When I wake, to my surprise Kane is beside me reading a book. I’m sure he knows that I’m awake, but he doesn’t look over.

I don’t know what to say and as the silence stretches, all I can hear is my heartbeat in my ears.

I doubt he's doing it on purpose, but it feels like a test to see which one of us will break the ice first.

"What are you reading?" It's not the question I want to ask, but it's the one I can manage.

"Damien." He closes the book and holds it up, the front cover out for me to see. It is a worn paperback that looks like the books you see in crates at garage sales; the ones that belonged to great grandparents, with card stock covers and bold, simplistic designs.

"It's in German," I say, a bit surprised.

"Yes. The English translation is not bad but," he pauses for a moment, his thumb brushing over the spine in a loving gesture, "I prefer this one."

I don't ask why as I look over the cover. The word ‘Damien’ is in bold across the top followed by a slew of words I cannot make out; the font and the age make it hard to read.

Along the bottom is a name, Hermann Hess.

"Oh, Hermann Hess! I read Siddhartha in school."

His lip quirks up. “His books all have a somewhat similar philosophy."

I nod though I'm not sure what he means. It’s true that I did read it in school, but I can’t remember a single thing about it. I sit up and look out the window on the opposite wall.

Outside light is filtering through the leaves and I can just make out the edge of the lake. I mutter, more to myself than him, "What am I supposed to do here?"

Despite having wanted to have sex and having thoroughly enjoyed it, in the light of a new day there’s nothing to keep the embarrassment and emptiness at bay.

"You need to learn to control that better."

My head snaps back and our eyes meet.

He clarifies, "Your scent. You're radiating your feelings."

"Says the man who tempted me into fucking last night,” I huff, incredulous. “You can’t seriously be lecturing me about keeping my feelings to myself when we are in this mess because of you broadcasting your horniess from here to Alaska,” I emphasize my point by throwing my arms wide. Then, realizing that I’m still totally naked, I cross my arms over my chest, my face heating up.

“And what exactly am I supposed to do about it anyway?" I snap, my temper still getting away from me.

But he doesn't react the way I expect him to. He doesn't take it as a challenge like all the other Shifters I have met would. Instead, he cocks his head to the side as if contemplating the question.

After a moment he answers, "You’re right. I made a promise to you and I did an awful job keeping it. All I can say is that it won't happen again.”

“I hardly think you can make me fall for that line a second time.”

“I can only do my best, Ama. Though I’ll admit it hasn’t been much. But, as for you - you'll have to train to hide your feelings, or suppress them at least."

He isn't smiling but his eyes are dancing. "It will give you something to do here," he says, repeating my earlier words back at me.

"Why should I trust you with anything, especially helping me?"

"It's not the first time," he replies, looking back at his book.

Was that a joke? I’m not sure what to make of this lighter side of Kane. “I don’t think fucking my brains out counts as helping,” I say slowly, eyeing him wearily.

He seems genuinely taken aback when he looks up again and blinks slowly before replying, “That was not what I was referring to, Ama.” His expression is endearing and it annoys me.

Grunting, I grab a shirt of his from off the floor and tug it on. It has the same woodsy smell as his sweatshirt that I’ve still got in my room, and I decide that I won’t be returning this to him either.

He doesn’t stop me as I hop along the wall to get my clothes and prosthetic from where we left them unceremoniously the night before.

When I’m back in the safety of my own room, I turn on the shower and hope that it drowns out the sound of my sobbing. I’m not completely sure why I am crying right now. I don’t particularly regret last night, though the ache between my legs and in my lower back is an unnecessary reminder.

I can’t entirely blame it on Kane’s emotions either. It’s not like I hadn’t thought about it before. But, that alone makes me angrier still. I keep getting swept up and losing sight of what I’m after and the shitstorm that landed me here.

I slide to the shower floor and tug my knees up to my chest. As I sit under the lukewarm spray, still wearing Kane’s shirt, I promise myself yet again not to let any of the Shifters or humans here sway me like this anymore.

I lean my head back against the cool tiles and let the water wash over my tear-stained face. “Maybe I should start meditating or something,” I mutter to the empty bathroom.

