Page 83 of His Toy

Her blue-green eyes were practically opaque, her lips were open, waiting for me. All of me. She needed the truth.

“I love you, Heather,” I said, and I opened my mouth to say more, but she put a finger to my lips.

“That’s all that matters. You love me, and I love you.”

My brows furrowed, but a seizing sense of fatigue overcame me. I had no energy to fight. Recovery was a bitch.

If that’s all that mattered to her, then I would make it right. I would make the world hers.

I squeezed her hand, then closed my eyes.

***

Determined to get the hell out, I sought release from the hospital a few days early. Technically I could refuse care, but Heather wouldn’t allow it. It had made me angry at first, but then I relented. She was taking care of me. It was one of the many factors of being in a partnership.

As master and slave, I may have controlled her every sexual move. But we were equals everywhere else. Heather was strong-willed, determined, and deeply loyal. I wouldn’t have had it any other way.

Once the doctor gave the discharge order, we headed to Northern Arizona. Grant and Hazel were still at the clinic. The tech at the front window nodded at me in recognition, then led us directly back to their quarters. They had been given a large room, but in the same department. Separate beds.

Hazel was sitting on one of the beds, her arms crossed. Grant leaned against the wall facing her, a scowl on his face.

“Yippee. The savior parade is here,” Hazel said.

“They killed your abuser,” Grant said. “Eric abused you.”

“You abducted me, put me in a cage, and took my sister as a slave, then sent me up here to live in isolation,” Hazel said. “Youare the abusers in my book.”

I stayed stoic. I couldn’t convince Hazel to trust me. I could only do right by her sister.

“It’s good to see you,” Heather said. Heather’s hug was met with Hazel’s cringing shoulders, but eventually, she returned the embrace too. “Grant has been good to you?”

“He’s an asshole,” Hazel said, glaring at Grant over her shoulder.

“But he hasn’t hurt you?”

Hazel sighed. “I guess not.”

Heather pat Hazel on the shoulder. “Grant is going to help you get reintegrated with society.” I had already spoken with Grant; he knew that he was on a special assignment for the foreseeable future, to protect and assist Hazel, until she was completely independent and functioning. Hazel wasn’t an addict like I had originally assumed, but she still needed some guidance, some motivation, to figure out her next steps. Grant would provide that.

“Reintegrated?” Hazel’s eyes widened. “What the hell does that mean?”

“Whatever you want it to mean,” I said.

Hazel glared at me. “I’m not talking to you, asshole,” she said. Then she turned back to Heather and pointed at Grant. “With that guy?” Heather nodded. “Are you going to live in Vegas withhim?” Hazel tilted her head in my direction, and Heather nodded again. “Then I want to live in Vegas too.”

I pulled out my phone and searched my contacts. I knew a few landlords in the area.

Hazel turned sharply towards me and poked a finger in my chest. “I will fucking murder you if you ever break my sister’s heart. Go ahead. Spank her. Do whatever weird shit you want. Nothing that I wouldn’t do, all right? But if I hear that you hurt her? That you broke her heart?” She narrowed her eyes and jabbed her finger into my chest again. “I will cut your face too.”

Another scar was healing on the opposite side of my face. I had no plans to receive a cut of that magnitude again.

Grant laughed, his attention focused on Hazel.

“You’re all talk,” he said.

“Shut up, muscle boy,” she said.

Heather stood by my side, linking arms with me. “Zaid’s rough around the edges,” Heather said, looking up at me, “but he’s actually pretty sweet.”