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J ack snorted. “You are. You’re the sweetest. And so innocent. But all Littles need boundaries and rules. And one of your rules is no lying.”

“Somehow, I didn’t think you’d be into rules.”

“Oh, I’m not. When it comes to me.” He winked at her. “But I think you need them.”

She sighed. “This isn’t turning out to be a good day for Maggie.”

“Poor Maggie. I think we better get your punishment over and done with so that you can feel better.”

Hmm. He didn’t sound that sympathetic to her plight.

“Okay,” she drawled. “What is it?”

“You’re going to write lines. Thirty lines saying that you will not lie. And I will start a list of rules in this notebook that I bought to keep track of any bad behavior.”

“Thirty lines!” she cried as Jack set her down on the bed and found her some paper to write on.

“Yep, thirty lines. And if you keep arguing, it will be forty.”

She gaped at him. How had she thought that Jack wouldn’t be the sort of Daddy to punish her?

“Get started. There’s no more playing until you’re done.” He picked up a fluffy white notebook and started writing in it.

She tried to peek at what he was writing, but the meanie turned it away from her.

Huffing out a breath, she got on with her lines. This was so unfair.

Urgh, this was taking forever!

“There, I’m done!” She gave an exaggerated sigh hours later.

Well, maybe not hours. But a long time later.

“Pass it over.”

She handed him the piece of paper and he went over each line. What the heck?

“Well done,” Jack told her.

“Can I see what you wrote?”

“Hmm. Not yet. I need to show Ian.”

She didn’t think she needed rules. “Don’t I have to agree?”

“Let me think about that. No, I don’t think so.”

“Jack!”

“What is Jack doing now, Little girl?” Ian walked in carrying another tray of food. Sheesh, were they trying to fatten her up for something?

Although some of the snacks looked palatable at least.

“He’s writing rules for me and won’t let me see. Isn’t he mean? And he made me write thirty lines! Thirty! I’m only a Little girl.”

“I thought you were a big girl before,” Ian said, raising an eyebrow.

Drat. He wasn’t falling for her ‘feel sorry for me’ spiel. That was a bummer.

“I’m a complicated creature. It’s hard to keep up with the many facets of Maggie.”

Jack snorted.

“What rules did you write?” Ian asked, after setting down the tray.

Jack gave Ian the notebook before picking up one of the books they’d gotten for her. It had empty pages and he started drawing something on one of the pages.

“Good. Really? Okay. Right. Sure,” Ian muttered as he read through them. “All pretty standard stuff.”

“Don’t I need to know what they are in order to follow them? I mean . . . I don’t think I need them. I’m a good girl. Never naughty.”

“You were just punished,” Ian told her.

“Pssh. Semantics.”

“Rules for Little Maggie,” Ian read out. “She must not lie. She must obey her Bigs. She must?—”

“Aren’t you going to say what comes next?” Jack asked.

He shot a look at Jack. “What comes next is ridiculous.”

Her gaze moved back and forth, trying to follow them.

“Is it?” Jack grinned, then he continued to draw. “She’s going to see it anyway.”

“She must obey her Tops, the handsome and gorgeous Jack and boring, grouchy Ian.”

Oh.

Jack was so naughty.

She glanced over at him, shaking her head. “I think Jacky needs a spanking.”

The idea was ridiculous, of course.

And Jack looked over at her slowly. “Someone else needs their mouth washed out. And maybe a lesson in who the Top is here.”

Umm.

“Or maybe not.”

Ian sighed, shaking his head. “Maggie must tell her Tops when she’s sick, hurt, or upset.”

She bit her lip, not liking that rule.

“Maggie must accept all gifts given to her by her Tops without argument.”

“What? Really?”

“Yes, really,” Ian said firmly.

She sighed. “I’m not agreeing to that one. Or the one before it.”

They both glared at her. Ian sat, facing her with his hands on either side of her hips.

“You need to tell us whether you’re sick or hurting. Whether you’re big or Little. I thought we already talked about this.”

