"Never," I said, and the word came out like a vow. "You could regress in front of a room full of people and I would still be therewhen you came back. You could push me away for a year and I would still be waiting. That's not negotiable. That's just true."
She made a small sound—not quite a sob, not quite a laugh.
"Your turn," she said. "Hard limits."
I thought about it—really thought, for the first time, about what I needed to protect myself in this dynamic.
"Don't pretend to be okay when you're not," I said finally. "Don't hide distress to avoid troubling me. If you're struggling, I need to know. My limit is being kept in the dark when you need help."
"That's your hard limit? Not being lied to?"
"Letting me help you is how this works. If you shut me out to protect me from worry, you're taking away my ability to do the one thing I need—take care of you."
She nodded slowly, and I could see her processing this, fitting it into her understanding of what we were building.
"What about consequences?" she asked, and there was something in her tone now—curiosity mixed with something darker. "When I break rules. What happens?"
"That depends on the rule and the reason." I moved back toward the chairs, needing the distance to think clearly. "If you forget to eat because you're genuinely lost in work, that's different than deliberately skipping meals to test me. The first gets gentle correction. The second..."
"The second?"
"Gets consequences that remind you why the rules exist." I met her eyes. "Spanking, if you want that on the table. Loss of privileges. Early bedtimes. Whatever makes the lesson stick without causing harm."
Her breath had gone shallow, color rising in her cheeks. "I want that on the table. The spanking. All of it."
"Then it's on the table." I sat back down, gestured for her to do the same. "But not tonight. Tonight is just the framework. The foundation."
"You keep saying that." She remained standing, a hint of frustration in her voice. "Framework. Foundation. Structure first. When do we actually—"
"When I'm certain I can give you what you need without breaking either of us." I looked up at her, letting her see the want I wasn't hiding, the control it was costing me. "I want you, Maya. Badly enough that it's taking everything I have to do this right instead of just taking what you're offering. But you've been hurt before by people who rushed past the careful parts. I won't be another name on that list."
The frustration in her expression shifted, softened into something more vulnerable.
"What if I'm tired of being careful?" she whispered. "What if I just want to feel something besides afraid?"
"Then let me give you that." I stood, closing the distance between us but not touching. "Not by rushing. By proving, every day, that you can trust me. By showing you that surrender doesn't have to mean loss—it can mean relief. It can mean finally putting down everything you've been carrying because someone else is strong enough to hold it."
She looked up at me, and I could see the war in her eyes—the longing fighting with the fear, the need battling the learned protection.
"The first rule," I said softly. "Starting tonight. You eat every meal I bring you. All of it. You stop working when I tell you to stop. You come to me when the darkness gets too heavy instead of drowning in it alone." I reached up, let myself cup her face, thumb brushing across her cheekbone. "Can you do that?"
"Yes," she breathed.
"Yes, what?"
The question hung between us, loaded with possibility. I watched her understand what I was asking—the acknowledgment I needed, the word that would seal what we were beginning.
"Yes, Daddy."
The title in her mouth, given freely, sent a shudder through my entire body. I wanted to kiss her. Wanted to pull her against me and show her exactly what that word did to me. Instead, I let my thumb trace her lower lip, the barest contact, a promise of everything I was making myself wait for.
"Good girl," I murmured, and watched the words hit her—watched her eyes flutter, her lips part, her whole body sway toward me.
Then I stepped back.
"Dinner," I said. "Now. I'm going to feed you, and then I'm going to walk you to your room, and then I'm going to spend the rest of the night thinking about everything I'm not doing to you yet. Understood?"
She nodded, dazed.
