Page 52 of Designation: Null

“Yeah, I’m here, baby.”

“What are you doing?” he asks, hand settling on top of Robert’s.

“Cleaning you up. How do you feel?”

“I want to be in bed. I want—” He hauls in a breath, making a horrible whimpering sound.

“Let’s get you to bed and we’ll work it out tomorrow. We’ll have a lot to talk about and everything will be fine.”

“You’ll… are you going to be here when I wake up?”

“Yes. I won’t leave you,” Robert promises. He wants to be sick. He wants to run away. He wants to shake Logan and make him promise that he’ll never do anything like this ever again.

Logan is so out of it that he doesn’t pay any attention to Robert’s sniffling.

He won’t tell Logan he’s going to clean up his apartment. Logan might find it distressing and he isn’t sure he’s going to. He sort of wants Logan to see it in the bright light of day. What a big deal this is. He wants them to get up and have Logan tell him it was a mistake. He needs to see it on Logan’s face.

Regret.

That he won’t do this again.

He imagines the whole thing as if Logan is a naughty puppy and he’s going to shove his face into the blood or make him hold the flogger while Robert glares at him and tells him he won’t do that again. Makes him swear not to.

Whatever it takes. They’ll work it out, figure out what Logan does need, and Robert will give himthat.

He gets Logan into bed, sits next to him and touches him all over, rubbing his back until he falls asleep. Robert gets up and sets the filthy bowl in the kitchen, leaving the washcloth in it. The water is dark with blood. Robert gags. He closes his eyes, loses a bit of time, and then comes back to himself.

He has to do better than this.

Robert looksaround the apartment as dispassionately as possible, with curiosity and every unhelpful emotion compartmentalized.

He’s nauseous, though. And his vision is a little blurry. Shock. And he’s too emotionally invested.

He has to try to keep it impersonal.

What can he learn about this submissive from examining his quarters?

First of all, Logan’s apartment isn’t nearly as tidy as he expected. His shoes crunch as he walks across the wooden floor and he realizes there are grains of rice everywhere, as well as buttons strewn all over, like they’ve been kicked out of the way.

This is fucking insane.

There aren’t many books or anything that indicates he has hobbies. How the hell does Logan spend his time? The fridge is filled with protein shakes, lots of random packaged meat like hot dogs, and a giant bag of hardboiled eggs that are already peeled.

This is the saddest fucking kitchen he’s ever seen. It’s almost morbid curiosity that makes him open the other cupboards. Lots of pasta and sauce. The freezer is filled with ground beef and ice packs. Frozen mixed vegetables.

He leaves the kitchen and goes to the bathroom, closes the door softly so he doesn’t wake up Logan, and proceeds to go through his things.

Any hesitation he might have had regarding Logan’s privacy is gone. He can’t even take off his shoes for fear of getting blood all over his feet.

His shower has hormonal body wash, of course. There’s a suppository hormone kit under his sink and a few more containers of pills. Pills that are labelled in such a way that he knows they’re experimental. No name but assigned to a submissive with a number to keep it off books.

This is crazy. Who is this guy? A few of them are submissive stabilizing drugs. Some of them are muscle relaxers and then there are the arousal drugs. He just can’t figure out what the hell Logan thinks he’s doing. Is he relaxing or getting hard?

Maybe Logan doesn’t know what he’s doing either.

He leaves the bathroom and opens the closet.

Logan’s toy box is open on the ground. He picks it up and takes it into the bathroom but doesn’t understand the contents. He goes back to look for another box. There isn’t one.

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