Next Generation (Book 4)

Firm Hand

|Paul's POV|

I took another deep breath as Vaughn ran off to her room. I took a seat at my desk and Steph resumed rubbing my back.

"Calm down, honey."

"I am calm, Steph."

"No, you're not. Deep breaths."

I listened to the sound of her voice as she repeated inhale, exhale at least a dozen times. I felt myself calming down. My body was beginning to relax.

"You okay?"

"Much better. Thank you."

"You're welcome. So, how are you handling this one?"

"Simple, doing what I should've done when she pulled this shit the first time."

"A spanking?"

"Exactly."

"I'm going to go check in with the oldest. Oh, Murphy is coming back from Shane's tonight."

I smiled. Our second youngest had decided on Columbia University for college. Semi close to home and just a plane ride away from her boyfriend, Ethan, who chose to head to Pittsburgh. She said they were giving long distance a shot. Guess we'll have to wait and see how that goes.

"Alright. It'll be good to have her home this weekend. Plus, Vaughn could use her company since she won't be doing anything else."

"I do want to talk to you about something. Were you serious about the party being cancelled?"

"Damn right."

She sighed.

"Paul, we've been planning this for months now. We have family coming in town."

"Well, it'll just be déjà vu from Zach's 18th birthday when his party was cancelled."

"Paul..."

"Vaughn will get her celebration. She wanted this huge party. There were nearly 200 guests. She doesn't know what many people anyways."

"Okay, but we do. Between our friends and family plus all the people she invited..."

"Steph, I know. My answer is still no."

"It's not just your decision to make, Paul."

"Alright, Steph. So what do you suggest. You wanted to cancel the party first."

"That was then. She didn't fight. Yes she lied and disobeyed us, but..."

"See, this is the problem. We always have discussions like these and then she gets off the hook."

"I'm not saying let her off the hook, Paul. What I'm saying is..."

"You're not saying much of anything."

She looked at me like I had two heads.

"Excuse you?"

"You're not offering a solution so what are you really saying?"

"You know what, it's not your say for the party to be cancelled. You should have talked to me about it before you said that to her. I get that you're upset, but that clouded your judgement. We always talked about the kids punishments before telling them. Why would this time be different?"

"Alright. Fine. What do you suggest?"

"We have spent too much money on this party to throw it away."

"I don't care about money Stephanie and neither should you."

"I know we have money, but that doesn't mean I want to just waste it. None of our girls had a Sweet 16. She's been looking forward to this and so have we."