Page 37 of Follow Me
“Thank you,” Mal said, clinging to her. “I promise I’m trying.”
“Trying isn’t good enough,” June tearfully said. “I’ve lost enough people I loved. The last one nearly killed a bunch of us. I need you to succeed. Ineedyou to beat this. You’re not much older than our daughters.”
Yes, a lot of their group would remain raw for a long time from that loss. “Can I start taking yoga from you again?” Mal didn’t want to let go yet, wanted to savor this hug.
“Sure. I’m free tomorrow afternoon, before pole-dancing.”
Mal was certain she’d misheard her. “Pole-dancing?”
“Yeah. We teach it now.”
“That sounds…unusual?”
June laughed. “No, it’s the latest craze. We’re teaching it as fitness and dance, although we do hold sexy classes for bachelorette parties and stuff.” Mal finally released her, and June immediately took her cue from that and she stepped back. “Follow me.”
June led her down the hall to a room that Mal knew was normally their playroom, but, sure enough, there was now a pole mounted in there.
June slipped her sandals off, walked over to it, reach up, grabbed it, took a couple of steps, and spun around the pole, climbing into a sexy position that widened Mal’s eyes.
“Holy crap!”
“It’s great,” Scrye said from behind Mal, where he stood in the doorway and smiled. “You should try it.”
June did a lazy, sexy slide down to the floor. “Only if you promise to keep eating. Maybe that’s a shitty bribe for me to use on you, but hey, I’ll do my part to help.”
Mal saw that Doug, Aden, and Niall had followed them and were also watching. “Do you think it’s okay?” she asked Niall. “I mean, if I take lessons?”
Niall looked to Doug and they seemed to form a silent consensus. “I think it could help ye get out an’ reconnect with the world,” Niall said. “But as June said, ye need to continue yer progress. It’ll be even more important now, if ye’re doing that, because ye’ll be burning calories. Ye’ll need to adjust yer intake to maintain or increase yer weight and maintain your goals.”
Except…Mal felt a little thrill of excitement roll through her, and when was the last timethat’dhappened? “But if I maintain or gain, I can do it?”
Niall did the Dom eyebrow thing. “I believe that’s what we just told ye,girl,” he quietly said.
Sheshivered.
Damn.
I wish Kel was here.
“Thank you, Sir.”
* * * *
Kel spent the afternoon rearranging the items he stored in the warehouse bay downstairs. He also went through his photography equipment, dusted, organized his ropes—basically wasted time and wore himself out so he wasn’t a nervous wreck at dinner. He didn’twantto have any damn energy.
He wanted to approach dinner as calmly as possible for Mal’s sake.
The only thing allowing him to force himself to do that was pulling up the texts from Niall that past week listing Mal’s weight.
She was maintaining and still regaining weight.
As much as hehatedthis process, hatedeverythingabout it—he couldn’t argue with results like that.
She wasn’t cutting, she was maintaining her weight, and she wasn’t running herself to exhaustion.
When he got out of the shower he spotted her day collar bracelet on the dresser, where he’d put it the day he’d moved back into the apartment. Despite knowing it’d gut him, he picked it up and closed his eyes as he remembered their collaring.
The joy in her eyes when she’d asked to be his slave at their collaring.
