I blink several times as I search his face, trying to see whether he is really telling the truth or not. But his face doesn’t even twitch as he looks right back at me.
“You can’t be serious,” I reply.
“I am. You will see in a couple of minutes.” He guides my head back to his chest.
I push against his hand, not wanting to miss anything.
“It is going to be far too bright for you,” he tells me. “You will keep your face in my neck so you don’t hurt your eyes. If you try and sneak a peek, you will get into trouble. Don’t think I won’t punish you. I’ve already spanked you.”
Grumbling under my breath, I feel us come to a stop and Da—, I have to stop saying that name. Raydn holding me starts to walk again. I will not call him Daddy in my head. That is another way for him to win, and I’m not going to allow that.
“We are going to take a short ride to the building and then you may look again,” he explains as he keeps his hand firmly against the back of my head, almost like he doesn’t trust me.
I can hear several different people talking, and all of a sudden, goosebumps litter my whole body. I snuggle closer to his body.
Why is it so cold here?
“We are almost to the vehicle,” he informs me. “Then you’ll be all warm.”
I shouldn’t have shown him that I was getting cold, but it came so suddenly and I had no time to prepare myself.
“Home,” Daddy said as he sits down and warmth envelopes me. “You may look a little. The windows are tinted, so your eyes will be okay.”
I pull my head back as he lets his hand drop to my back and look at the small box we are in. I’ve never seen anything like it.
Daddy runs his hands over my skin and hums. “No wonder you are so cold. Your skin is so thin, it doesn’t do anything for your body,” he says and shakes his head. “Daddy will have to keep a close eye on you.”
“I don’t need to be watched like a pet,” I retort.
“You do need watching. I will not have you harming yourself or trying to get away,” he replies.
I open my mouth, but before I can say anything, a deep voice rumbles.
“We are here.”
I look around, trying to find who it belongs to, but Daddy guides my head back to his neck before he gets out. He doesn’t push my head against his neck like last time, so I keep my eyes open and realize it’s darker than in the moving box.
“We are almost there,” he tells me.
He steps into another metal box, presses a button, and we move. I hold onto him tighter, squeezing my legs around his waist as we travel upward. What is this thing?
“Welcome home.”
After we leave the lifting box, I turn my head and take everything in. It’s so spacious and clean. There isn’t anything on the walls and only a couple of different pieces of furniture in the big room. I’ve never seen anything like it. Granted, I’ve only lived in the space station, but Luna told me some stories she heard about big cities around Earth.
“Luna?” I turn my head toward Daddy. I want to keep looking around, but I need to know whether she is okay or not.
“You will be able to see a lot of Venkoria through this window,” he tells me as he carries me farther into the room, ignoring what I said. “This is where you are going to live.”
My eyes follow his, and my mouth hangs open as I look outside. We are so far away from the ground. Gripping his neck tighter, I push my head into his chest and take a shaky deep breath in.
“What’s wrong, Little companion?” Daddy asks.
“No heights,” I mumble into his chest.
On the space station, I didn’t like looking out the few windows we had because we didn’t have anything around us. It scared me to know that at any moment we could fall and die. Now it’s even worse with how clear the window is.
Any time we walked close to one of the windows on the space station, I always took a deep breath and didn’t look. I made sure that I was oblivious so I didn’t get all nauseous and vomit. How did I become so scared of heights? I don’t know, but it’s been this way since the first time I looked outside the space station.
