by Cee Smith
“Hailey, can you hear me?”
I nodded. He brought a glass of water to my quivering lips, showering my tongue with a stream of crisp water that sent a jolt through my body. I took a few small sips while he continued holding the glass.
“Good,” he said pulling the glass away before he continued speaking, “I think you have decompression sickness. A doctor is on his way to help you. I haven't had a chance to go over my expectations of you, but needless to say, I expect you to be on your best behavior. Do you understand?”
I wasn’t sure what he expected from me, but I wasn’t in any position to fight him, and even if I wanted to blow the whistle, I could barely hold a conversation. I felt mildly assured that nothing would befall me before I had a chance to put a plan in place to get out of there. There was something about this man that settled something in me. I couldn’t explain it, and I didn’t trust my gut entirely because this was something I couldn’t afford to be wrong about, but for the moment, all I could trust was my intuition. Though, where was my intuition when this man licked me like the cat that got the cream?
“When I ask you a question, I expect an answer.”
“Yes, fine. I understand,” I said exasperated. If he was upset by my insolent behavior, he didn't show it, and I didn’t give him time to respond.
“I need the bathroom.”
A look of uncertainty crossed his face before he grabbed a bottle of water and picked me up again, carrying me into an en suite bathroom with the same style as the bedroom, with it’s large Victorian mirror and French country vanity. I wondered if he'd ever found himself head bowed over the toilet, six shades of green. That definitely didn't seem like the type of bathroom one got sick in. It seemed too posh for that.
I knew things were really shitty when I didn’t even think about vomiting in front of someone as hot as this stranger, that very easily could have been a model with his good looks and large stature. Fortunately, he didn’t act put-off by my sickness. What am I thinking? This man kidnapped me; I don’t care what he thinks of me being sick. In fact, I hope he thinks I’m too much trouble and decides to return me.
“Go on,” he said, his hand making a shooing motion as if I were a dog begging for table scraps at his feet.
“Can I get some privacy?” My voice sounded flat, exhaustion wrung out of every word. I was surprised when he immediately turned his back and faced the door. I glanced across the marble counters looking for anything that would help me escape before his words sliced through the air like a samurai sword decapitating my thoughts, “You won't find anything in here that will help you.” He shot me a deadpanned look over his shoulder, and I scurried the rest of the way to the toilet before he changed his mind.
My knees dropped to the stone floor, the fabric of my pajamas making me slide shakily across the slick surface. I gripped the sides of the toilet in an attempt to steady myself, when I felt his hands latch onto my waist. For the briefest moment, I forgot why I was there clutching the toilet bowl like a chalice. Similar to when he licked my face, his touch was gentle and just inside the line of indecent. In no way was his touch inappropriate. It was the synapses of my brain sparking with the urge for more that left me unsettled in his arms.
I didn't have time to think about how we looked—hair clenched within his fist, my feeble body hunched beneath legs that sheltered me like two thick slabs of stone peaking to an inverted V.
Repulsed by my damnable flesh and a mind that wasn’t firing on all cylinders, and resolving to purge these thoughts, I threw open the toilet lid. Both of his hands moved to my hairline, brushing the strands up until every hair was wrangled within those thick fingers. I actually didn’t mind the way he held my hair; in a way, it was quite soothing. Though that may have had more to do with his other hand rubbing circles along my upper back, as I stayed cradling the toilet with one hand. I shoved two fingers of my right hand to the back of my throat and felt my throat flex against the intrusion. My stomach rolled like the wave at a football game, and I pulled my fingers out quickly as my stomach pumped.
“Here.” He handed me the bottle of water, loosening the hair in his fist, and I took a few more sips before returning to my prior position. We did that a few more times—me heaving between sips of water, all the while he stood above me clutching my hair and rubbing my back like one would expect from a boyfriend. Except, there was still something very clinical about the way he touched me.
