Chapter 3 Ryder
RYDER
Ishouldn’t have enjoyed the idea of a bath as much as I did, but there was something compelling about getting clean. He’d been gentle the last time, even if I hated the feeling of his hands on me.
No, that wasn’t entirely true. I didn’t hate the touch. After so long of being trapped down here alone — however long it was; I didn’t even know — the little touches were a reminder that I was alive. I was a tactile person and always had been, and…
I swallowed hard.
All I wanted was to go home to my girlfriend, to cuddle up to her and pull her into my arms. I wanted the warmth, the closeness, the knowledge that I was free.
I would never be free as long as I was here. The mitts might have been off, but he’d shown me more than once that he still owned me. Even when he was being kind, he was still cruel on the heels of it. It was like he just couldn’t let it go.
I shivered in the tub as he brought the water up to temperature and it welled up around my hands and knees. It turned warm, and I half-expected him to turn it up to boiling just because he could. Even when he didn’t do it immediately, I still thought he might.
He got off on that. I could tell by the way he shifted, by the way his gaze turned heated. He liked this, all of it. The more humiliated and miserable I was, the more aroused he got. It didn’t bode well for me.
He gently rinsed me off, and I instantly felt cleaner.
It was better than feeling the traces of my own filth along my ass and thighs, and the water was so warm that it was hard not to get lost in the sensations.
Even when he soaped up a cloth and started to bathe me, it was hard to tell my body it was supposed to be hating this.
Because, well, I liked this.
Demeaning as it was, degrading as it was — “I’d have to find it first,” he’d said when I’d told him to leave my cock alone before — my body liked it. By the time he reached between my thighs, I was getting hard.
I hated it.
I hated him.
I squirmed, but all it did was increase the potency of that touch.
I held my breath and went still, but this time his touch wasn’t clinical and detached.
This time he was taunting me, stroking me, until I was fully erect in his hand.
I closed my eyes, fighting back tears as the waves of shame washed over me. How could I handle this?
“Good boy,” he whispered, almost as though he was afraid to speak the words. “Such a good boy for your master.”
I whimpered.
He didn’t let go of my cock, holding it through the washcloth, and his breathing quickened as he leaned in. He softly kissed the top of my head, and I squeezed my eyes closed tighter. I didn’t want to see him.
He drew back after a moment, letting go, and I opened my eyes.
Afraid of what I’d see, I didn’t look at him.
I stared at the bottom of the tub instead until he told me to move so he could wash my hair.
I sat down and tilted my head back, letting him douse my hair with the water.
The feeling of his fingers massaging the shampoo into my hair was impossibly good, but the tension didn’t leak out of my body.
How could it when I sported an erection from being touched by another man?
He rinsed out my hair in silence then towel-dried it before grabbing the grooming dryer from nearby. I braced myself for the wave of warm air, but it still took me off guard all over again.
At least my cock was steadily losing interest in being touched, though it ached from the lack of attention. I never went this long without masturbating, but this was the first time I’d even thought about getting off since the time I’d gotten there.
Funny how getting kidnapped by a madman could kill your sex drive.
By the time I was dry, I was sweating a little. The cool air of the basement was welcome upon my skin when he helped me down from the tub. I went back down onto all fours, hating it but not knowing what else to do.
There was something heavy between us, something that had begun when I’d gotten hard and it hadn’t faded. I didn’t know what he was going to get me to do next, which was terrifying. I hated that I was the subject of his undivided attention, that he didn’t seem to have anything to do but torment me.
Then again, I wasn’t sure what he’d do when he didn’t have a use for me either.
I found out the answer after he led me back upstairs. My knees were aching by the time he opened the kennel door, and I balked.
“Please don’t,” I pleaded, edging back. “I’ll be good. Please don’t put me in there.”
He sighed. “C’mon, Toby. Do what I tell you. It’s time to kennel up.”
Kennel up. Like I really was a fucking dog.
