I’ve retreated into my head again around him. But it’s not into the abyss. I just can’t believe what I’ve told him. A complete stranger, nonetheless! Sure, he saved my life, but to open up about my dad like that? To talk with him about our special place? Our special routine, our ritual together? That’s not something I even told my closest friends. Not even the people I went to beauty school with in New York know about that.

I can’t believe I’ve just shared all of that! I wipe at my eyes, feeling my whole body shaking— from the remains of my nightmare, which I guess was a “night terror” from what he just explained, and also from thinking about Dad again. Just even admitting to the guilt I’ve felt — that’s enough to make a squishy sponge out of my heart, and a leaky faucet out of my eyes. But I don’t share any of that with him.

Why is he being so nice to me anyway? Why care so much about someone you don’t even know?

I study him, a little frustrated and embarrassed at myself that I’m actually admiring his towering, bulky form. Appreciating the muscles I can see in his chest, his arms and the little bit of light coming in from the hallway through the open bedroom door. Just a little while ago I was afraid of that bulkiness.

I still should be, I think. For all I know, he could be being nice to me so he puts me into a false sense of security. So that when he tells me I can’t leave tomorrow — or ever again — I’ll be into him enough to not mind being captured.

These thoughts aren’t allowed to continue uninterrupted, though. My angel from the woods has started talking to me again. Maybe he’s been talking to me the whole time, but I’m just now hearing him. “I know what will help,” he says.

Immediately, my mind turns to more food, so I say, “I don’t need any more to eat. Or drink.” In my head, I see myself wolfing down the sandwich and chips. Guzzling the milk down mindlessly. “You gave me enough the first time. And I ate like a pig.”

Like a great white shark is more like it, I think, but I don’t bother to make that comparison. It’s probably not something this nice guy would like to picture: having a great white shark type of girl in his bed, at his dinner table.

“I’m not usually like that,” I say. “Not usually so ravenous, you know.”

To this, my savior just chuckles. “I don’t mind a girl who can eat,” he says. “And anyway, sometimes when we let our emotions get the best of us, we forget to take care of our bodies. Our minds. So, don’t worry about it.”

He lets me go, getting up from his kneeling position near the bed. “But no, when I said I had an idea for something that would help, I didn’t mean more food. I was thinking more of a bath.”

“Oh.” I don’t know why, but this seems a little funny to me— hilarious even— and I start to laugh a little bit. “A bath. Right.”

I look down at myself. I’m still in my same T-shirt and sweatpants from earlier. Though he offered his own clothes, I didn’t bother to change into them. I like this combination, but I can’t remember how long I’ve been in it. I suppose since yesterday, because I slept in it the night before last. At my own house, and now his too. My days and nights are starting to blend together and I’m losing track of time.

I’m really starting to lose track of everything. And that includes what I’m dressed in, what I’ve been thinking or feeling. One quick, elusive smell at myself, and I know I’m in bad shape. You can really smell the sweat, dirt and musk in everything— something I’m suddenly hoping my savior hasn’t smelled and used that as his excuse to offer me a soak.

I stand up and get out of bed, deciding I’m going to make sure he doesn’t have time to smell me, now or later. I do smell him, though. The minute I get up, I smell a waft of pine, wet earth and sweat from him. It’s oddly intoxicating and comforting to me. It smells a bit like campfire, I guess. Except without the smoke.

Like he’s done most of the night so far, he takes any movement from me as his cue to show me to the next area. “I’ll get you started with a bath,” he says. “You can stay in there as long as you like. Even put more hot water in if you want or need.”

I don’t answer him. I just follow him out of the room and down the hall. As I do, I take this as my opportunity to look around, to see where I’m really at. I know I’m in a cabin, but getting a look at it now, I see that it’s really much more majestic than that. It’s not small or cramped by any means.

It’s not rinky-dink, the way most people probably picture cabins. It’s rustic, but with style. Almost like his house used to be a fancy ski lodge in some place like Aspen, Colorado or something, but instead it got dropped here. In New Mexico. In the middle of the Tijeras Mountains.