Maybe it was the fact that he never touched me in an obviously sexual way, though he could have. I didn’t know how I had time to think about his hand placement while I was upchucking, but it was the only thing that kept my mind focused on something else besides how sick I felt. His hands kept me grounded when I wanted nothing more than to curl up into a ball at the foot of the toilet.
We exited the bathroom. His fingers were loosely wrapped above my elbow, guiding me across the room to the door I knew to be his closet.
“No, please...” I pleaded.
“Come.”
“I promise I won't leave. Please don't lock me up.” I dug my heels into the carpet like a dog on a leash protesting movement. His abrupt stop startled me, and I cowered upon his glowering eyes. I felt the tension in his muscles ripple through his fingers as the pressure above my elbow increased.
“Ow.” I winced.
“If you can't walk on your own two feet, I'll be forced to carry you everywhere...but maybe you like my hands cradling you?” A lecherous smile encapsulated his face as if he read my earlier thoughts and was just now throwing it in my face for shock factor.
“You disgust me.” For the first time since waking up, I stood to my full five-foot-four height, chin raised with glaring eyes. For a moment, it was just the two of us facing off. He stared back at me with those mocking eyebrows and coal-like eyes, and I wished he were easier to read. He broke off staring down at me and continued moving without so much as a backwards glance.
When we entered the room, a man with blonde hair and soulless brown eyes was sitting in one of the high-backed chairs opposite the door. His arms hung casually over the arms of the chair, with one leg carelessly crossed over the other as if we were interrupting his teatime.
“Dr. Reynolds,” the man still clutching my elbow said with venom in his voice.
“Dominic,” the doctor nodded before standing. He was tall, not quite as tall as Dominic, but still menacing nonetheless. Nothing about their interaction felt natural, and I knew that this doctor wasn't one with which I would risk attempting freedom. He seemed too in his element with the way he draped across the furniture and greeted Dominic like he was a king in any man’s castle. I didn't like it, and when I looked up to read Dominic's expression, I noticed that his jaw was locked tight, and his lips were clenched as tight as the fists at his side.
I took a hesitant step back, which broke the standoff between the two alpha males. Suddenly, I felt like a baby gazelle that walked into a lion’s den. Both of their eyes snapped to me, and I stood there frozen, waiting for someone, anyone to say something to break the tension that was sucking all of the air out of the room.
“You said you think she has decompression sickness?”
“Yes. We were scuba diving two days ago. She just started displaying symptoms thirty minutes ago.”
“I see. Leave me with her so I can examine her more closely.” The doctor's empty eyes peered into mine, and I looked up to Dominic. Was he going to leave me with this man? Alone? Of the two, my abductor seemed like the safer bet. His leering eyes stopped their assault on the doctor long enough to look down at me. I couldn't read his expression—there seemed to be too many conflicting emotions, which left me confused as he exited the room. As he disappeared through the closet, I secretly hoped he was huddled against the other side of the door, ear pressed tight to the wood to make out every word uttered.
The doctor circled me like a vulture eyeing up its next meal, and I circled him, not wanting to present my back to him. He was pencil thin with gaunt cheeks
and chapped lips, but nothing about him seemed decrepit. His suit was expensive, more expensive than any doctor I’d ever seen wear. He flashed me a mocking grin as if my discomfort with his appearance gratified him.
He rattled off questions regarding the dive, and I answered in a soft whisper. His imperceptible nods let me know he acknowledged my responses before he continued onto the next question. I was still suffering from bouts of memory loss, but the answers to his questions seemed to come quickly, without thought. Perhaps, like a victim of a car crash, my mind was protecting itself from everything that happened after I was underwater.
He paused, returning to the chair he previously occupied, and my eyes scattered across the room as his eyes drank in the length of my body.
“You're very good. I'll give you that.” I felt my hackles rise at what he was insinuating. I was starting to see for myself why Dominic didn’t like the sight of him.
