I lifted the bowl and walked around them. Ilya cussed and Savin stepped in my path. “He’s a Kostava,” he said in a deadly hush. “You’re a Tolstoi. Yet you help him? The knayz helps him? I don’t get what the fuck is going on. He should have been slaughtered when he was found. Hung up and paraded through the streets.”
For a moment I felt a flash of shame. Real shame that I was about to help the enemy. But something stronger overcame this shame—a need to help Zaal. A need to get close to him. I couldn’t explain it. Of course, it was irrational, it was wrong, but I had to. He had no one else.
I was it.
Ignoring the men, I headed for the basement, and Ilya called out, “We’ll be watching that monitor, miss. If he so much as touches you the wrong way, we’ll come down and I won’t hesitate to kill him.”
It wasn’t a threat. His words were a promise.
Mu‘duk, I muttered under my breath, and resisted telling him to fuck off. When I reached the small landing of the basement, I saw the switch that controlled the security camera directly before me. Turning to bolt the two inner locks of the basement door, I then smiled directly into the stair’s camera hanging from the ceiling, and cut the live feed. Last thing I needed was Ilya and Savin watching me wash Zaal down.
When I walked down the stairs and returned to Zaal’s side, I set the bowl down and carefully began to wash his body. Blood and dirt eventually gave way to tanned skin. I gently washed every inch of him, and when I reached his face, it was to find a pair of unfocused green eyes, staring up at me.
My hand froze but I stared right back.
My heart raced and my cheeks flushed with heat.
Zaal studied me, his eyes widening, then he began to move.
Quickly shuffling backward through fear of what he might do, I stopped when he dragged his lethargic body into a slumped sitting position. His gaze dropped to the bowl and then to his half-washed torso.
He looked back up at me and I could see confusion clouding his features. He watched me and I watched him. The room seemed to increase in temperature and a powerful magnetic tension formed between us.
Zaal’s attention fell to the sponge in my hand. His black eyebrows pulled down and, lifting his hand, he ran it over the clean side of his body.
Swallowing, watching his array of facial expressions communicate without words, I slowly shifted onto my knees. Zaal’s eyes snapped to mine and he tensed. Perhaps he perceived me as a threat?
I held up my sponge, and his wary eyes narrowed. Edging closer, I nervously whispered, “I was cleaning you.”
The clean hand moved to the soiled and sweat-ridden side of his body. He fixed his gaze on me once more and dropped his hand. He focused on me blankly. I moved ever closer. His nostrils flared, his hands clenched, the chains attaching him to the wall rattled at even this slight movement.
But I kept moving forward until I was within touching distance. Stopping, I held up the sponge and gestured to the bowl of hot water. Clearing my throat, trying to chase away the nerves starting to overwhelm my body, I said quietly, “Can I keep going? Can I continue to clean you?”
He didn’t react, but his cheek twitched, then twitched again. I didn’t know if that meant he wanted me to or not. Deciding to continue regardless, I carefully dipped the sponge into the soapy water. Zaal’s torso was on full display and he tensed, as though I was about to strike him.
My heart fell again.
Had he not had any human contact at all? Had no one ever cared for him? Touched him? Spoke to him other than to issue a command to kill, or to pump him full with drugs?
He didn’t move as I approached very slowly, but his eyes watched me like a hawk. Holding out the sponge, I said just as quietly, “I’m going to run it along your arm, is this okay?”
There was no answer, just another twitch of his jaw and a narrowing of his green eyes.
Averting my attention from his face to his large arm, I pressed the sponge against his skin and met hard muscle. My lips parted and my heart raced. I could feel him watching me; I blushed under his scrutiny.
The deathly silence in the room only intensified the mood of the situation and his wet skin bumped in my wake. He was solid muscle. His skin was nearly golden in tone, but my chest tightened at seeing the mass of jagged scars marring his skin up close. They were everywhere, more than I’d realized. Round marks that looked like they’d once been open holes, red raised scars that looked like burn marks. I’d seen them through the surveillance feed, but up close? They were horrific. I didn’t even want to imagine how they could have been caused.
Swallowing back my shock, I glanced at Zaal, who was still watching me. His head was angled slightly to the side. I tried to cast him a smile. And when I did, his lips parted, the top boasting a perfectly shaped cupid’s bow.