Breathtaking would be a great word for the kind of cabin I see around me. Along with its stately, dark wooden, intricately carved beams and panels, there is a certain New Mexico flair. Colors and patterns in line with a south-of-the-border vibe. Reds. Oranges. Bright blues. Yellows. There are cacti and horse motifs in some places, coyotes and desert landscapes in others— mostly in paintings and carvings.

“Well, here we are,” says my savior, as he throws open the door at the end of the hallway. Even without seeing inside, I can tell by the soapy, perfumed smell that it’s the bathroom. Though it’s not the girly type of perfumed. It’s masculine, like aftershave. Cologne.

Smelling this, I can’t help it: my mind undresses him from the back. I imagine that I can see through his tight, clingy tee, and down to his skin. How smooth and velvety it must be. How muscled and toned his shoulders and back must be, to grab onto his shirt like that.

Before I can stop myself, I imagine what it would be like to run my fingers along his body. Down the center of his back. How it would feel to lay my head on him there. Fall asleep on him, feeling his skin cool and warm at different times during the night.

Soon, though, those thoughts turn to static in my head. They get jumbled just as I step into the bathroom. He’s already put the light on and started the water. I tell myself that the jarring sound of the water running is what’s caused the static in my brain— or part of it, anyway.

The other part is my dad’s training. The part of his voice I can still here in the back of my head telling me to be wary. To stop thinking about this person that way, because he might be the enemy. He might be getting ready to ambush me, like Dad was ambushed.

Get a hold of yourself, I think, forcing myself to pay attention to the bathroom— to the walls and textures around me. I know you feel like you’re slipping, like there’s nothing to hold onto, but we don’t know anything about him. We don’t know what he intends to do to us, or what we really are to him, Juliet. The best predators are the ones who can masquerade as completely normal people. Remember that.

Still, even with these thoughts, I find myself watching him. Watching the way my hero bends over the tub, dutifully checking the water. Stirring it around, so that everything is evenly heated. He’s even gone so far as to put in a few pearls of something. Bath salts maybe? Whatever they are, they smell amazing.

They’re much too girly for someone like him to have, but for some reason, I get the sense that these aren’t his. They smell like something belonging to a mother or a grandmother. Very rosy. Lilac and vanilla.

After a little bit longer, he turns off the water, and gets up from his perch on the side of the tub. “It should be just about perfect for you, I think.”

He dries his hands on a small hand towel. And, for some reason, I enjoy the smallness of it. The juxtaposition between that tiny piece of cloth and his big, rough but tender-looking hands.

“I’ll be around if you need anything.” He gestures to a little cabinet. “There are towels in here for you, when you’re ready to use them.” He pauses, searching my face.

I lower it, not wanting him to have any chance of seeing what’s been in my head. My desire to touch him. My fixation on his big hands and the tiny towel. “Thank you,” I mumble.

“No problem,” he says, and leaves me to it.

On the other side of the door, once he’s closed it, he reminds me that he will be around if I need anything. And to not hesitate to ask him for help if I need it.

I don’t answer, deciding he’ll take my silence as answer enough. He has for the last couple of hours, so he should have no problem doing so now, either.

Sure enough, he doesn’t wait around long for an answer. He just heads down the hallway. Slowly. Calmly. And I’m oddly comforted by hearing his footsteps out there. Probably because it reminds me of what it used to sound like when Dad would walk away from my bedroom after tucking me in for the night. Or when I would be taking a bath like this after a weeklong camping trip.

I shake these thoughts and memories out of my head, deciding to focus on getting out of my clothes. I don’t want to think of my dad right now because the memories just make me sad. And I don’t want to think of the stranger right now because it just… turns me on, which is weird, since I’m so sad about my dad.

And anyway, I think, as I step out of my sweatpants and underwear (they practically blend in with the sweatpants) and into the hot bath water, however you’ve been thinking about him, that’s… Just as I’m about to think, “that’s got to stop,” it kicks up into high gear, instead.

I start fantasizing about him. About his tall, firm physique. His thick overwhelming arms. His hands. How it would feel to have those hands on my small, sensitive bits; my vulnerable, shaken pieces. Those parts of me that never quite came back together again after falling apart.

I shiver, both from the sadness of my shattered self, but also from something new and scary: how strong my desire is to be near him. To be touched by him. And in more than just the way he does when he’s trying to “save me.” To be really touched by him. Held. Caressed.

