HE FURROWED HIS FOREHEAD. "You really want to know?"

Ah, hell yeah. "If it's not too hard for you."

"They were gutted and mutilated in our farmhouse while my brother and I were at the movies," he said with a shudder, eyes glossy. "Apparently, our neighbors were high on meth and wanted money."

"Shit. That sucks."

"My brother and I got a huge inheritance and decided to live our best lives. We wanted our parents to be proud of us," he said, nodding. "To do that, I promised to be happy and be what I always wanted." He shook his head. "I know it sounds stupid — to want to be perfect and be like the people we see in the media. In real life, they're just everyday people, but I was six and didn't really know any better," he said. "But I lost weight and changed my personality and did things so that people would like me. I wasn't being my true self, but I had friends, money and beauty, so that's all that mattered, right?"

"Were you happy?"

"At first, but it sucks pretending to be someone else. It takes a toll on you after awhile," he said, staring at me. "I feel like I can never just be me. And I've been pretending for so many years now that I don't even know how to be me." He laughed. "This sounds stupid, doesn't it? How do you not know how to be yourself?"

"It's not stupid at all," I said, turning away. Damn. He was just like me. Hiding away, constantly being something that he really wasn't. We had different motives for doing it but the same end game.

And his parents were murdered, just like mine.

Was this why we had the matching chess pieces? Because we had similar backgrounds and hang ups? I did have to admit though that it did give me comfort to know what I wasn't the only one struggling with something like this. I wouldn't tell him that though. Not now.

"It feels stupid," he said, sniffling, eyes averted.

I snuggled closer to him, placing my head on his shoulder before grabbing his hand. My filthy fingers traced lines in the palm of his bloody hand. "It's not. My godfather used to tell me that people will do the strangest things to survive. Other people might not understand why we do those things, but we do and that's all that matters," I said, peering up at him.

He looked down at me, eyes never leaving my face. "I guess that's true," he said.

"Your parents were murdered, and you did what made sense to you because it helped you cope with their deaths, right?"

His bright blue eyes turned cloudy, tears forming in the corners. "Yeah," he stammered, voice soft like cotton candy.

"So don't beat yourself up about it, okay? You wanted to live your best life, right? It's not too late." It might be since we could die at any minute, but he didn't need to hear that right now.

The tears crumbling at the surface of his eyes tumbled down, sliding down his cheeks. "Thank you for saying that."

My thumb wiped away a rolling tear. "No problem. That's what allies are for, right?" I went to move my hand from his cheek, but he stopped me with his hand, holding it in place as his eyes stayed trained on me.

We just looked into each other's eyes, faces only inches apart. A connection formed, but it was broken by the sound of footsteps.

"You bitch," Gmie screamed from down the hall, looking fresh and clean. No filth whatsoever, but deep bruises colored her eyes, cheeks, and lip. "Look what you did to my face. My beautiful fucking face."

"Ah, I just made it more beautiful, darling," I said before giggling. "Those purple and black bruises are really in right now in Paris. I read it in Vogue."

Her eyes became huge balloons as she pursed her lips, fist clenched. "You tacky ass—" She started to charge at me, but Demo pulled her back by her shirt.

"We'll get her later, Gem. Right now, we need to ice your face," Demo said, pulling her back down the hall.

Sebastian chuckled next to me, eyes still zeroed in on my face. "You never cease to amaze me."

"Yeah, I'm that bitch so...." I shrugged, pulling away so that I could pull my knees to my chest and look at Tiran's room again.

He straightened up and coughed. "Umm, I'm sorry about the spider — Layla thing," he said, changing the subject. "I shouldn't have tried to tell you what to do."

"No. You shouldn't have."

"But I was scared for you," he said, looking down at me. "I didn't want you to die... but it wasn't my place to force you to do anything. I'm really sorry."

"Wow. You even give perfect apologies," I said, and we laughed.

"So, tell me about you?" he asked once we stopped laughing.