When I finally get out of the shower, after having turned into a human-sized prune, Kane is gone. He doesn’t come back for the rest of the day but doesn’t have anyone take his place in the house either.

As I sit alone on a chair looking out at the lake, I realize that I never did ask him why he left me with Haden in the first place. Perhaps he didn’t trust me to be here alone and has since changed his mind. If it’s only been changed because we fucked, then Kane is a much simpler and more naive man than I thought.

He doesn’t come home for dinner either, which is a surprise, and I am about to go to bed when an ear-piercing scream shatters the silence I’ve grown accustomed to.

For the first time in the months I’ve been living here, I run to the front door and yank it open. There’s a semi-circle gravel driveway and a dirt road that leads off into the night. The lawn surrounding the driveway is overgrown with weeds over a foot high. Standing in them are three men, all naked, with their backs to me.

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Someone screams again, and it’s clearly coming from the same direction as the group of men, but I can tell that it’s a woman’s voice. The whimper that follows makes me swallow hard and I steel myself for whatever’s about to come. I’m almost certain these men are Shifters and that they have a woman they are hurting.

I force myself to move, walking towards them, though I know there is absolutely nothing I can do against one Shifter, let alone three. The gravel crunches under my socks and I stumble when I step on a particular jagged piece of rock.

I curse as all three turn in unison. I immediately recognize Kane at the furthest to the right of the three but the other two I don’t know.

“Kane, what’s going on?” I ask, my voice trembling as I continue to approach.

He holds up a hand and I stop. Then he points to the house and sharply orders, “Go back inside, Ama.”

“No, not until you tell me what’s going on!” I shout back. If I leave now and she gets hurt or killed, I won’t be able to live with it. At this moment, I would rather die than turn away from another this unknown person suffering.

“Trust me, Ama. You don’t want any part in this.” Right as he speaks the hidden woman wails and I see the grass in front of him move.

“Trust you? Fuck’s sake, Kane! I heard her screaming from inside. You want me to, what? Go back, keep listening, but do nothing?” I’m equal parts livid and terrified but I hold onto that anger and let it keep me resolute.

I continue forward and as I step into the grass, a prone figure comes into view. There’s a woman lying on her side. She’s as naked as the rest of them with her hair obscuring most of her face. All along her body are scores of deep gashes…claw marks.

Bile rises up my throat and I fight back the urge to vomit. I press my knuckles to my lips and move closer; the only thing going through my head is how I need to help this woman.

Kane grabs my arm before I’ve taken another step and swings me away from her. I scrabble at his fingers as he hisses, “She’s dangerous, Ama.”

“What?” I dig my nails into him, leaving dark red moons in the flesh between his thumb and pointer finger. “More than you?”

“She was going to kill you.” His harsh words don’t register immediately, as I lean away and try to see around him.

I can see her again but now she’s on her back; she’s still breathing, though it’s quick and shallow. As I continue to stare, watching her chest rise and fall, his words finally sink in.

“Why?”

“This isn’t something we can discuss right now. Now go back inside, please.” He pushes me back towards the house. Right as he does, the woman suddenly shrieks and sits up. One of the men is on top of her immediately, slamming her back into the ground.

“Jesus,” my breath hitches as the woman’s hands come up and I see that her fingers are actually claws as they slice into the man’s shoulders.

He grunts but doesn’t release her. Kane looks away from me and growls, stalking over to them.

“Get off, Klien” he commands. As Klien shuffles back Kane replaces him with his hand on her throat. She claws at him, her nails digging into his forearm but he doesn’t even flinch. “Answer me, right now.”

She spits in his face and the other man circles around and grabs for her arms to pin her down.

“I said, back off,” Kane growls low and both men immediately take a few steps back, falling into a military-like 'at ease' position, which is so out of place considering they are all stark naked.

“Beta, just kill her. She isn’t going to tell us anything,” Klein voices after a moment’s silence.

“No, we’ve got to get more out of her,” the one whose shoulders are still bleeding snorts, “losing a few fingers might help.”

“God, Kane!” I can’t believe what I am hearing. I know that I am really tempting fate and it seems there’s no love lost between me and this woman, but how can I let them torture and kill her?