Assbaboons. They had. She slid a look at Jack, who’d grown tense.

“Yes. You’re right. Sorry. I agreed to that. But I don’t have to accept gifts. And you shouldn’t be buying me anything.”

“We want to spoil you,” Ian said.

“You hardly know me.”

“We know we want to spend time with you, get to know you and your Little,” Ian told her.

“But you shouldn’t spend money on me,” she protested.

I’m not worth it.

“What we do with our money is our business, Little girl,” Ian told her.

“What if one of you buys me a snake? Do I have to accept it?”

“No one is going to buy you a snake,” Ian answered her. “How about all reasonable gifts?”

“Is a glass dildo considered a reasonable gift?” Jack pondered.

“Jack! It is not!” She looked at Ian to back her up.

“Actually, I don’t believe there’s anything wrong with a glass dildo,” Ian mused.

They were bonkers.

“Right, onto the rest of the rules,” Ian continued. “Maggie will not do anything to deliberately put herself in danger or hurt herself.”

“Okay.” That one seemed easy to agree to. She nodded.

“She will not speak badly about herself.”

Blimey.

“Really?”

“Really,” they both said sternly.

She huffed a breath. “Fine.”

“Maggie will accept help from her Tops,” Ian added.

Yikes.

She wrinkled her nose. “What sort of help?”

“Any sort of help we think you need, Little girl,” Ian told her sternly.

Dear Lord. Maybe it was a good that this was just temporary.

“I’m also going to add that she will tell her Tops when she needs something,” Ian said.

Jack nodded.

“And that she will prioritise her own self-care.” Ian wrote in the book as he spoke. “Eating. Sleeping. Resting.”

She huffed out a breath. “You guys make it sound like I can’t look after myself.”

The silence was damning.

“I think that will do for the moment.” Ian closed the notebook. “We can add other things as they come up.”

“Nothing more will come up,” she said. “I can barely remember all of those as it is.”

Ian leaned in and kissed her forehead. “We just want to look after you. Is that so bad?”

Darn it. He knew just how to take the wind out of her sails.

“I guess not,” she muttered.

“What do you want to do now, Little girl? Some coloring?”

“I want to see what Jack is drawing.”

Jack turned his drawing around. It was a caricature of someone getting probed by a huge, tentacled alien. She let out a surprised giggle. Especially as she saw that the person being probed was Ian.

“Like it?” Jack asked.

“Yes! Can I color it in? Please?”

“Of course, baby. I drew it for you.”

Ian groaned and lay back on the bed. “The two of you will be the fucking death of me.”

Wow.

She took in the incredible detail. “You’re so talented.”

Jack shrugged. “Here you go, baby. Have at it.”

She settled in, carefully coloring in Ian first. A feeling of lightness filled her. This was perhaps the happiest and most at ease she’d felt in years.

Which was a bit scary if she thought about it too hard.

So she decided not to.

“Get on, you tricky things,” she muttered as she tried to get a shoe onto Ziggy’s foot.

It was early evening.

The night nurse came to take care of Uncle Willy, and she, Ian, and Jack were going to have a movie night.

First, though, Jack was checking the perimeter while Ian made dinner for them all. And she had nothing to do but put different outfits on Ziggy. The knock at the door barely registered as she struggled to put some tiny shoes on Ziggy.

“Ratbum!” she muttered as her hand slipped. Ziggy dropped and the shoe went flying.

Smacking Jameson in the face.

Oh. Oops.

“Oh God, did I hurt you?” She shuffled over to the edge of the bed and stood, ignoring the twinge in her hip. “I’m so sorry. I’m such an idiot. Did it get you in the eye? Those suckers are small, but they’re well-made. Like proper shoes. Can you see okay?”

She peered up at him. He was gaping down at her. “Here, come with me. I’ll get you an ice pack.” She took his hand and tried to tug him to the bed.

“What are you doing?” he asked, sounding incredulous.

