Page 168 of Deep Cover

41

Annie

Iwanted to spend the rest of that day under the covers, with the pillow over my head. I'd gladly endure the headache that comes from breathing out your own CO2 or whatever it is, if I could just pretend the world beyond didn't exist.

Cole took me into his exam room while I was unconscious but it wasn't hard to figure out a way out. There was a locked door on one side of the cubicle and an unlocked door on the other. The only question was like the lady or the tiger – would I open the door that led me back to my cell? Or would this lead me somewhere I desperately didn't want to go, clothed only in a drape he hadn't seen fit to give me before he finished?

My body burned with the intrusions, the things that had been done to it. The invasiveness, the inability to cover up, the horror of something that for me was an infrequent event and only when I absolutely couldn't convince Mark to use a condom and couldn't talk anyone into giving me more birth control pills.

Cole had done that to me. He'd made it worse, and he undoubtedly knew it, by making the first part of it so pleasant I was off guard.

But the pain that had come and still flared up from deep between my legs - that I thought had been unintentional. He seemed almost as shocked as I was by it and I had no idea what he'd done. No doctor had ever hurt me like that.

Despite not wanting to move from my fetal curl and despite wanting to do nothing but curl in the bed and find some way to deny what had happened, I waited until all sounds of him had vanished and forced myself to sit up. My head swam a little with the aftereffects of whatever he'd used to knock me out. When I was certain I wouldn't fall – and angry because I didn't want anything about this day dragged out – I pushed myself off the chair that had become a table and wrapped the drape tight around me. Cold feet on linoleum reminded me of every exam I'd ever suffered through.

The door that was obviously locked was really locked but it never hurt to check every option. The other door led back into my cell down a short hallway passing, I thought, the room where he so often made other women scream and took me for corrections and whatever he called it when he enjoyed it and there was no other reason for it.

At that thought, my unfaithful body sent a twinge up from between my legs that wasn't pain. I felt both sickened and anxious. Wanting again. The same damn thing. Wanting Cole to take me and hurt me and make me come and at the same time, knowing enough by now to understand that pain was pain. There was no exception.

"You were less fucked up when you were high," I muttered and collected a pair of running tights, two pairs of sweatpants, a jog bra, a t-shirt, a second t-shirt with long sleeves and a huge hoodie. In the bathroom, I turned the water all the way to hot and waited until the steam was billowing up. It hurt to step into it but I felt too degraded, too betrayed for anything else. I wore the drape into the shower and dropped it at my feet once the curtain had rattled into place.

Showering, I cried, pain and burn and anger, and I used the scrub brush that was one of the implements he sometimes used to spank me, this time using it to scrub areas that like a little more gentle handling.

When I started to bleed and when the water had, on its own, regulated to a temperature that no longer ached against my skin, I stepped out and dried off. It wasn't easy dressing in all that steam. My clothes wanted to stick to me. But I put on everything before I left the bathroom and once I was out, I went back to the bed and curled there, all the covers over me, and tried to disappear out of my own body.

Cole came for me after lunch. His cook had delivered a surprise midday. I hadn't even remembered that I hadn't eaten since the night before, fasting for the bloodwork.

"I don't know who he thinks he's feeding," the cook said. She was a white-haired lady and had always been nice to me. Whatever she thought of what was going on in the compound and however much she might think it was my choice, she was non-judgmental. "You're one girl, not a hyena."

That was enough to bring me out of my stupor. I sat up and considered. "Why would you assume I was a hyena?"

She raised her brows at me and uncovered the food. I started laughing before she stopped uncovering. Cole had clearly put his medical knowledge to work, giving me a selection of things that would help build my blood back up after he'd taken – all of it, essentially, that's what it felt like – and also was something of a reward or apology, perhaps. Because he'd sent a carafe of coffee with real cream and sugar, and ice cream along with all the healthy things but the centerpiece was a Round Table pizza. Disbelieving, I flipped the top of the box and discovered a large pepperoni with pineapple and extra cheese.

I couldn't help it. I laughed. "Would you and about 15 of your closest friends like to join me?"

"I know, right?" she said, which didn't answer the question but made me feel slightly more sane than the amount of food did.

It was a feast and while it in no way mitigated what he'd done to me, I was less likely to try and stab him with my ice cream spoon when he appeared.

He showed up late afternoon when I'd had time to digest. I'd eaten the salmon and to my own surprise, the spinach. Maybe my body knew better than me what it needed for recovery. I'd eaten the ice cream, because ice cream, and the pizza because there will never be a day when I don't eat pizza.

Then and only then I'd considered taking off some of the clothes but in the end I didn't. I just lay back down on the bed, curled under the protective covers, and slept until Cole showed up.

"Wake up."

I woke instantly with no disconnect. Something had reset in my head while I slept or maybe in the ritual after-exam shower, the one that put me back on my feet and back to feeling I had control of my own body and wouldn't be violated again for another couple years. So without consideration, I slid from the bed onto my knees, eyes cast down, hands behind my back.

"Good."

"Sir."

"What you went through earlier was unpleasant. It was meant to be. You're mine. I paid for you. I saved you. I own you."

He gave me space to hang myself out to dry.

I wasn't that stupid.

"I know who you are. I know what you are. I know you're strong and I know you fight. But you do not ever say to me the things you said to me."

---