You just are craving human contact, I think. I say a version of this out loud to myself, but my mind isn’t with that program. Even as I say it to myself — even as I try to convince myself of it — I’m fantasizing even harder about him.

I’ve even brought my fingers down below the water, and into the folds of my pussy. It’s a place I haven’t touched in ages, and it shows. Even with the lightest caress, it’s already jumping, twitching under a violent pulse of pleasure and pain. My lips and clit are so starved, I think I can feel the ridges in my fingerprints down there because of how strongly everything reacts. But that’s not what I’m really thinking about or reacting to.

In my head, I’ve jumped unceremoniously into the abyss of my sexy savior: of his big, strong hands. His commanding arms bringing me to him, holding me to him, as he takes down my pants, and brushes up my shirt and bra. But it’s not in a forceful way. Not like he wants to violate me, but rather like he wants to help me. Heal me. At least, that’s what I’m imagining he’s saying to me.

“Juliet,” he says to me as I imagine him bringing his big hands on to my tiny, curvy ass, and wet, slim pussy, “I’m sorry things have been so rough for you. I’m sorry to be so forward with you — to be putting my hands on you in this way — but you need this. You need this to get well, to feel better. And I’m going to make sure you get what you need.”

Under these words, I imagine he starts to rub my clit with his strong, rough finger. It’s intense. Almost like being rubbed with a bit of sandpaper, but unbelievably addictive. I imagine that one finger is enough to cover my entire clit and hood. Massage every inch of it, without him even trying. Even my lips get stimulated from this single finger.

“You’ve been holding a lot inside, Juliet,” he says in my mind, while increasing his speed on me. When I squeal inside and outside my fantasy, I imagine he responds with, “it’s not good to hold that in. Not good at all. So, I’m going to touch you like this until you have nothing left inside that you’re holding onto. Nothing to keep away from me.”

I pant in my fantasy and in reality, feeling my shoulders sink deeper into the water in real life. In the fantasy, they sink deeper into his protective chest. His arms that have a hold on me. It’s similar to the way he was at the face of the cliff, except, I’m not over the edge of an abyss or the side of a mountain.

Here, I’m over the edge of his hands. His fingers rubbing and stroking my whole pussy. My lips, clit, hair and all. The way he moves, it’s like he’s milking my mound. Squeezing it gently but firmly, hoping for juices.

I feel some juice release from my folds. I feel it even in the water, but I imagine what it would look like on his fingers. How shiny and wet it would be, evidence of how good he makes me feel.

“There you go, Juliet,” he says, using my own juice to make more. He rubs me harder and faster. Under each caress of one finger, then more, he pauses to pet my lips. He slaps my folds lovingly, encouragingly, before getting back to jiggling his fingers back and forth against my clit. As he does this, I imagine my pussy’s covering him with more and more wetness. More and more shine. And goop as well. “That’s a good girl. Release all that wetness inside you into my hand,” he whispers.

As he does, I imagine that his big hands have come to grip me around the hips and place me just ahead of him. As he holds me there with one hand, he spreads me open with the other.

Underneath me, I see where I’m being guided to— onto the head of his cock. Something I imagine to be massive. Straight and tall. Meaty, like the rest of him. More than a mouthful, more than a pussy full. Something I’m equally terrified and excited for.

I whimper at this, feeling my body tightening toward orgasm. My whimper happens both inside and outside my own head. And again, I imagine he has a response to this. He lowers me closer to his thick, shiny head, saying, “Now that we’ve got all the juice out of you, I have some inside me that I need to give you.”

Hearing this, I feel my lips begin to fit over his plump and warm head, down his silky and taut shaft. In my head, it happens easily, and I only catch a bit on the veins and textures I imagine he has in droves.

I moan, feeling pressure building from how fast I’m moving my hands under the water, and from how much I imagine I’m being stretched by him, filled up by him, and I’m not even more than a third of the way down on him. Still, my savior guides gently. Slowly, but determinedly.

“You have to take the whole thing, now,” he says, pushing a few more inches of himself down into my throat. I whine, feeling my lips fattening, tightening over him, and everything getting tighter with every bit of him I take in. “You have to take all of it, otherwise neither of us will feel as good. And I want both of us to feel very good.”

