My entire body hurt.
I kept retreating to my safe place, peeking out long enough to make sure things were still OK.
But OK still felt really awful.
I didn’t even know the extent of my injuries, just that I had many, and it hurt to even breathe. The knife Adam had used had torn me up, and I was scared to even know just how much.
Which was why I stayed in the dark corner of my mind, humming my and Seth’s song, hoping that this was all just a bad dream I’d wake from.
Something ugly lurked on the edges of my mind, beckoning me closer, though. I wasn’t alone in my safe place. I knew this. It scared me, so I tucked myself deeper into the darkness, hoping I could make sense of everything soon. I’d felt this darkness before, but it had never been so pronounced. So. . . alive.
“She’s been like this all day,” Stitches murmured, his warm hand in mine as I stared up at the ceiling in Church’s room. He’d brought me here after the doctor released me. I’d been here a long time it seemed. I didn’t have an accurate count of time. It was all the same to me. Could have been a week or a month. I just didn’t know, nor did I care. The only thing I wanted was the nightmare to go away.
“She’s humming more than usual.” Ashes commented. My pyro. “That’s good, right?”
“She hummed when she was in the med ward last time,” Church muttered. “Look how that went down.”
“You said she asked for Claws. Maybe we should get her. We can’t keep pushing her away. She’s nuts and will fucking set the house on fire just to smoke us out,” Stitches said. “Or Seth. Get Asylum. You always tell him no when he comes to check on her.”
“Mirage,” I whispered.
There was a scurry of activity as the guys gathered closer to me.
“What’s that, baby? What did you say?” Ashes pleaded, cradling my face. “Come on, heaven. Just talk to us.”
I said nothing, my heart hurting. I needed to see Mirage. And if I couldn’t see him, I needed Asylum.
“Asylum,” I murmured.
“OK. Fine.” Church placed a warm kiss on my forehead with so much fierceness it made my heart jump. “Malachi, get Seth.”
There was a scraping of a chair and then the sound of Stitches’s heavy footsteps leaving the room.
“He brought her back before,” Ashes commented, squeezing my hand.
“At what cost?” Church let out a sigh. “They grew closer after.”
“Well, I mean, it’s worth it, right?”
“Is it? What if he’s right about all of this shit? That he gets her in the end?” Church asked, his voice soft.
Get me in the end? I’m not leaving you. I’m not. God, why can’t I just scream it for them to hear? Why was I so messed up?
I love you all so much.
“She loves us. I know she does.” Ashes kissed the top of my hand. “I’m not worried. Much.”
Church snorted.
I closed my eyes, desperate for a little escape.
The curious tendrils of the monster lurking on the edges of my safe place raised its head and smiled.
Sleep couldn’t come soon enough.
The room felt heavy. I opened my eyes and peered blearily through it, my body aching so much I wanted to scream. My gaze landed on him a moment later.
I let out a soft whimper.
He sat forward in his seat, his blue eyes fixed on me.
“Firefly,” he whispered, cocking his head to the left.
I said nothing as I stared at him. Slowly, he rose from his seat and moved to tower over me. I sank a little deeper into the bed when he reached out and ran his thumb along my busted bottom lip. It was still swollen and stitched up. Eating and drinking were too much of a chore, so I hadn’t been doing much of it.
“He hurt you,” he murmured, his voice trembling. “He will pay, firefly. Do you want to help me make him pay? Do you want to be stronger and take him out? To slay? To kill? To maim? Your revenge to claim?”
I stared up at him, my heart in my throat, not understanding what he was saying to me and sad he wasn’t Mirage.
He leaned down and ran his lips along my jaw. When he got to my ear, he stopped and whispered.
“I’m telling you, we will let you kill him. We will find him for you and let you kill him, firefly. All for you, my forever girl. A gift. Do you accept? You and the monster in your head?” He didn’t move away from me.
I lay beneath his warmth, so many thoughts racing through my head until one stuck. That creeping darkness on the edge of my psyche became clearer, the intent much darker than I could have ever imagined. My monster. The heat from his body flowed into mine, opening my eyes to a world of potential. All the hurt. The fear. The pain. The unknown.
“You choose,” Asylum whispered into my ear. “Tell me.”
I let out a shaky breath, that decision going from a little flicker to a bright, burning flame of want as I embraced the monster inside me who wanted to come out to play.
“Yes,” I rasped.
“Yes, what, my forever girl?”
“I-I w-want revenge.”
“How do you want it?” His lips brushed against my ear, his warm breath sending goosebumps scattering across my skin, making me shiver. Not with fear. With desire.
So much desire.
“I want to kill him.” I exhaled, sealing his fate.
Asylum shifted and brushed his lips gently against my busted ones, taking care to not put pressure against them in the most gentle kiss I’d ever gotten before.
When he pulled away, his blue eyes sparkled with all the wickedness in the world.
“So be it. It shall be done.”
His words should have terrified me, but instead, they doused the flame burning inside me in gasoline, igniting some dark part of my soul I didn’t know I had.
He let out a soft chuckle. “That dark part you feel in your soul, firefly? The one you’ve just illuminated? That’s where we live. Welcome home, my little firefly. No more hiding. It’s time to come out and play.”
I liked the sound of that.