“I’m trying to get you to sit down so I can look after you. I have to go downstairs to get an ice pack. If you won’t sit, then at least stay there. Okay? Be right back.”

She turned toward the door, holding back a wince of pain. Shoot.

“Whoa. I don’t think so.” Jameson grabbed her shoulders to stop her.

She let out a yelp of surprise and he let go of her immediately, giving her a horrified look.

“My apologies. I didn’t mean to just grab you. Are you all right?”

Great. Now she had polite, distant Jameson. That made her want to tease him a bit. Ruffle him up.

“No! I don’t think I am! Oh! Ohhh!” She stumbled away, turning to face him.

His face was filled with horror. “Bloody hell! What’s wrong? Here, lie down.” Picking her up, he carried her to the bed. Then he grabbed his doctor’s bag. “Where does it hurt?”

“Right. Here.” She put her hand over her mouth. “From trying to hold back this.” She broke out into giggles.

His eyes widened. “You were . . . you were . . . joking with me?”

“Yep.”

“You’re not really hurt?”

“Nope. You just looked so horrified. And then I got robot Jameson. So I wanted to shake you up a bit and get real Jameson.”

“Robot Jameson?” he asked.

“Yeah, when you kind of withdraw. You go all formal and stiff. I just wanted to . . . I don’t know. Now, I’m thinking that was kind of silly. I worried you. Sorry.”

“No, I, uh . . . I apologize for going all robot on you. It’s something I’ve done since I was young to protect myself.”

What would he need to protect himself from? She wanted to ask but got the feeling that he wouldn’t welcome any more questions.

“How is your eye, though? I’m really sorry.”

He huffed out a breath. “Are you always like this?”

“Like what?” she asked in a small voice. Annoying? Silly? Crazy?

“So concerned about everyone else? Even at the expense of yourself?”

“Oh.” That wasn’t what she’d expected him to say. “Is that a bad thing?”

“Not a bad thing. As long as you look after yourself too.”

Yeah. She wasn’t so good at that.

“What actually hit me, anyway?” Looking around, he picked up the shoe. “This?”

“Um, yes,” she replied, feeling silly. “I was trying to dress Ziggy. Sorry. Let me tidy up a bit.” There was stuff everywhere. She gathered all her things up and looked for a place to put them.

“That’s a lot of stuff you have there.”

“I know, Ian and Jack have been spoiling me.”

Something strange crossed his face. “Have they?”

She attempted to wriggle off the bed with her arms full. Jameson reached down and grabbed them from her arms. “I believe that I told you to rest.”

“You’re not the boss of me!” she told him without thought.

The dark look he gave her stole her breath. It made her want to get down on her knees and beg his forgiveness. To give him whatever he asked for.

Jameson was Dominant. With a capital D. She’d had an inkling . . . but even she was surprised. Mostly, he seemed calm and reasonable. But she could see a look in his eyes . . . something that told her that he liked control.

His hand shot out and grabbed her chin. Not hard, but definitely firm.

“You think not? You think I couldn’t be in charge of you, Shortcake?”

Oh, he could be.

Whether she would survive or not was another story.

“That I couldn’t get you to obey me? Have you down on your knees, begging me to take you . . . to fuck you . . . to give you the orgasm that you’d been denied?”

Holy. Crap.

She’d poked the beast. And she wasn’t sure she was ready for him to bite back.

“Not sure you can handle that?” he asked smoothly.

She raised her chin. No, she wasn’t sure she could. Not at all. But she wasn’t backing down.

For a long time, the fight had been broken out of her. Now, it seemed, it was coming back.

“I can handle you.”

He smiled. It was a wicked, sizzling smile. “Open your mouth.”

Her mouth popped open immediately.

“What a good girl you are for your Dom. So obedient. Sometimes, at least. Do you think you could be a good girl all the time? I’m not so sure.” His finger traced her lower lip.

Is that what he wanted? Someone who obeyed him without question? Who didn’t challenge him?

That didn’t feel right.

