Page 254 of Psycho Beasts

“So we both agree that was cringy and embarrassing?”

“Oh, shut it,” I groaned at Aran as I collapsed onto my knees in front of her. “No, it was sweet,” I mumbled under my breath defensively.

“So how are we going to do this?” Aran asked, changing the subject with a weak chuckle, her face a bloodstained mess.

Her gore covered my skin.

“The only way we can,” I said with conviction, then awkwardly shoved her body over the lip of the tub into the shower.

Immediately, I collapsed beside her.

We lay together under the hot spray, fully clothed, unable to move, limbs tangled, as I handed her a bar of soap and we both scrubbed weakly at our skin.

The water ran red around us.

“I think we’re cursed,” I said through gritted teeth as I picked shards of glass out of my skin, the water stinging unbearably.

Aran haphazardly rubbed soap across the holes still dotting her flesh.

Bloody limbs entangled in the tub. It was a morbid scene.

“You know, they banned guns in the fae realm because enchanted bullets don’t just kill shifters.”

Aran paused.

“They also kill fae.”

Droplets slammed against the tub and hammered our sensitive flesh.

Aran turned her head and pulled her hair back to expose her neck and ears. “My hair wasn’t the only thing that changed when I took off my mother’s toe ring.”

It took me a second to process what she was showing me.

Then it hit me. “Well, fuck.”

Aran slumped against me, and I patted her head as we lay dejectedly under the warm spray.

Thinking about how everything was messed up, thinking about how nothing was what it seemed.

Because Arabella Alis Egan, fae princess, rightful ruler of the fae realm, heir to the seat of death, daughter of the fae queen, wanted fae monarch, didn’t have fae ears.

Aran wasn’t fae.

Chapter 44

Sadie

THE BALL

The don sent a limo.

Lights flashed, reporters yelled questions about our trials, and betas screamed and reached out as we walked down a gold silk carpet that spanned three city blocks.

The entire financial district was blocked off for the celebration.

To the casual onlookers, we were glamorous starlets walking into a large domed glass structure.

An ultraexclusive event held by the don every equinox.

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