Page 16 of Fixation

HARPER

I ’m hot all over. From head to fucking toe.

Shame threatens to eat me alive as I lie here and stare at Anderson.

So much shame that I’m drowning in it.

Shame for being bound to this bed.

Shame for going in a bucket that isn’t here anymore. The air is fresh and clean.

Another layer of shame descends on me when I realize he smells clean. His woodsy cologne permeates the air. A touch of spice.

And his hair, it’s still damp from the shower. With my nose only partly stuffed, I’m able to inhale his scent. It smells just as mouthwatering as the rest of him.

I hate him for it.

Yet the thickest, most horrible layer of shame is because I lust for him.

His arousal on my fingers. I’ve almost licked the cum of the man who’s kidnapped me.

A scream bubbles in my throat.

“You’re a monster.” I have to put my clothes back in place without getting his cum on them. I won’t lick it. Don’t want to lick it. “If you think you’re coming anywhere near me, you’re delusional.”

I’m about to rub his seed on his clothes. His hip is the closest.

“Now, now.” His hand is a manacle around my wrist. Dr. Maguire is a force, gentle yet powerful as he pushes my fingers toward my mouth. “There’s no need to panic. I’ll be quick. A warm cloth over your body. That’s it. You’ll feel better after it.”

“You mean you’ll feel better.” His hand is closer. A threat. A temptation. I smell him. I don’t want him. No. “You sick fuck.”

Truthfully, there are two sick fucks in this basement.

One of them is him.

The other is me.

As it dawns on me, I sigh. I stop resisting.

I let him use my fingers to smear his cum over my cheeks.

I’m sticky, and I hate it as much as I hate him.

I’m hot and I don’t hate it one bit.

Dark eyes grow darker. His shoulders are tense. His expression is stern, yet the rest of him is all emotion. A thundering desire. An unhinged kind of possessiveness.

He can’t control it. Anderson looks at me like he’s going to eat me alive.

Maybe he will.

I refuse to whimper, so I don’t. I will my legs to stay where they are. Relax my thighs.

Nothing he does will make me seek friction. His rough and careful touch won’t fuck with my head so badly that I clench my legs. Again.

Fuck that.

Revulsion and guilt make me angry. So angry.

Fuck him for my wet pussy. For this need that he’s been injecting me with for days. It’s no better than the anesthetics. Worse.

My veins have to reject him.

I have to reject him.

But how can I when my cells thrum for his touch?

“I hate you.”

“You’ll have to learn to be more obedient.” He completely ignores me.

He’s after other things, and he’s taking them.

Anderson demands that my own fingertips run down to the corner of my lips, so that’s where they travel.

“You have to understand that I know best.”

I open my mouth to tell him I will never.

His lips quirk in a devious smirk. Then he shoves my fingers into my mouth.

“I made a mess of your fingers.” The man shoving my fingers in and out of my mouth is pure depravity. The embodiment of sin.

This is what this debasement feels like.

Like a hospital room and sex. And filth.

“As your doctor…” He pushes my fingers deeper into my mouth. His knuckles are soft and firm, pressing to my lips. I gag on my fingers and swallow the salty taste of him. “I’m telling you that you need to clean it up. You need to suck them until there’s nothing left. Do it.”

His cock stretches against his scrubs. From the split second I was awake, just before he came, I felt him. How big he was in my palm. I could barely close my hand around it.

The veins on it, I remember those too. How smooth and hard he was for me.

A humiliating moan slips past my lips, and I could cry. I am crying.

“Lick it,” he seethes, his free hand curled into a fist. The veins beneath the barbed wire tattoo pulse. “Lick it fucking clean, Miss Arlington.”

“No,” I groan, the word mumbled. My fingers hit the back of my throat. I’m so full of him. Of myself. “No.”

“Another no and I’ll sedate you.” His head cocks to the side. “For a whole day. Two. Three even. Imagine all the things I could do to you.”

I want to call his bullshit so bad. I hear it in his voice.

He’s an evil man.

Putting me under for so long, however, is irresponsible. Dangerous. I’ll probably end up dead.

He won’t go through with it. I believe what he said hours ago. Or was it yesterday? Whenever it was. I believe him. He won’t be reckless with me.

He does what he knows best, nursing me to health. The monster in a hospital uniform. The lover who demeans me with every move he makes.

I’m part horrified, part grateful.

That, too, fills me with shame.

No part of me should warm up to him.

Absolutely no part of me should listen to him.

I do, anyway.

I suck in my fingers, then dart my tongue out to lick his hand. One swipe over them, and he shudders for me.

