Fight, Flight, or Freeze: The Healer's Story
Chapter 141: Bathing In Diamonds

Chapter 141: Bathing In Diamonds

It wasn’t until the next day that Buddy showed up looking for me. I would have to admit that I expected him within hours of Rip coming home, but I think it was just another mind game...

A way to keep us off balance.

Joke’s on him. We were always kept off balance.

Rip had just finished clearing off the table from breakfast, and I was practicing walking back and forth from the kitchen table to the sink when the knock came, startling the both of us.

I shrugged and slowly made my way to the cage, crawling on my hands and feet simply because it was easier. Rip gently shut the door and twisted the lock until it looked engaged before rising to his feet and going over to the door.

"What do you want?" demanded Rip, blocking me from seeing who was outside. I didn’t particularly care who it was; I was just pissed off that because they were there, I was here.

"I was told yesterday that I needed to speak to you in order to make an appointment with the Healer," came the cultured voice on the other side. I raised an eyebrow. This must be the man who Rip was talking about yesterday.

The one that made even the Alpha uncomfortable.

"No," grunted Rip, not wasting time with any pleasantries... or extra words.

"No, you are not the one I have to see in order to make an appointment, or no, I don’t get one?" asked the stranger, and I could hear the laughter in his voice. And the disdain.

Those that didn’t respect Rip didn’t get jack shit from me, so he could die of old age on the porch of our cabin before I met with him.

Or he could learn some manners, apologize, and then maybe I would be willing to reconsider.

"The second one," answered Rip, leaning against the door jam, still acting as a solid wall between me and the other man.

"But why? You don’t even know what I am willing to offer in order to meet with your Healer," purred the man smoothly. There was something about his voice that made me tempted to call out, to tell him that I was willing to talk, but I bit my tongue instead.

"There is nothing you have that she would want," replied Rip. I absent mindedly nodded my head in agreement. I mean, there was a crap ton of things that I wanted... running water, a carrot cake, a toilet, my old body weight in chocolate... my freedom.

But there was no way that this guy could give me any of it without Alpha getting involved, and I wasn’t going to be the prey for the next hunt.

Nope. Living with Rip was the highlight of my current life, and I was becoming content with it.

"I could give her her freedom," shot back the man like he was reading my mind, but that was impossible, right?

"You really can’t," responded Rip. "Not without pissing off people that you don’t want to piss off."

There was a few minutes of silence, and I was desperate to know what was going on, but I kept my mouth shut.

The tension was so thick that I could feel it crawling over my skin, driving me insane. But I still wasn’t going to open my mouth, no matter what the little voice inside of my head said.

"I know she is here," said the stranger with a sigh. "And I am not going anywhere until I speak to her. The choice is yours, but I can be here, knocking on your door every ten minutes until I get what I want."

"You seem a bit desperate to see the healer; I assume things aren’t going well, health wise?" asked Rip, a slight purr of satisfaction in his voice.

"I am being polite right now," replied the man, not answering Rip’s question. "But you should be more careful. A man that has nothing to live for should always be a man to be feared."

Rip tilted his head back and burst out laughing. "I used to think that too, but I have since learned better. A man with nothing to live for is to be pitied, not feared. Now, a man who has found his treasure after decades of searching for it should be feared. He will do anything and everything to keep it, including coming back from the dead a few times."

"You’re a Reaver," grunted the man, sounding shocked. "How?"

Once again, silence encompassed the room as my ears strained to hear the conversation at the door.

"The h—"

"You might as well invite him inside," I said quickly before he could finish that sentence. I know what Rip was trying to do, but I wouldn’t put a target on either one of our backs by letting that man finish his sentence.

Rip grunted at my request but stood to the side so the stranger could come into my sanctuary.

"What do you want?" I asked, watching the short man looking around the room as if trying to find me. He was both older and younger than I expected. I had assumed that he was in his thirties, but he looked to be pushing closer to 50 than 40.

His black hair was littered with grey, and I could see the wrinkles around his eyes and mouth, but otherwise, there didn’t appear to be anything wrong with him. He was well muscled and carried himself with an ease and confidence that was rare to see in this camp. In fact, I couldn’t see any sign of sickness. So why was he looking for me?

Rip let out a snort of disdain as he walked over to my cage and ’unlocked’ the door. He gently pulled me out and picked me up in his arms. Carrying me over to the couch, he sat down and re-arranged me in his lap.

"What the fuck?" breathed the man, staring back and forth between me and the cage I was just in. "So it’s true?"

Rip simply raised his eyebrow and tightened his arms around me like he was scared that the man would dart forward and steal me away from him. "What is true?" I asked. Someone had to maintain some sort of conversation, or else this was going to go nowhere.

"That everyone other than Reavers and VIPs were kept in cages," answered the man, grabbing one of the kitchen chairs and bringing it over so he could sit down.

"The fighters get bigger cages, but yes, that particular rumor is correct," I responded with a nod.

"Do you know what a healer is worth in the outside world? You could be bathing in diamonds and jewels, and yet, you are content with sleeping in a cage like a bitch?" The man wanted to get a rise out of me, and if he had found me when I first arrived here, he would have succeeded.

Not so much anymore.