yeah.

Oops.

“I can tell from your silence that you didn’t. You also don’t have enough safety gear on.”

“What? I was wearing safety goggles.”

“Which you can barely see out of,” he told her. “Not acceptable. You should have on a hard hat and gloves and steel-toed boots.”

Shoot.

Next, he would tell her that she should be wearing a high-vis vest in her own house!

“And you should have a high-visibility vest on.”

“Okay, now you’re just talking crazy!” she told him. “A high-visibility vest? In my house? Why would I need that? Who needs to see me?”

“Me. So I can pull you out of the rubble when the damn house collapses on top of you.”

She gaped at him.

He’d just raised his voice at her. Corbin never raised his voice. All right, he might have done it at the skate park, but she’d understood that. He’d thought she was hurt.

This was different.

“You’re yelling at me,” she said in a sad-sounding voice.

His eyes widened as her lower lip started to tremble. She really didn’t mean to do that. It just happened.

Sometimes, a lip did what a lip had to do.

“I’m not yelling at you!”

“Yes, you are. You’re still doing it.”

“Shit. Am I?” He ran his hand over his face. “Fuck. I didn’t mean to yell at you, okay?”

“I don’t like it.”

Crap.

Had her voice just grown higher-pitched? Was she . . . was her Little close to the surface?

That was unacceptable.

She shut that down super-fast, pushing her Little back into that locked box where she kept her.

Even though she cried as she did it.

Sometimes, Bebe wondered if she had a split personality. If other people thought this way. If they had to keep their Little side on lockdown.

“I’m sorry, Bebe.” He reached out to take her hand and she flinched away.

Shoot.

She hated the look of surprised concern that filled his face. Followed by a hint of hurt.

The last thing she wanted to do was hurt Corbin.

“Is your hand all right?”

“What? Yes, why?” She was tempted to cradle her hand to her chest, to hide her hand from his gaze.

“You pulled it away from me. I thought it might be hurting you. I’ve noticed that sometimes you favor it. And that you wince if someone grabs it too hard.”

Shit. Shit. Shit.

How was he so observant?

“It’s fine,” she said, standing abruptly. “I’m fine. I need to go.”

“Where are you going?”

“To look up how to tell whether a wall is load-bearing. And to find my darn sledgehammer!”

And to get far away from him. Before she was tempted to throw herself into his arms.

And beg him to never let her go.