“I don't know what you mean,” I snarled. I didn't intend to sound so nasty, but when the words ripped from my throat, I could no longer contain my disgust for this man, despite his “help.”
“Your acting skills aren't nearly as convincing, but never mind that. I believe you do have decompression sickness. It isn't too far advanced, so I think oxygen therapy should be sufficient. I'm leaving a tank here with you—”
The reemergence of Dominic halted Dr. Reynolds' suggestions, and based on the sudden downturn of his mouth, I could tell that Dr. Reynolds wasn’t happy about the interruption. His eyes squinted at Dominic before he continued, “As I was saying, I'll leave an oxygen tank here and you should leave it on for somewhere between 5–6 hours. Drink lots of water for the next few days.”
He rose from his seat, picking up a small black bag to the left of his chair that I hadn’t noticed until he was digging into the hidden compartment. He pulled a bottle of pills out of the bag and set them on the dresser.
“That’s for the nausea. If she's not better in a couple days, call me.”
Dr. Reynolds grabbed his bag and was on his way through the closet door when he stopped and turned back to Dominic.
“You should be proud—her silence was almost convincing. Almost.”
“Leave.” I felt Dominic’s growl in my own throat, and I was surprised that Dr. Reynolds could appear so unaffected by Dominic’s anger. He nearly had my knees rattling from fear, and he wasn’t even speaking to me.
Dominic moved past me to the dresser. After he inspected the pills, he opened the bottle and dropped one into his palm. I watched as he leaned down to grab the bottle sitting on the table between the two chairs. He was still shirtless, and his muscles stretched tight along his abs and back as he reached for the water. He passed me the bottle and when he handed me the pill, I hesitated taking it. Instead, I tossed it around in my palm like a gambler at a craps table. In a way, it was just another type of gambling, except I was gambling with my life. Everything that had happened in the last 24 hours felt like a lucid dream. I didn’t know if it was the sickness or the drugs that he’d given me, but I hardly felt like myself. I guess I expected I would fight more, that he would have to drag me around kicking and screaming, but I was relatively calm. Maybe the drugs had made me less combatant.
Dominic stood, with arms folded over his chest, showcasing thick forearms with menacing veins that slithered with the glow of the fire. His posture straightened out, and the foot that separated our heights began to feel more like a hill versus a mountain. I couldn’t measure up to a man of his size.
“Take it.”
I knew I couldn't exactly trust Dominic—he'd drugged me every day against my will like it was as natural as brushing my teeth or combing my hair—but I trusted my gut, and it told me that I could trust him with this. I popped the pill back and took a healthy swig of water while Dominic watched. I half expected him to tell me to lift my tongue to check if I had swallowed it.
After taking the pill, he put me back in bed, this time without the cuff. With hesitant eyes, I watched as he pulled the covers up and fluffed my pillows. If he could sense how tense I was by his calm actions, he didn’t let on. His actions left me uneasy. His care and consideration didn't fit with the man who had gone so far as to abduct me mid-dive. That kind of plan took time and effort to orchestrate. That was the work of a man who was determined. I couldn't get comfortable with the man who fluffed my pillows as if I was something to be taken care of. There was only a brief moment when I felt it. Hiding there beneath the surface was something dark, sinister, something deeper than a man who would commit such a crime as kidnapping. Maybe it had something to do with why I was taken. Whatever it was, I felt it. So far, he had contained it, but how long would that last? I saw his eyes sparkle in delight with my every struggle. No, there was nothing about him that I should be comfortable with.
He had just finished propping me up when the door opened. The woman from before strode in carrying an oxygen tank in one hand and what looked to be a thick plastic mask in the other. She placed them at Dominic's feet and took a step back like she was awaiting further instruction.
“Please bring more water. I'll have a turkey club for lunch, and Hailey will have some soup. I'll be taking my lunch in here.”
“Yes sir,” she nodded, leaving us alone again.
