Page 20 of Three, Two, One [321]

“You hungry?”

He’s got his arms wrapped around me with my ass pulled up close to his hard-on. One arm fits perfectly under my neck like a pillow, and the other hand is lightly dragging up and down the center of my belly.

I imagine what it would feel like if his fingers slipped a little lower and then I feel disgusted with myself for thinking perverted thoughts. If I was back in the basement I’d be punished for that. Because no matter what they did to me there, they changed me. They made me enjoy it. And once they discovered I enjoyed it, they took that enjoyment away. I was forbidden to touch myself, but my appetite for pleasure was insatiable and my fingers always wandered, just like they are doing now.

I pull back, expecting the slap, but it never comes.

Just his soft, rumbling voice. “Hey.” He whispers it this time. Like he can feel the internal struggle going on inside me. “I know you’re hungry. Want me to make you dinner?”

“Dinner?” I ask. Holy fuck, yes. I contain my excitement as I nod, and then turn my whole body to face him. “Yes, please,” I whisper back. His hand drapes across my ass with the move and then he squeezes one cheek.

His fingers are almost between my legs and I let out a little gasp from the touch.

His eyes search mine. They dart back and forth between them as they try to figure me out. “Tell me your name.” It’s not a request, but it comes out soft. Like all his other words today.

“I can’t,” I say back, matching his somber tone. “I really, really can’t.”

“Do you want to call someone?”

“No,” I say, shaking my head. “No, I can’t do that either.”

“Is it because you’re afraid of them?” I know it’s a generic them he’s referring to, but I shiver all the same. He doesn’t need me to speak to get that answer. “You’re safe here. You can stay as long as you need to.”

“What about your friend?” Ark is the one I asked for help. He’s the one I’m worried about because he looked at me like I’m broken. Like I’m beyond saving. Too much trouble. Too few prospects.

“He likes you,” JD says. “I can tell. He’s pissed off that we’re here together right now, I know that for sure.”

“Where did he go?” I study JD’s face and decide I like it. Before, when he and his friend were taking the pictures, JD was talking to me like the men in the basement did. Like I was a whore.

But right now he’s just talking to me like the men in the waiting room did.

Like I’m a possibility.

I was a possibility a few times over the course of this last year. But thankfully, none of them ever took me home.

“I’m so hungry,” I say.

His fingertips trace the outline of my ribs. “They didn’t take very good care of you, did they?”

I have to swallow that down before I can shake my head no.

“I’ll take good care of you, Blue.”

I stare up into his own blue eyes. They are light, like the blond scruff on his chin. “Thank you,” I whisper.

“You’re welcome,” he says, wrapping his arm tightly around my waist and pulling me close again. “It’s my pleasure.”

And then he kisses me on the head and we rest there for a few moments before he pulls me up, takes my hand, and walks me out to the kitchen.

Seven hours of sleep has done wonders for my observation skills, because if you had asked me anything about this place when they brought me here, I wouldn’t have been able to tell you. It’s such a dangerous situation. And after all I’ve been through this past year, I’m so stupid for allowing myself to be taken in by a pretty face.

It was the drugs. I was better off than the other girls, but only because I vomited up the sedative they gave me once the night was over. It was supposed to keep me subdued until we got back to the basement.

“What’re you thinking about?” the guy called JD asks me. I’m standing in the middle of their kitchen. He’s busy at the island counter, where ingredients for the food he’s making are scattered around. “You look a little lost.”

A little lost doesn’t even come close.

“You can sit if you want.” He points to the living room, which is open to the kitchen, so he’d still be able to keep an eye on me if I sat over there.