I squirm in his grasp, but I don’t fight. I’m now feeling hot and sticky. Aglow, like I’ve shoved a Roman candle-turned-vibrator up my pussy.

“Just a bit more. A tiny bit more, and you’ll be all done. All full,” he says in my mind. These words only make me tighten and bear down on him more, even though I can feel my body rising up out of the tub, pushing against the sides, so I can get more fingers inside of myself, which I do easily. Now I can imagine him in my pussy, so I can feel how it is to be stuffed to the rafters by my savior.

He slips as much of his cock into my pussy as he can, and still I’ve got about three inches to go before being completely filled. He doesn’t seem to mind though. He begins to move me up and down on him, careful to leave those three inches untouched.

I moan loudly, unable to tell the difference between my fist and his imagined head pounding against my womb. My deep hurts and secret pains.

“Good girl, Juliet,” he says, bringing his big, bear -like hands up to my breasts and nipples as he slips in and out of me like a slow, steady piston. “You’re feeling better already, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” I say. And, like everything else in this fantasy, it’s echoed in both places. In my real world, and the one in my head. “Oh, yes,” I say, partially aware that I sound fussy. Like a baby. “So much better, and I want to feel even better!”

On my cheeks, I feel tears falling. My chest constricting under waves of pleasure and sorrow.

“Then you have to cum,” he says quietly. “You can’t hold it back anymore.”

And I do.

I cum violently. So violently, that my feet and arms actually kick and punch into various parts of the tub. The sides and floor. And I’m crying hard. Sobbing from how relieved I feel, and how much I still feel pent up inside me, stuffed into little crevices.

Part of my brain knows this exercise isn’t going to be enough. I’m going to need more than this little bit of self help if I want to get better. But I let myself cry a bit more.

Now that my nerve endings are sufficiently primed, I take advantage of it, playing with my clit a bit more while continuing to finger myself. I cum a couple more times before pulling my fingers out of my folds, whimpering with the feeling of being spent and limp, and hoping that the water has hid the sound of my tears and flailing from him.

It must have, since he didn’t come busting in, thinking he had to rescue me yet again—this time from drowning. Or from dying due to too much self-induced pleasure.

Still, as I feel the cold water slip around my arms and hands, I hope he’s gone to sleep already. I don’t want to try to explain any of what that was to him. I can barely understand it myself. The timing is not ideal. The situation is downright embarrassing were he to find out about it. And yet, I just couldn’t help myself. And I feel a lot better now that I got that out of my system.

I decide to get out of the tub now. I’m cold, and even though I hate to admit it, part of me is more than a little curious as to where my savior is— what he’s gotten up to while I’ve been in here.

As I wrap a towel around my bottom half, and don’t bother to do anything about the top, I think, his name was Brandon, wasn’t it? I shake my head, opening the door and turning off the light. I’m sure he told me. But, like a lot of things he told me, I don’t remember them.

I’m still tingly from my fantasy. Awake from my masturbation session, and all of the textures and sizes I ascribed to him. I blush, thinking about the giant cock I think he must have. One that almost rivals his arms in size. Seeing him resting on the couch as I walk back toward my room, part of me hopes he will look this way. That he will see me walking around as I am, naked from the waist up.

Just the thought of that warms me, sets my skin on fire. Almost makes me want to take the towel off completely, just in case he hears me walking and turns around to take a look.

I wonder if he’s really that big? That well-endowed? I tremble, enjoying the feeling of my exposed breasts. How big they are, even on my small frame. How plump and perky they would be if he just happened to move. If he would only turn this way, and open an eyelid.

No dice though. He seems to be fast asleep. He must have drifted off while waiting for me to finish up in the bathroom, trying to make sure I was okay in there. At least it’s a relief to know he probably didn’t hear me thrashing around and moaning while orgasming. So, I head back into my room and close the door.

As the darkness folds in around me again, I’m filled with two distinct desires: that I not have any more of those night terrors. And that maybe, just maybe, Brandon feels the same way about me. That he might have enjoyed my naked body had he seen. Just as much as I enjoyed the imagined naked body I gave him while in the bath.