Page 19 of Cook

Without realizing it, I had eaten both pieces of toast brimming with butter and jam. The food fell heavily into my gut, my stomach expanding tightly. I hadn’t realized how ravenous I was.

I lowered my gaze to the napkin in my lap. “If we were good, Signora gave us oatmeal.”

However, the gruel her minions shoveled into our bowls hadn’t been the buttery-sweet oats my parents had given me and Melanie when we were kids. Those were half-cooked and soupy and lacked any sugar or spice.

“Most times, we got scraps. Whatever was left over from Signora’s meals or the guards’. Sometimes, they would toss it to us like slop for pigs just to see us fight over the scraps.” I shrugged one shoulder. “Signora didn’t care as long as we didn’t leave permanent marks on each other.” The only people allowed to mark us were the clients or Signora.

Cook worked his jaw like he was about to say something else, but then the oven dinged. He leaped up and donned mitts, pulling out the bacon, before he turned off the oven. He leaned on the counter, his head hanging as his shoulders hunched.

The bacon smelled so delicious. My stomach was full, but I didn’t think I’d eaten a strip of bacon since before Signora’s men took me. I would eat as much as I possibly could, remembering my father standing over the stove and frying it up.

Cook recovered from whatever his worry was with a deep breath and slid the plate in front of me. My fingers reached forward and took two strips, then my hand moved toward the sunny-side-up eggs, where I paused. Remembering to use the utensils, I experimented with how to grip them.

“Like this.” Cook showed me how he held his utensils then put them beside his plate, grabbed the knife, and placed it in my right hand. I mimicked his hold on the fork.

Signora hadn’t allowed us to use forks, knives, or spoons, because they could’ve been used as weapons. We only ate with our fingers as the guards watched on, joking and elbowing each other in the stomachs and pointing at us and laughing.

When Cook lowered himself into the closest chair, I asked, “You aren’t going to eat?”

“We need to talk about something,” said Cook in a deadly tone.

I forgot about the fork and knife, even about the food. My stomach clenched. Was he sending me back to the hospital? To Signora? I turned myself to stone and demanded, “What?”

Hardening myself was the only way I wouldn’t cry or rip off his head. I wouldn’t make it far if I ran—he was in much better shape and would probably catch me before I reached the door. But he needed to know I wouldn’t go back to either of those places.

“You called meDaddyagain last night,” said Cook.

My hands turned clammy. At least, this wasn’t about me leaving. But I couldn’t explain why any more than I could explain it last night. The word had just slipped out.

It fit him.

“Are you going to send me back to Doctor Richardson?” I asked, my voice thin. I didn’t want any more of her talking or sedatives.

“No,” said Cook.

I released my bated breath.

A vein in his neck throbbed. “I’ll never. But I want to understand.”

“I told you.” But I hadn’t told him everything. The word, or the title,Daddymeant more to me. I was sure of at least that much.

Silence lingered, and I had no idea how to fill it, or if I should. Meanwhile, the eggs and bacon cooled on the plates.

“I still don’t understand,” he said.

He leaned back in his chair. His fingers thrummed against the table. When I realized I wanted those fingers on my skin, my cheeks flushed, and I looked away. What kind of freak was I? A captive, sold for sex and violence, and now I wanted another man to touch me. Maybe I did need the drugs and a head shrink.

But there was more to this than my attraction to Cook. It was freedom. I got to decide.

I thought he might want to say more, so I waited for a few seconds before responding. “I don’t understand either.” That much was true. How was I supposed to explain something I couldn’t even understand myself?

“What does that mean?” he asked. Was that judgment in his tone?

My shoulders slumped. There had been many times in my life that I wondered when the pain would go away—if someone could take it away. Maybe that was what I was seeing in this man. Like he could free me from all the shit in my past and I could become a new person.

I could start over.

Stupid thought.

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