Dim white light filtered in through the blinds like the first signs of morning light, but Dominic was asking for lunch, so it must have been sometime around noon. I remembered seeing an alarm clock on the nightstand on the right side of the bed, but when I tried to lean forward to see around the pillows, my stomach protested the movement, so I fell back into the pillows at my back.
After setting me up with the oxygen tank, Dominic took a seat in the chair opposite the one Dr. Reynolds had sat in. The only time he broke his eyes away from whatever was on his laptop was to remind me to drink more water.
Lunch arrived on fancy china atop a white ceramic tray. The Bartholomews had similar china that was only brought out for special occasions. I wondered how they felt about my disappearance. My family was close to the Bartholomews, and after my parents died, they took in me and my sister, no questions asked. To go through losing their closest friends to my abduction—it seemed like more than one family could take.
I always felt like an outsider looking in when I was around our adoptive parents. They were wonderful, loving people, and I admired them for everything they did for us, but I never felt comfortable bridging the distance that naturally arose between us. Jessa didn’t feel the same way. She treated them as if they were our real parents. Maybe I always felt distant because it seemed like they pitied us. Or, maybe they tried too hard? I couldn’t remember, but more than anything, I just wanted to return to them. I fought back tears that threatened to fall, instead choosing to focus on the small woman who was setting a plate beside Dominic's chair. I wondered the extent of their relationship as she placed silverware wrapped in a linen napkin next to his lunch.
She finished unloading his lunch and made her way to my side of the bed with lips twisted in a smile meant to reassure me, but nothing about either of them was reassuring. Inwardly, I was narrowing my eyes at this woman who seemed comfortable with my imprisonment, but I played the perfect victim, choosing to keep my face blank even as she raised her eyebrows as if she were going to speak. I took the oxygen mask off and she said, “May I?” as she reached for the pillows behind me.
I rose up, my stomach protesting the movement. She fluffed the now limp pillows behind me, and while she was distracted, I observed everything I could within those few moments. The halo of gray hair and her sun-splotched skin revealed her age to be somewhere in her fifties. She wore a simple collared shirt in a mute purple color that did nothing for her caramel skin. Her tailored black pants accentuated her slim waist and hips, and her sandals revealed a fresh pedicure—reaffirming my thoughts that she wasn’t some lowly servant, also here against her will.
She finished fluffing the pillows and placed the tray across my lap. The soup aroma wafted thro
ugh the air, cocooning me in winter memories of my mom making soup. Nothing made me feel so alone as peering into the expensive bowl of soup that looked as delectable as it smelled and knowing that there was no love put into this—there was no mom, no Jessa, because there was no room for happy thoughts in these four walls: my prison.
I took the mask back off, letting the smell of the soup overwhelm all my senses. My stomach seemed to grumble on cue, alerting me of my sudden hunger. Pushing my contempt for this woman aside, I asked for her name while committing her face to memory. When I escaped, I was going to need to be able to remember everything about that place, everything about him, about her. Plus, I didn’t like the fact that they seemed to know things about me, yet I was left in the dark as to who they were. Dominic seemed to stop typing, and I felt his eyes watching me as I interacted with the woman who also seemed out of place in her own way.
“My name is Clementine, but you may call me ‘Clema.’ Be sure to eat all your soup. I’ll be back to pick up the tray when you’re done. Feel better, Hailey.” Her voice was soft to my ears, but she spoke like a mother would to her children, urging them in some silent way to heed her words. I didn’t respond. I didn’t want to give her the satisfaction of thinking that we somehow bonded just because I wanted to know her name. When I looked up, Dominic was watching me with narrowed eyes.
Monotonous days had passed since the oxygen mask was needed and now my stomach just felt queasy from being abducted. Though our rooms were merely separated by a closet, I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of Dominic since he sat in the corner of the room. In fact, the only contact I’d had was when Clema came to help with the bare necessities, such as feeding me and helping me shower. I didn’t exactly need help cleaning myself, but maybe she was only there to make sure I didn’t try to escape.
