Page 11 of Captive Heart

"You know that's not going to make any difference," Logan said resignedly, turning to look at the woman himself.

"Surely, she can shed some light on her own situation and exonerate the club from any suspicion," Jake asked reasonably, looking from one man to the other.

"An abused girl, scared for her life?" Micah asked with a raised eyebrow. "Because we all know how much the fear of reprisal affects the psyche now, don't we? Even if it's just from a willing submissive trying to get out of a punishment. Never mind someone who's suffered chronic abuse and probably been intimidated into accepting it as their role in life. I don't even want to go into how many battered women either suffer in silence, refuse to press charges, or just outright deny what's happening to them."

"So, we face scrutiny if we take her to the hospital, a shelter won't give her the care she needs, we can't throw her back out on the street. What the hell do we do? Seems like we're stuck between a rock and a hard place". Jake lifted his palms up in supplication, clearly frustrated with the situation.

"It doesn’t matter”, Joel responded. “She's got to have care. Is the hospital the best place for her Xavi?”

The doctor shook his head. “Honestly, I’m not sure it is. While it may provide for her in the short term, I do feel she needs a lengthier rehabilitation than they're likely to provide…”

He paused, considering his next words. “I'm also conscious of the fact that if someone is looking for her, then a hospital is the type of place which will be top of the list of places to look, considering the poor condition she's in. I'm sure whoever did this to her would likely conclude that she'd seek medical care."

Xavier looked back at the woman who at least seemed to have settled into a more comfortable state. "In an ideal world, I'd take her home with me, but my job excludes me from being around enough to look after her properly. What about any of you?" Xavier directed the question to the four owners, even though he looked like he was warring with his own decisions.

"Fuck, you know how difficult that would be for any one of us," Joel declared. "Desi's on bed rest herself. I can't have her thinking that she needs to care for someone else, and you know she will. I just can't risk it!"

Jake shook his head, too. "Charlotte's already run ragged with the baby. He's just started teething and is still suffering from colic. She needs someone to help her, not vice versa."

Xavier sighed, clearly torn. "I could take her to A&E, myself…say I found her collapsed on the hospital grounds. I work the odd shift there, after all, when they're short staffed, so it wouldn't look odd for me to be in the vicinity. But that might hamper any investigation into her situation, which I'm not really comfortable with. And I really don't like the options of where she'd end up after discharge. They won't keep her long enough to convalesce completely."

"I can look after her," Micah found himself saying, though he didn't realise he was going to make that offer until the words came out of his mouth. "But that means you'll have to agree to her staying here at the club with me. It's not ideal, but we could make it work."

"You don't think that will have her running, screaming for her life?" Connor, the voice of reason, asked. "It's clear, she's been abused. How will it affect her staying at a kink club and seeing that sort of thing going on around her?"

"Well, for a start, she wouldn't be allowed into the club, like any other non-member. And this area is all sound-proofed, so there are no worries about the noise disturbing her. We can review our options in a couple of weeks, when she's had time to heal."

Xavier nodded slowly, considering. "It could work," he surmised, almost to himself. "I can prescribe treatment and care and come in and check on her as often as any physician would do patient rounds in the hospital and I can be on emergency call day and night. I live close enough. Plus, the one thing that gives me even greater confidence in this plan is that Micah will be able to take care of any psychological issues, and she's bound to have them. That's one aspect no hospital is going to provide, and equally as important, in these early days, as her physical care."

The doctor seemed incredibly pleased with this new scenario, and he and Micah looked expectantly at the four co-owners who seemed nonplussed at the idea.

"Perhaps once we've had a chance to question her a little and find out what's been going on, we could bring Andy Storer into the equation." Xavier referred to another member. A Dom who also happened to be a police detective.

Logan blew out a breath. "Yes, I like that idea. As much as I don't want to involve the local constabulary unnecessarily, I don't want the woman to be denied justice, should it become clear there's a need."

"Are we agreed then?" Joel asked them all. "The girl will stay here under Micah's care and with Dr. Diaz’s guidance, until she's sufficiently recuperated and can tell us what the hell is going on?"

"Okay."

"Yes."

"Fine."

And with that, Micah had somehow managed to become responsible for a battered, unknown woman who had literally fallen at his feet.

6

Logan, Joel, Jake, and Connor had made their way back to Blackwood Universal Holdings, where they were all directors, and left Micah once again in Xavier's company while the doctor jotted down a list of things that Micah needed to do or look out for.

"Right now, she needs to be kept warm. The fact that she's indoors, out of her damp clothes and off that swollen ankle and those frostbitten feet is a good start," he declared as he propped her injured leg up on a cushion to raise it.

"We've got to increase her core temperature, and when she wakes up, you need to get some wet warmth into her frostbitten toes. You mustn't start too hot, or it will do more harm than good. At this point, anything above tepid is going to feel like it's scalding, so be aware of that and raise the temperature incrementally."

It was difficult during times like these to remember that the good doctor was also one of the club's more extreme sadists. It was one of those mind-boggling contradictions in life.

"She needs to drink plenty of water; she looks to have had a more severe case of dehydration, which she has managed to start counteracting, herself."

"There was a glass catching rainwater from the drainpipe. It was full when I first noticed it, but I forgot to move it. Then, yesterday, it was empty, even though it was still raining, that's what made me realise there was something going on," Micah confided.

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