Stabled (The Stables Trilogy #1) by Penny Lam

sweet, descended on Maple.
     
    As sleep forcefully claimed her, she thought she felt fingertips on her thigh.
     

 
    Chapter Nine
     
    Her mouth felt like cotton. Maple’s lips opened before her eyes, gasping for air.
     
    “What do you need?” His whisper was so soft and strained that Maple almost didn’t hear it through the drugged fog.
     
    “Water.”
     
    A straw slipped between her lips. She sucked, the warm water filling her mouth. She pictured the desert after a rain, how the ground greedily devoured it in seconds. That’s what it felt like. She took another sip, larger.
     
    She opened her eyes. When she tried to sit, though, she couldn’t. Fibers from rope cut and itched at her wrists and ankles. Maple tugged hard on instinct. She was tied to his bed, her arms pulled taut about her head and her legs spread and tied down at the foot of the bed.
     
    Why in the hell was she tied up? Twisting, she tried to slip a limb free, but the ropes were knotted well. They slid and burned, but they didn’t give. “Why am I tied up?” Her body felt hot as she considered how compromised she looked.
     
    “You wouldn’t stop scratching yourself.”
     
    Fuck. She hoped to God it was scratching and not touching. Because given some of the dreams she’d had of J.B., she had no trouble imagining sliding her hands between her legs as she slept. Maple couldn’t look at him.
     
    Compounded with her worry was knowing that this was a real and regular fantasy for her. Her hands and legs bound, J.B. relishing the varied tortures and pleasures he unleashed on her body.
     
    The bed dipped as he sat. He untied her ankles first. In order to untie her wrists, J.B. had to lean close over her. His shirt whispered on her skin, his smell wrapping her up like a blanket. Maple wasn’t sure if she imagined it, but for a moment, it felt as though he lightly traced up her forearm before loosening the knots.
     
    Her shoulders screamed as he pulled her hands down and held them. In strong, sure strokes he rubbed life back into them. The touch was rough, but intimate, and Maple bit her cheek, fearful of groaning. “Water now?”
     
    J.B. was there, holding a glass to her, but his face was made of stone. Unreadable. Anxiety tried to beat its way in but whatever was in her IV held it at bay.
     
    “How do you feel?” Cold and removed.
     
    Her stomach lurched. “Like I’m going to throw up.”
     
    She saw the wince J.B. tried to hide as he slid an arm under her shoulders to help her up. The pine scent of his shampoo tickled her nose. There wasn’t time to enjoy it, or the hot press of his skin near hers, because the lurch turned into rebellion. She vomited, hard, into the bucket he held to her face.
     
    It was hard to stop, even after her stomach was empty. It fought and spasmed, uncontrollably. Tears, unbidden, slid down her cheeks as she dry heaved. J.B. slid her arms around the bucket, making her hold it, while he added something to her IV.
     
    Slowly the spasming stopped, leaving her breathing hard into the bucket. The sour smell of bile and its tangy, bitter taste surrounded her. Weakly, she handed him the bucket. “Thanks,” she croaked.
     
    “Now how do you feel?”
     
    Her body was tired. Beyond tired. It was sore, her arms and legs scarcely felt as if they were attached. The itching was gone, though, and the tight, stretched feeling to her skin. When she raised her arms and hands to the light, she saw they were normal sized, no longer swelling. Relief flooded through her. “Awful, but better.”
     
    He nodded.
     
    Maple was still in his bedroom. She was dressed for the most part, though the arm with the IV hung out of a large button-down shirt. He’d buttoned it along her torso and chest as high as her armpit. It was butter soft Chambray, with pearl buttons. It was his, and it was touching her skin.
     
    J.B.’s bedroom was simple. Like the rest of the house, she could see the money, but it wasn’t shoved in her