I’m not Toby, I wanted to say. I’m not your fucking dog.
Instead, I crawled toward the kennel and went inside, panic surging within me as he closed the door behind me and took one of the damnable padlocks to secure the door. I couldn’t help it. I grabbed the bars, trying to shake them, trying to get the thing open.
He watched me, shaking his head. “You have to stay in there while I work,” he told me, which was the first indication he’d given that he actually did anything but torture the fuck out of me during the days.
I’d known for a while who he was: Griffin Meyers, a formerly famous musician who had pretty much retired after he’d gotten into an accident. I was dealing with someone with a lot of money — enough to get away with this.
“Please don’t leave me in here,” I told him, my voice high and terrified. I had the mental image of there being a fire or something, of being caught in the kennel to die. Unlikely as it was, it was a very real fear.
He softened, ever so slightly, his scarred face somehow seeming gentle. “I won’t be far,” he promised.
It shouldn’t have been a relief, but it was. If he wasn’t far, then I was safe.
Except I was in a dog kennel in a psycho’s bedroom, with dog bowls for food and water and a bottle to piss in.
I was so far from safe that it might as well have been in another zip code.
Yet…
He reached through the bars of the kennel, and I had to fight not to flinch as he touched my cheek. He smiled. “Such a good boy, to not want to be separated from your master.”
As though that was anywhere close to the truth.
But if it made him happy, I’d take it. I’d rather him be pleased with me — with a lie — than know what was really going on in my mind.
It was just… easier to shove those thoughts aside and let him believe I really was turning into what he wanted me to be.
Then again… wasn’t I?
It was an unsettling thought.
I closed my eyes, unwilling to look at him and see that soft expression. It was so at odds with everything else I knew that I couldn’t reconcile it with the man I’d started to learn about.
“I’ll be back soon,” he said, withdrawing his hand. “Just relax. I’ll put on the TV.”
Hopefully not on ghost stories.
He put it on Animal Planet, which was on par with his particular sense of humor. I glared at him, but he only smiled back at me. His scarred face seemed softer with his amusement somehow, and even though I was the butt of the joke, I could deal with it.
“Behave,” he told me, as though I could possibly do anything else when I was trapped in the kennel.
I sighed, shaking my head as he left the room and closed the door, enveloping me in darkness but for the light of the TV.
It was surreal to sit back and watch TV, knees against my chest, as I tried to get comfortable.
He’d woken me up earlier because he hadn’t wanted me to sleep too much, but I would end up drowsing soon enough.
There was some show about cats on, and I couldn’t help but think of my mom’s old cat. She’d been spoiled rotten, given everything a cat could ever want and then some. If I was going to die and come back as an animal, I’d want to be a cat.
The thought jolted me, and I sat up a little more. If I had to be an animal…
Oh, fuck no. No, no, no. I was not even considering playing more into his games. There was no way I could do it.
Yet… it seemed so much less humiliating somehow.
I groaned, burying my face in my hands. I couldn’t do it. I didn’t know much about puppy play in the real world, but I knew it existed — along with kitty play and pony play. I had about zero desire to end up as a pony, but a cat…
A cat could have claws, in more ways than one. Cats had attitude.
Cattitude.
I stifled a hysterical laugh.
If I was going to be here, if I was going to be fucking stuck here, shouldn’t I get some say in the terms?
The idea invigorated me, shaking me from the depressing haze I’d started to slip into. My personality was all but being quashed as a pup, but as a cat, it could be so different. It had to be different before I lost myself completely.
I didn’t know if he’d go along with it. He seemed to have some very specific ideas of what he wanted from me. But if I was going to have to do this…
I found a core of strength in me I hadn’t known was there until that moment, taking a deep breath and devoting myself to the plan. Not that I really had much of a plan yet…
Before I could come up with one, the door opened and Griffin returned.
He was smiling, and I thought… Well, here goes nothing.
I meowed.