I reluctantly drag myself up the stairs and find Meemaw already there, having turned down my covers. She tucks me into bed herself, and I let her.

But just for a little bit, I decide as I climb in—I’ll sleep for an hour or two, then I’ll send everyone away. Then I'll go downstairs and take back over—no lunch party.

That's a good plan, and I'm right about not having a lunch party with all the people Waylon sent over.

But that's because I wake up way too many hours later in the pitch black. How long did I sleep?

“Glad you’re all rested up,” a voice says in the dark. “Because you broke my rule about saying things you don’t mean.”

My heart stills. Waylon’s back. And he sounds a lot more menacing in the dead of night than he did on the phone this morning.

Especially when he adds, “Now I’m going to have to teach you another lesson.”

Waylon’s here, his voice looming above me in the dark. But how? Kentucky is a seven-hour bike drive away, and he isn’t supposed to be leaving until tomorrow morning.

I’m lifted out of bed before I can ask him about it—as easy as a ragdoll, and for a few moments, I hang there like one until he pulls me in for a kiss.

No explanation for why he’s here so early. He claims my mouth passionately, roughly—like he missed me, and he’s pissed off at me at the same time.

So you know, typical Waylon. But my body’s so trained—so taught, I immediately respond to him, wrapping my legs around his waist and grinding myself against the heavy erection encased in his jeans.

“I missed you,” I whine against his lips, my pussy already aching for relief. “I missed you so much.”

Sometimes that’s enough to get out of a lesson.

Not tonight.

He breaks the kiss to answer, “Yeah. You missed me so much, you thought you could break my rules. But you know I wasn’t going to let you get away with that.”

Yes, payback is still this bastard.

He turns on the push-button reading light he installed into the bedframe shortly after we got married. Ostensibly so I could read in bed at night without needing a whole lamp, which he hates—devils prefer the pitch-black dark, after all.

But more often, he uses it to provide just enough light for his lessons.

He lays me back on the bed instead of throwing me like he does when I’m not pregnant. But that small concession immediately gets erased when he removes the belt from his jeans with a whispered ssss.

“Now turn over and present your ass to Teacher,” he commands, his stone-cold face cast in harsh shadows.