And it definitely wasn’t her.

Disappointment flooded her. Which was silly. He wasn’t hers.

“I’m not a good girl,” she whispered. “Not at all.”

He tilted his head to the side, then pressed his finger into her mouth. “Suck.”

She started sucking. If she hadn’t been watching him so closely, she might have missed the way his eyes narrowed. He wasn’t as unaffected as he liked to act.

“You don’t think you’re a good girl?” he murmured. “I think you can be a very good girl, sweetheart.”

She closed her eyes, breathing in the words, wanting them to be true. But the guilt she carried wouldn’t let her believe them.

She was falling apart. Everything was a mess and she wasn’t enough to hold it all together anymore.

“Uh-uh, I didn’t say you could close your eyes.” He slid his finger free of her mouth and she let out a sound of protest. “Keep your eyes open and stop thinking so much.”

Stop thinking?

Was he crazy? If she knew how to do that, she’d have been doing it a long time ago.

“All you need to focus on is this. On doing what I tell you. Open your mouth. Eyes on me. That’s it. See? You can be a very good girl.” His finger went back into her mouth. “Suck.”

This was just bizarre. She was sucking his finger and felt grateful. She felt aroused.

And . . . weirdly, safe.

As though Jameson wouldn’t let anything or anyone hurt her. Because he would take care of everything.

So silly.

“No thinking,” he ordered. “Eyes on me. Concentrate on sucking. That’s it. Look at you. Nice and calm. Shoulders relaxed. You’re doing so well. I’m very proud of you.”

Shoot.

There was a sound from somewhere in the house. A loud bang followed by someone swearing. Ian.

And before she could blink, Jameson pulled back. He was staring down at her with a bemused expression. And she knew before he spoke that she was going to get robot Jameson.

He drew back into himself. “I apologize. That was extremely unprofessional. I think it would be better if I referred you to another doctor.”

“Jameson, you didn’t do anything I didn’t want,” she told him.

“It was unethical.”

She sighed. “I kind of thought we were friends first and doctor-patient second.”

“Even more reason to have a new doctor.”

“All right.” She was too tired to keep arguing. And she knew she wasn’t going to win this argument. Besides, she understood where he was coming from. She didn’t want him to do anything that made him feel like he was doing something wrong.

And then that barrier would be gone . . . right?

Monkeyballs. What was wrong with her? She didn’t want just one man, but three!

And none of them were anything she could pursue long-term.

“Good. I think that’s a good idea.” He breathed out, his relief clear.

“I might be insulted by your relief if I didn’t have such a good sense of self-worth,” she told him in a light voice.

Oh, wait.

She had very little sense of self-worth.

So. Ouch.

He didn’t try to offer her false platitudes or smile back. Instead, his intent gaze studied her.

“I don’t think your self-worth is as healthy as you believe.”

Double ouch.

“This isn’t because of you, sweetheart. It’s about me and my behavior. Do you understand? None of it reflects on you. I don’t want my actions to erode your trust in me as your doctor.”

Oh. Right.

Well, okay.

“All right,” she whispered. “I think I understand.”

“Good girl. I mean . . . bloody hell.”

She couldn’t help but giggle. Most of the time he seemed larger than life. So far above her that he was untouchable. Gorgeous. Sexy. Smart.

So having him stumble over his words made him seem more relatable.

He sighed, shaking his head. “I really did come here to check your hip. I’ll have to get someone else to come over. They likely won’t make it here until tomorrow, though.”

“You really don’t have to worry. I’m not . . . I know you didn’t mean anything by what just happened. Also, Doctor J is different from Dominant J. I still trust you. Really.”

He eyed her for a moment, obviously debating something in his head. Then, with a nod, he walked over and sat on the bed, facing her. Only, he sat right on Ziggy.

“Nooo! You’ve killed him!”

Oh my God! He’d killed Ziggy.

Death by Sexy Doctor bum was a good way to go . . . but she wasn’t ready to say goodbye!