Page 58 of Fighting Gravity
My vent cover was still on the ground. No sense crawling back into my safe tunnels. Clearly, Rhone was willing to cook me alive to get me out. I kicked the grate aside, a bit bitter, and slowly undressed, taking the shower at the very back like it made a difference.
Fully stripped, I turned on the water, elated to see he’d reactivated the baths. I kept the temperature low, letting the cool stream caress my burning back first before I let it warm. I needed the soothing water to relax my taught muscles.
Looking down at the drain, I saw little threads of crimson washing away and grasped that I was bleeding. I reached a hand between my legs, lightly cleaning away the sticky remnants of Rhone’s savagery. More blood dripped down toward the drain and I realized he really had done a little damage.
Shit, what was I thinking? What was Idoing? Who the hell was I!?
On Earth, most intimacy was done through virtual reality. Except for the couple of years that I was working for Switch, most of my experience was virtual, too. Which meant my body didn’t know what to do with Rhone’s invasion. It was foreign, and not just because he was alien. Hell, he made me feel like I’d lost my virginity all over again.
I didn’t finish scrubbing myself before I felt my legs giving out. I wasn’t sure if I was in shock or actually weak in the knees or maybe just dehydrated. Whatever it was, it put me on my ass. I slid down the wall, careful not to irritate whatever was on my back, and curled in on myself. The water ran down my whole body but I still didn’t feel clean.
Remembering what it felt like to be railed by Rhone’s oversized dick made my body tremble. Heat coiled in my stomach again and I chided myself for even thinking about it for a second without disgust. He wasNorm. A cruel, awful monster.
Who showed kindness to a woman and her child in an arena…
Who only fought in that arena to get me back…
Shut up, brain! You’re supposed to be on my side.
As I stroked the scars around my wrists where he had bound me that day in my cell, I recalled all that he’d put me through. He hit me. Threatened to kill me. Cut me. Used me against my own people. And now he’d taken even more from me… because I told him to.
Dammit. I was so lost in my head. I wanted spaghetti and brownie batter. I wanted a massage and clothes that were made for a human body. I wanted a comforter and decent pillows. But no. I had torment, alien dick, and a whole lot of confusion.
My face was dripping with water, so if I was crying, I could hardly tell. I wasn’t used to crying. I’d refrained from doing it so many times in my life. Even at my lowest, I expressed my sorrow and pain through other means but rarely by crying.
I felt like I’d been sulking in the water for an hour. I could have fallen asleep there, but instead, I just spaced out until I didn’t care anymore. Until my fingers were pruney and my body didn’t hurt.
And that was when Rhone had to appear to wreck my depressing meditation. I saw him in my peripheral first and side-eyed him, wondering what he’d do to ruin me next. He walked into the chamber, closing the entrance behind him, which meant he wanted privacy. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing. When he came closer, I noticed a metal saucer in his hand filled with food. I didn’t know what the food was, but it was food and not a nutripack. That was different.
There was no way it was for me.
Setting the saucer on a low wall across from my stall, he sighed and looked me over. I stared up at him, waiting for him to say something angering, but he didn’t. He moved closer, tilting his head from side to side.
“What do you want?” I said. He held out a hand toward me and I glared at it. “Don’t act nice now. You’ll have an aneurism.”
“I don’t know what that is,” he shrugged, keeping his hand out in offering.
Eventually, I figured I had nothing left to lose and I rolled my eyes, reaching for him. His fingers coiled around mine and I hobbled to my feet, but just as I straightened, I felt a dizzy spell coming and clutched his arms. He stabilized me, stepping into the water with his clothes on.
“What are you doing?” I said. “You told me to take care of myself. I assumed that meant you wanted no part of this.”
Rhone let his gaze fall to the shower floor where new streams of red trickled toward the drain. It wasn’t much, but it was noticeable. Then his eyes darted to the wall where I’d been sitting. Looking back at it, I could see little droplets of blood where my back had been pressed.
Rhone spun me, letting the water rinse my wound before he gently slid his palm along my spine where my skin burned the most.
“What’d you do to me?” I said. “Stings like a bitch.”
“You told me to punish you.”
“So, ripping my flesh off was your first idea? Couldn’t you just be normal and spank me?”
“No. My first idea was to bind you and whip you until you screamed for mercy.” He stepped closer. “And then keep going.”
“I don’t really scream for mercy,” I shrugged. “Not my style.”
Again, he turned me, making sure I was stable on my feet. There was some hesitation in his expression as he ran his hands down the curves of my body. He was thinking about something and he was doing it hard. I knew that face anywhere, even on an alien.
“I will not say sorry for what happened,” he said.
