He crosses the room in three strides. Before I can react, he’s got the bowl in one hand and my jaw in the other, forcing my mouth open.
“I saideat.”
I jerk away, but his grip is iron. He shoves a forkful of rice and vegetables against my lips, and I have a choice to swallow or choke.
I swallow.
“Good girl.” The words drip with condescension. “See? That wasn’t so hard.”
Get fucked.
Humiliation burns through me, hot and sharp. I want to spit it back in his face. I want to claw his eyes out. I want to?—
He forces another bite into my mouth.
“You don’t get to starve yourself,” he says, almost conversationally. “You don’t get to hurt yourself on my watch. That’s not how this works.”
On his watch.Like I’m a prisoner he’s obligated to keep alive. Which, I suppose, is exactly what I am.
He did say captive, after all.
He feeds me half the bowl before he’s satisfied. His fingers are sticky with sauce when he pulls back, and he wipes them on his jeans without looking at me.
“Now it’s time to shower,” he says.
“What?”
“You’re covered in dried blood and warehouse grime. You need to shower.”
“I’ll pass.”
“That wasn’t a request.”
We stare at each other. The air between us crackles.
“You want me to strip down while you watch?” I ask, putting acid into every word. “Is that what this is?”
On his face, for just a second, I see the man from Montana—the one who looked at me like I hung the stars.
Then it’s gone.
“Five minutes,” he says. “I’ll be right outside the door.”
I don’t move.
“Now, Mia.”
I turn and head into the bathroom, breathing a quick sigh of relief as the door closes shut. My hands are shaking as I strip off the tank top, the bra, the knickers. I can feel him on the other side of that door, listening, and I hate how much it affects me. Hate that even now, even like this, some twisted part of me wants him to walk in.
The water is steaming. I stand under it and let it scald me, hot on my bruised skin, washing away blood and sweat and the last remnants of who I was before he saidhello, Miaand my world collapsed.
When I come out wrapped in a towel, there are clean clothes on the bed. His clothes. A T-shirt that will drown me, sweatpants I’ll have to roll at the waist. No knickers.
He’s not in the room.
I dress quickly, surrounded by the smell of him, his detergent and something woodsy and underneath it all, that scent that’s allNate. The shirt hangs to mid-thigh. The pants pool around my ankles.
The door opens.
