"Better?" Ivan asks.
I don't answer. The fullness in my stomach doesn't feel like comfort; it feels like a debt. I let him take care of me, and owing him is dangerous.
He leans closer.
"You need sleep."
"I can stay up," I say automatically. "I'm fine."
His eyes harden. Not with cruelty, but with refusal.
"The place you came from taught you to grind yourself down until you don't know what you are anymore," he says. "That's not happening here."
The words hit a place I don't want touched.
I look at him—the man who built me, the man who just cleaned my blood off his floor and fed me.
Part of me wants to spit in his face.
A bigger part wants to lean closer until my forehead touches his shoulder.
"Where do you want me to sleep, sir?"
Flat. Professional. The question of a man turning a need into an assignment.
Ivan's expression shifts; something flickers behind his eyes.
"The bedroom," he says. "Like before."
Before the file. Before the gym. Before I realized how much of me had been shaped to fit.
I should refuse.
I'm too tired to fight.
"Yes, sir."
It tastes like rust.
I stand. My legs feel steadier with food in me, but my body still feels thin, stretched tight. I walk toward the bedroom, feeling him behind me—close enough to register as heat.
The chair by the door waits.
My body angles toward it without thinking.
"The bed," Ivan says.
I stop and look back.
He's in the doorway, backlit by the main room. Up close, his face looks worn—heavy, not soft.
"Sir—"
"Not tonight." He crosses to the bed and pulls the covers back. "Here."
I stand there too long.
His bed smells like him—cedar soap and skin. Closing my eyes in that scent feels like stepping into something I won't be able to climb out of.