"Umm wouldn't you rather go wash that shit out of your hair?" I said, moving my arms, feeling maggots shift in my bra.

"Nah, I can deal," he said before smiling. "This is more important."

"Wow, a guy just chose me over washing shit and sperm out of his hair. That's a big step there, buddy."

He laughed, white teeth gleaming against his dirt-covered face. "Don't forget the maggots and bugs and a wolf scratch."

"What? You got the wolf pit?"

Rolling up his sleeve, he pushed his arm at me. Glistening claw marks scarred his skin, crimson dripping from the edges.

"Fuck that must hurt. You need to get that disinfected asap. Do you have medical supplies?"

"No."

I jumped to my feet, feeling my pain return full force, but I ignored it, grabbing his hand to pull him to his feet. "Come on, let's go see Khan."

"Khan?" he asked, confused.

"He has some medical supplies in his room," I said, pulling him down the hall. His fingers grasped mine tightly, his palm feeling warm against mine.

It took us only a minute to get to Khan's room. My knuckles banged against the door twice. He answered a couple of minutes later.

When the door opened, Khan stood there, bare-chested again with his silk pajama pants riding low on his hips. He had an arm around Duke who was lying against his chest, yawning.

"God, I envy him," I said, looking at Duke.

Both of the guys' eyes zeroed in on me, and I was confused by the looks on their faces until I realized what I just said.

"No. No. No. No. I meant that I e-envy him because he didn't have to go through all that shit that w-we did tonight," I said, stumbling over my words, cheeks warming. "Not because he's cuddled up on Khan's chest."

Shit. Why did I say that last part?

"Umm yeah.... Sebastian got scratched by one of the wolves tonight, do you think you could patch him up?" I asked, trying to bring everyone's attention back to the main point.

Khan's deep brown eyes traveled over to Sebastian for a second, face blank. "Yeah. Sure." He backpedaled into his room, letting us in before closing the door behind us.

Sebastian glanced around the room, eyes wide. "Wow, this room is incredible."

Dropping Duke on the floor, Khan walked over to the dresser. "It's alright."

Duke bounded toward me, yelping and barking. I picked him up but held him at arm's length. "You do not want to lick me right now."

Duke whined, clearly disagreeing with me.

"Do you want to take another shower?" Khan asked, grabbing the med-kit.

"Another?" Sebastian asked, looking from Khan to me.

"Khan helped me earlier—when Gmie and Demo were trying to kill me," I said. "He patched me up, and I took a shower here."

"We had tea too," Khan said, placing the med-kit near the recliner in the corner. He then went back to his dresser and threw me a towel, a shirt, and new boxers again. "I'll patch him up and when you get out, I'll clean yours again too."

"Thanks," I said, eyeing Sebastian who was giving Khan a funny look. Slowly backtracking into the bathroom, my eyes stared at the two males who just kept looking at each other. The last thing I heard before closing the bathroom door behind me was, "This is gonna hurt."

Dropping the clean clothing onto the toilet, I started to undress, feeling disgusting. My shirt stuck to my body like I just got out of the pool, making it hard to get off. Unhooking my bra caused dead and alive spiders, bugs, ants and maggots to rain down onto the floor. Same with my panties.

Putting the water on extra hot, I scrubbed and lathered my entire body in soap, trying to erase the entire night off my skin. Certain parts of my skin blazed under the soap, signaling that I got new cuts. Great.

The hot water did relieve some of the stiffness and agony in my muscles, so that was a relief. Showers were truly miracle workers sometimes.

Even though the bugs were gone, it felt like they were still there, crawling and nibbling. I shuddered under the nozzle, washing everything off. Peering into the mirror, I looked clean but still felt dirty. Guess there was some dirt that you couldn't just wash off.

When I made it back into the room, a heavy tension masked the atmosphere. It made my nose tingle. Looking around, I spotted the boys. Both of them were still in the corner, staring into each other's eyes. Duke lounged in the middle of them, watching them both with confusion in his eyes.

What was going on?

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