I don’t even know what I am pleading for, but I try again, “Kane, please. Don’t.”

He looks away from the woman struggling beneath him and meets my eyes. I hope I’m conveying just how important this is - that I can’t watch him do this.

His brow furrows as his mouth opens slightly and I want to sag under the relief that he might actually listen to me but I almost immediately regret saying anything at all.

She takes advantage of the distraction I have inadvertently caused and manages to get her knees up between her and Kane. She kicks him with all her might and Kane loses his grip on her neck.

Her movements blur as she gets to her feet and runs straight at me. Time seems to speed up as she disappears right as something splatters across my face.

She’s directly in front of me now. I stare straight ahead and look past her into the trees through the space where her head should be.

As her body begins to fall backward, I reach up with a shaking hand and wipe away whatever is on my face. I look down at my hand and see a streak of dark liquid across my fingertips. There’s not enough light to see the color, but I know it will be red.

I feel my knees go weak and a pair of arms are suddenly under me. One of Kane’s men scoops me up and flips me over his shoulder like I weigh nothing. I lay with my face against his naked back and can’t bring myself to care about the indignity of it.

There’s a buzzing that’s filling my head now, drowning out the conversation happening around me.

Somehow that woman was decapitated and I completely missed it. Someone took off her head right in front of me, and I couldn’t even see it happen.

They are so much stronger and faster than me. This isn’t the first time I’ve had this realization but every time I do, it hits me square in the chest like a truck.

I feel darkness invading the corners of my vision and think I might pass out when a voice booms from the darkness, “What the fuck is this?”

My head lolls to the side and I watch, almost upside down, as Alpha storms up to us. Behind him is another group of Shifters.

“Put her down,” he commands and the man holding me drops me like a sack of potatoes. I fall, not able to catch myself before my face slams into the gravel. Small stones bite into the skin on my face and hands before someone grabs the back of my shirt and I’m lifted up into the air and put on my feet.

I don’t have time to pull out the small bits of gravel now embedded in my palms as Alpha grabs my arm and begins to tow me toward the house.

“Clean this shit up. I’ll be back in a minute,” he calls over his shoulder at the growing group of Shifters; more and more are appearing from the shadows.

I look back just before we enter the house and see Kane looking down at something in his hand. I follow his gaze and see the woman’s head, swaying as it swings by its hair, tangled up in his grip.

As Alpha pulls me up the stairs I give up on fighting and let myself be dragged along. When we reach my room, he practically throws me onto the bed.

I catch myself and spin around only to find him right behind me. The muddled sounds in my head begin to roar and the horror of what I’ve just seen finally sets in.

I scream at the top of my lungs, “None of you have a fucking shred of humanity!” I feel the mania bubble up from deep inside and I begin to laugh, full belly laughs, that have me clutching at my sides. “Oh god, I get it now!” I say through tears, barely able to form the words around my giggling.

He looks down at me and his expression stays placid as he asks, “Would you rather she have killed you? Kane made a choice. A choice that prioritized you. I would have thought you’d like that, little one.”

I choke on my laughter and grow cold under the weight of his stare and the meaning behind his words. When I don’t speak, he smiles cooly, “That’s what I thought. You need to adjust your moral compass. Accept the world you now live in or each day will break you.”

The giggle returns as I look up at the ceiling. “You’ve already broken me,” speaking more to the world than to him. I am sure now that he should have killed me along with Nia.

“Don’t give me that much credit, little one,” he scoffs. I breathe in deeply and count to ten before looking back at him but he’s already got his eyes on the door.

“If I run, will you drag me back or just kill me?”

He responds, though he doesn’t bother to look my way again, “I wouldn’t kill you, but I doubt you’d make it far. And depending on who caught you, you might end up like Harper.”

“Who?”

“The corpse on the lawn, little one. Did you think she was a nameless Shifter? No, I know exactly who she is.” He shakes his head and walks away from me before I can ask him to tell me more.

I hear him go down the steps and then the front door closes.

I never get to have a complete conversation with him or Kane. They always say what they’ve got to say and then leave before I can even wrap my mind around any of it.

“Fuck,” I scream crouching over and clutching my stomach. “Fucking fuck!”