I tilt my head yes, and then despite myself, rest my head against his shoulder as he starts to carry me out of the cell. He moves so fast that I almost feel like I have motion sickness. I close my eyes to help combat it, but that just makes it feel worse. My leg throbs angrily, and I have a serious crick in my neck from sleeping on my elbow and knee for so long. I meant to take a little rest, not lose a whole day.
When I open my eyes again, Rook is carrying me into a large, clean, white-tiled bathroom, with several private shower stalls. It’s too nice to be a block bathroom, but I can’t imagine he would have taken me to the guards’ locker room either.
Rook looks down at me, and he must see the questions in my eyes. “It’s a new addition to Nightmare Penitentiary. It’s going to house more criminals of the white collar variety,” he explains in answer to my unvoiced question.
I look around again with that new information rolling around my mind. Figures. If you’re white collar, then you’re used to certain perks and privileges. Why should prison be any different? I suddenly want to smear ogre blood all over it. Let them bathe privately in the smell of cat piss while their lawyers get them out on technicalities and they laugh smugly together about all the shit they get away with.
Rook sets me down on a cool tiled bench, and he pulls his support away slowly, like he’s expecting me to fall. Psh, I’m not some weak ass. I totally don’t need his help to—whoops! That ground sure is tilting funny.
Rook catches me before I can face-plant, and he sets me upright again. I roll my eyes at the worried look in his gaze. I obviously would’ve stopped myself from falling...or the floor would have caught me. Either way, it would’ve been fine. He’s overreacting.
When he watches me for several seconds and I don’t tip over again, Rook disappears into a stall and turns on the water. He’s back in a flash, kneeling in front of me, and I wonder if I just blacked out again or if he really moved that quickly. He carefully unties the knots in the makeshift bandages around my leg and unwraps the torn pieces of the dirty blanket of assholish origin. The fabric sticks to the cut like it tried to meld together and become one. He pulls the strips of fabric away, making me hiss in pain, and the edges of my cut come up too, like they’re trying to keep the fabric from leaving. It’s like watching two lovers being torn apart; hurts like it too.
As soon as he gets the bandages off, my leg immediately starts to bleed again. I watch the tracks of blood slip down my thigh, and I can’t help but feel like it’s mourning the loss of the bandages. I stare at it for another beat before fingers snap in my line of sight, and I’m pulled from my weird ass thoughts.
The snapping fingers lead back to Rook, and I focus on him. “I need to go get some things for your leg. That iron must’ve been laced with something. It’s fucking up your healing. I think you’re hypothermic too, Sun—I mean, Sinclair, so I’m going to sit you in the hot water, and you should start to feel better in just a couple minutes. Our cockatrices bounce back pretty quickly, but I don’t know how long you’ve been like this…” Rook trails off, and I can see anger and frustration etched in his expression as he speaks.
“Just sit and get warmed up, okay? I’ll be right back,” he stares at me for a moment, but I don’t react. My thoughts are muddy and thick.
With a troubled exhale, he pulls my oversized gray shirt over my head and picks me up before carrying me into the steam soaked stall. The hot water hits my bare skin, and I hiss and shy away from the heat.
Rook tenderly shushes me as I whimper. “You need this, Sinclair. I know it feels too hot right now, but just give it a couple minutes, and then it won’t feel hot enough, I promise.”
He sets me down on the warm tiles, and a waterfall of heat envelops me. I rest my head back against the tile, and Rook watches me to make sure I’m okay for a minute before running out. I can hear his boots squeaking against the pristine white tile, and then all I hear is the water falling from the showerhead to patter against the floor and flow down the drain.
After a couple minutes of the scorching water raining down on me, I realize that my body stops trembling. I didn’t even know I’d been shaking. Slowly, the hot deluge brings me back to life like some magical potion. My brain slowly feels like it’s clearing up, and the scorching water rinses out the gash in my leg, helping to clean out whatever iron-rusted muck was in there. A steady stream of red swirls down the drain, but it’s no longer dirty, and it already looks and feels better. Things around me start to seem more in focus.
Just like Rook said, the hot water soon doesn’t feel like it’s burning me alive anymore. As my temperature regulates, I find that I need it to be even hotter. I look down at my cut and the water flushing it out. I reach up and turn the dial all the way to red. The water instantly gets hotter, and I sigh at how good it feels.
Cockatrices can have trouble regulating their temperatures sometimes. It’s not an issue really when it comes to the heat, but when it comes to the cold, we can catch hypothermia very quickly. I can’t believe I didn’t notice the signs. Stupid, cold-ass, lizard-killing solitary confinement cell.
I scoot more directly under the shower spray and moan.
Fuck, that feels good.
The sound of my satisfaction echoes around the tiled bathroom, and I feel wrapped up and cocooned by it. I feel like me again, washed clear of my injury and sex session.
As I start to rinse out my tangled hair, the sound of squeaky boots on tile bounces off the walls, alerting me that Rook is back with whatever he left to get. I suddenly feel unsure and vulnerable. I don’t know how I feel about him being here, taking care of me.
I’m grateful that he found me and knew how to help without taking me back to the creepy Dr. Brina, but it doesn’t excuse his abandoning me for the last five days…or six.
Dark blue pants appear to the left of the wall, and Rook moves closer. When he turns the corner and sees me, a flash of relief moves over his features. “Oh good, you turned up the heat. How are you feeling?”
“Better,” I answer as he kneels down to get closer to eye-level with me. “It got weird there for a second. My cut and bandages were having a full Romeo and Juliet moment, but I’m normal again.”
Rook snorts. “Normal? I don’t know if I’d go that far,” he teases, and then he puts his hands under my armpits and picks me up like I’m a toddler.
He sets me gently on my feet, water spraying on his clothes, adding darkened droplets wherever it lands. We both stand there beneath the swirling steam and just stare at each other. His turquoise eyes look sad today, but I blink away any concern I might have about it. His sad eyes are his problem.
Like he can see my hardening thoughts, Rook clears his throat and steps back from me before grabbing a bottle of shampoo from a niche in the wall. He must have set all of this up before, because there’s a rainbow-colored washcloth, body wash, and shampoo and conditioner just waiting to be used. I sigh. If he thinks a rainbow washcloth will ease the sting of five days of stewing in abandonment, he’s an idiot.
My eyes scoot over to the washcloth. Itispretty, though. So bright and colorful and—dammit, Sinclair, don’t let him distract you with bright colors!
Rook pours the shampoo in his hands and puts the bottle back with the others. He rubs his hands together and then spreads shampoo all over my orange and yellow tresses. He threads his fingers through my hair and starts to scrub and massage my scalp.
I should stop him.
I definitelywillstop him…in just a sec.
