Page 80 of Her Hero Daddy

“Baby alligator, look at me,” he said again, this time using his finger to lift her chin.

Her wet blue eyes stared at him as more tears fell.

“I’m sorry I was bad, but I couldn’t bear the thought of losing you.” Her lips trembled as she spoke.

“You aren’t going to lose me, baby. I’m right here. Now, I need you to breathe in and out slowly because you’re panicking.”

When her breathing slowed, Kane reached over her and undid her seat belt, pulling her from the car into his embrace. She wrapped herself around him and sobbed loudly as her entire body shook.

“It’s okay, baby. Daddy has you. You’re safe now.”

33

HAYLEE

“So, what you girls are saying is that you tricked Keith into thinking Ally had an owie that she needed a Band-Aid for and sent him on a hunt for the first aid kit, while Haylee snuck out of the house and started the car, and then Ally snuck out of the house and hopped in while he was in the upstairs bathroom still searching for a Band-Aid?”

Haylee and Ally sat on the couch in Luke’s living room as Kane, Luke, and Keith stood staring down at them and scowling.

They’d spent the last half hour explaining their actions of how they’d tricked Keith and driven toward the motel, spotting Tim running through the field with Kane and Luke on his tail. Haylee told them that she’d planned to drive the car in front of him to knock him over. Well, she had actually planned on running him over with the car, but Tim had slowed slightly when he turned and shot at Kane, running into the side of the car instead.

Luckily, the men had to close off the crime scene and sort out a bunch of things before they could leave, so Luke put both girls in the back of Kane’s SUV. They sat back there for nearly two hours, and in that time, it had seemed to them that both men had calmed down. Well, not calmed down, but Haylee no longer saw smoke coming out from the top of their heads.

“Yes, but everyone is okay, and Tim is in jail now,” Ally spoke up.

Luke gaped at her, his eyes dark and his jawline tight. “Everyone is okay? You two could have gotten seriously hurt, and you went against both of our direct orders, disrespected Keith by lying and disobeying, and you drove right towards an extremely dangerous crime scene!”

Yeah… They were definitely in trouble.

“I’m sorry. It was my fault, not Ally’s. I was the one who said I wanted to go make sure my Daddy was okay and came up with the plan to escape,” Haylee admitted.

She had thought she had seen the intimidating side of Kane. Turns out, that was the teddy bear side of him compared to how he looked as he loomed over her, scowling. She could see a vein in his neck popping out, and she was sure he might explode any minute. Still, despite how angry he was, she didn’t feel as though he would harm her like Tim would have.

“As nice as it is that you’re trying to protect your best friend, Haylee, Ally will still be getting her butt blistered, and she will be grounded for at least a year for this stunt that you both pulled,” Luke answered sternly.

“I think a year is pretty light. They should probably get their butts spanked every night for a year and be grounded for the next five years,” Kane said.

Haylee and Ally both lowered their eyes to their laps and nodded. They sort of knew they would be in trouble when they’d decided on their plan; however, they hadn’t expected their Daddies and Keith to be as mad as they actually were.

“Sorry, Daddy. Sorry, Keith and Luke,” Haylee said quietly.

“Me too. I’m sorry too. We didn’t mean to be so bad. We were scared.”

Keith just nodded and strode out of the house without another word, making Haylee feel even worse. He was supposed to be protecting them from danger, and because they were sneaky and lied to him, he had been unable to do his job.

“Each of you girls is going to write a letter to Keith and apologize more in depth to him,” Kane said.

They nodded in unison.

Haylee felt horrible for causing so much trouble. Kane and Luke looked exhausted from the whole ordeal of catching Tim, and now they were having to deal with her and Ally. While she regretted disobeying the men, including Keith, she was so relieved that Tim had been caught and arrested. She knew that Kane would have caught Tim. When they saw Tim running, Kane wasn’t all that far behind, and Luke was just behind Kane, but she couldn’t help her impulse to help the situation by using the SUV to stop him.

“Come on, Haylee. It’s time to go home. Both of us Daddies have some spankings to give.”

Reluctantly, Haylee got to her feet and followed Kane, who was standing by the door with the bag of stuff she’d brought over that morning in his hands.

“Bye, Ally. I’m sorry I got you into trouble,” she whispered, giving her a hug.

Ally hugged her back. “We are ride-or-die besties for life. Love you.”