Page 37 of Pose for Me
I’ll never take getting a bath and brushing my teeth for granted again.
“Come,” Ryell says, and I hurry over to him. “Strip so I can clean you.”
I remove my clothes and toss them as far into the corner as I can. I really do smell awful. Embarrassment fills me, but it’s quickly replaced by relief when I step into the tub. Being in a warm bathtub feels better than any words I can think of.
Ryell lathers up a washcloth with a bar of soap, then rolls the material over my body, cleaning away the dirt and grime. He even takes some kind of stick thing and cleans under my nails.
I can’t reconcile this Ryell with the one that left bodies behind and the one that ignored me for so long that I broke. This Ryell is almost…gentle.
“Can you promise me something?” I whisper. It could go either way. Either he’ll shut me down, or he’ll hear me out. I hold my breath, waiting.
His gaze flicks up to mine briefly. “Maybe.”
“Can you promise not to leave me again? I can’t…” I reach up with a shaky hand, pushing my fingers through my filthy and matted hair. “I can’t handle that.”
To my surprise, Ryell leans forward and kisses my forehead. “I think I can manage that.” I let out the pent-up breath and give him a shaky smile. “Now tip your head back so I can wash your hair.” I do what he says, and when his powerful fingers scrub my scalp until it’s clean, I sigh.
After he squeezes the excess water from my hair, he takes my hand and pulls me to my feet. The water sluices down my body, the faint droplets hitting the water audibly.
Ryell’s eyes track my body, and my dick stirs, though I’m too tired and lightheaded to want to do anything about it. My body couldn’t handle how hard and roughly he’d probably want to take me. How hard Iwantit.
“You’ve lost too much weight,” he says with an unhappy edge to his tone. “You’ll have to start eating two meals a day.”
I peer down my body and see the hollowness of my belly, how much my pelvis juts out from the lack of calories. My stomach growls just looking at my weight loss.
“Okay,” I whisper.
Walking over to one of the shelves on the wall, Ryell pulls down two large towels. He wraps one around my hair and theother around my shoulders, the warm, but scratchy material feeling surprisingly good against my skin.
“Here.” Ryell drags his shirt over his head and passes it to me. I awkwardly grab it and pull it against my chest. Ducking my head, I breathe in his scent, desire coiling in my belly at his musky and masculine smell. “Wear this until I can get you some clothes.”
“Underwear?” I ask.
He sends me a devilish smile that I’m starting to think he only shows me. “Why would you need those? You’ll pose for me later.”
I nod and duck my head. “Okay.”
But when I take a step, my knees buckle, and I almost crash to the ground. Only Ryell’s strong arms around me keep me upright.
“Fuck, you’re probably dehydrated,” he tsks. “You’ll need more than one bottle of water, Lane,” he scolds. I don’t have the energy to remind him that it’s he who’s responsible for feeding and watering me every day.
He scoops me into his arms and takes me back to my cell. Placing me on my bed, he covers my legs with the thin blanket then forces the bottle of water into my hands. “Drink it all or I’ll give you an IV to hydrate you.”
Tipping the water to my lips, I guzzle as much water as I can handle but stop before I can drink more than half. Ryell curses and looks down at me with fire in his eyes. So I drink more, forcing the water into my too-full belly.
Before I finish it, it all comes up, and I vomit, getting most of it on Ryell. He just looks at me with a blank expression as I fall back against the bed.
“An IV it is, then,” I hear Ryell says as if from far away. I close my eyes, then slip into unconsciousness.
I come to when I feel a prick in the crook of my elbow, the slight pain making me hiss. Ryell is standing beside an IV pole, the saline bag mounted, and he opens up the gauge fully to hydrate me quicker.
I glance over at Ryell through sleepy eyes and whisper, “Thank you,” before I’m pulled under once more.
Sixteen
Lane
The morningafter I’m cleaned up and given an IV to hydrate me, I feel ten times better. Enough of my faculties are back that I regret not trying to escape yesterday, that I was so fucking weak to allow him to order me around without complaint. I have to at least fight against Ryell, but the larger part of me doesn’t want to. I’m so fucking tired of fighting, of clawing back from the brink. I want to just…be.