“Good, that’s very good.” The tension in his shoulders tells me I’m getting to him as well. I might be bound, but I’m getting to him.

At least that’s the lie I tell myself. It’s how I convince myself that’s why I lick and suck and take my fingers down my throat. To fuck with my captor.

I don’t want this.

“That’s enough.” I’m breathless when he yanks my fingers out of my mouth.

Get a fucking grip, Harper.

Anderson raises my fingers, twisting my hand gently. When he examines me, the darkness retreats from his eyes. They’re as impersonal as can be.

Cold and detached.

That’s impossibly worse, being his patient again. He’s making it out to be as if nothing’s happened just now.

As if he wasn’t the first man I gave a hand job to.

As if he weren’t the first man to make me come.

He confuses me down to my core by being indifferent as he places my hand on the bed beside me.

His gaze remains on my face. I feel more exposed than ever, quickly shoving my shirt and sweatshirt down my body.

Raising my sweats will take too much wriggling. I’m exhausted, so I reach for the blanket. When I grab for it, the swift shake of his head is an order to stop.

I resent him.

I listen to him.

The blanket falls on top of my legs. My wet underwear is out in the open.

My hand lands on the soft sheets of the bed.

His lips press together. His expression is unreadable.

For a second.

He’s making a sound of approval in the back of his throat. “Glad we got that out of the way.”

My orgasm? His? Am I just here to tend to his sick needs?

These thoughts bounce around in my head, driving me crazy.

“Got what out of the way?” I stifle a scream. Drown the urge to reach for him.

To beg him to explain—please, for the love of God—what he’s doing to my head.

“Your lesson in trust. You passed, Harper. You’re the one who let me shove your fingers in your mouth.

You sucked and licked them.” The words come out flat.

A simple explanation for a simple truth.

“Now, you’re going to let me clean you up, here on the bed.

When you’re ready, when you’re better, you’ll have your shower. With me there.”

The double entendre in the word better echoes loud and clear.

Better physically, as in not sick.

Better mentally, as in when I want him.

“You can’t just make me.”

“Wasn’t I clear? This isn’t up to you.” His eyes darken. “Or do I need to tie you up for that?”

Yes, you bastard. I’ll die before I submit to your deranged orders.

The insults sit at the tip of my tongue.

I keep them locked in for a few reasons.

Reason one is that sweat had drenched my clothes he’d been at work. That meant the fever was going down. I feel better now too. Anderson is helping me. I can’t hate him for it.

Reason two has nothing to do with being grateful.

It’s so I can manipulate him.

Up until this moment, Anderson had been mostly professional around me. Clinical. Composed.

An actual, deranged doctor, sticking to his act with the devotion of an A-list actor.

There was an underlying sexual desire beneath his skin, which he hid exceptionally well.

His control is back now that he’s come, but it’s shaky.

The wall he’s erected around himself is crumbling. Fucking my hand while I slept is unethical as all fuck.

A crack means an opening. I can learn about him when his guard is down like that. About his weaknesses.

“You can wash me.” I lean up on my elbows, chin raised high. I’m as proud as a prisoner could ever be. “On one condition.”

“More bargaining?” His lean arms cross over his chest. His tongue darts out to wet his upper lip. I could die, but I won’t. I won’t give in to this. To him. “Let’s hear it.”

“You’ll answer my questions.” Daring him is a bold move. Raising my voice is risky. “You’ll tell me about yourself.”

Light shines behind his eyes. He snuffs it out immediately.

Too late. I’m already onto another weakness.

This isn’t just about fucking.

There’s something in me he’s fixated on. Not my body— me .

Why?

“I’ll answer two.” No, I don’t notice his thumb dragging over one of the barbed wires inked to his skin. I don’t notice how perfect his fingers are compared to my calloused ones. “You’ll answer three.”

“That’s unfair,” I huff, reaching for the blanket the second time.

“I’ll answer two, none of which will be Why me? ” he says in his authoritative voice while his hand curls around my wrist. He locks it tight around me, the punishing grip sending ice up my spine. “You’ll answer three. Understood?”

I have no choice. “Understood.”

“Understood, what?”

My eyebrows knit together. A second later, realization comes.

Oh God. He’s actually making me say it.

Heat rushes up my neck. Up my cheeks.

He tracks it with his eyes. Still detached, but so hot.

I dip my chin. “Yes, Dr. Maguire.”

“Good.” In long, decisive steps, he rounds the bed. Plucks a key from his breast pocket and unlocks the handcuff around my wrist.

While he rubs the slightly reddened skin, something buzzes on the treatment cart.

His phone.

“I have to get this.” His determined eyes find mine. “Strip, Miss Arlington.”