Page 33 of No Asylum Here

“We’ll get to that in a second, Doc,” I said coolly, as if I was the one with all the power, even though I was the one in chains. “You haven’t fulfilled your end of the bargain yet.”

She blinked. “What are you talking about? I pulled up my skirt.”

I shook my head as much as I could, making the leather groan and the metal chains sway from the movement. “Show me your cunt. That was the deal.”

“I can’t,” she muttered. “You’re my patient.”

“I’ve done worse with mine,” I drawled, dropping my voice to an octave that had her squirming. “Besides. You’ll find things like that have less meaning here than anywhere else you’ve worked.”

“You mean things like professionalism?” she asked with an arched brow.

“Exactly.”

“I doubt Dr. Rook shares the same views. And as my boss, his opinion matters to me.”

“I won’t breathe a word to that bastard. Besides, if I did, there’s a chance he wouldn’t let us see each other after this, and there’s no way in hell I’m giving this up. It’s already the highlight of my pathetic existence.”

Tuesday swallowed thickly, and I could make out the jump of her throat, like she was trying to swallow the fact that she was about to expose herself to me. All for some information from a madman.

My sadistic grin stretched wide behind my mask. “Why so resistant? You want to.”

“You don’t know what I want.”

“At least your body doesn’t lie to me,” I said, my attention dropping back to the wet spot framed so beautifully by her lush thighs. Hives splotched her otherwise milk-pale flesh. What a nervous, lusty, indignant little thing.

Fucking beautiful.

The doctor stared at me for a long beat. Then her body swayed, as if she were about to faint. The urge to catch her in my arms overwhelmed me. What an odd knee-jerk reaction. Maybe on some level, I was already beginning to care for this woman.

Too bad Rook would poison her against me. Soon enough, she’d be torturing me like the rest of his staff, and not in such a fun way as she was doing now.

“I think we need to end this session for now. I’m getting lightheaded. It’s the altitude.”

“It’s not the altitude.” My snarl had her attention snapping back to me. “We’re below sea level, if you can believe that.”

The quirk of her eyebrows told me that she didn’t. “Nonsense. The mountains are just beyond the fog,” she said, gesturing to the haze beyond the window.

“There’s something beyond the fog, alright, but it’s not majestic mountains, Dr. Beckett. Now, enough stalling. Spread your legs and show me that cunt.”

Her chest rose with a sharp breath. “You should be whipped for talking to me like that.”

“I probably will be. Or electrocuted. Or drowned. Or dissected. Who knows. They’ve been mixing it up lately.”

She balked, appearing to hold back whatever line of questions had bloomed from my comment. “I need something more from you if I’m going to…to do this.”

“I’m all ears, Doc.”

“You’re going to answer my questions directly. And don’t give me some half-assed cryptic answers and try to pass it off as mental instability. You might be evil… But I don’t think you’re crazy.”

I considered her words for a moment before releasing a long, agitated sigh. “And what if the things I tell you don’t make sense even if they’re true? Are you going to believe me? Or will you just shrug it off as nonsense and toss me some pills?”

Now it was her turn to mull over my response. “I–I...don’t know. It’s my job to make sense of things…”

Her voice wavered and trailed off. She didn’t need to finish her line of thought; I knew what she was thinking.

Nothing about this place made sense.

Least of all, me.