Page 21 of Lust

“Butyoujust did,” Seth snaps. “See? Plenty of ways of getting the truth out of you, even without my goddamn powers.”

“We didn’t fuck,” Brad clarifies.

“I don’t give a shit.” Seth moves quickly, snatching me by my jacket and shoving me against the corner by the stairwell entry. “Listen to me, you piece of shit.”

“Seth!” Brad shouts.

But Seth disregards it and goes on, “You ever attack Cody again like that, you so much as give him a nasty look, and I won’t need any powers because I will tear your navel through your goddamn skull. Do you hear me?”

Even in the dim lighting, I can see how red his face has turned and the tears in his eyes. Despite how he’s treating me, there’s something nice about seeing how much he cares about his friend. I’ve never had a friend willing to defend me like this. And as much of an ass as he’s been to me, it’s something I can respect.

But my appreciation of his loyalty doesn’t distract me for long. “Cody attackedme,” I say. “Like I told Brad, I was trying to clear my head of that shit he was dredging up. I didn’t mean to hurt him.”

He studies my expression. “If you’re telling the truth, that’s fucking worse.” As I twist my face up, he says, “Which sounds worse to you: a psychopath who has his finger on a trigger to a bomb, or someone running around with a bomb, totally unaware of what they have in their hands?”

“Neither sounds like a great option.”

“I’m struggling with the same thing.” He gets right in my face. “If you come for someone, you come for me. Or I will end you. Are we understood?”

Brad grabs his shoulder and pulls him back, though Seth keeps his hands firmly on my jacket.

“Seth, get your goddamn hands off him.” The way Brad says it takes Seth by surprise, and even Brad flinches, like he wasn’t expecting those words to come out so severely. Theyalmost sounded like he’s trying to protect me from Seth, but that can’t be right. Not when he had a knife to my neck last night. Although, he said he was just trying to scare me, and after everything that’s happened, I’m tempted to believe him.

Seth sneers at his friend. “You gonna tell me why you just said that, or should I urge you to tell me?”

“Seth, don’t you fucking dare.”

“I know it’s hard with what’s going on, but try not to think with your dick.” Seth gives me a shove, and Brad tenses up like he’s having to keep from going at his friend.

Given what just happened, maybe I shouldn’t press, but considering how pissed Seth is, I’m too curious not to ask. “So how is he?”

Seth turns away from me. “Only time he stops crying is to sleep. One of us has to be there to make sure he eats. Cody’s been down from using his powers before, but this is worse than normal.”

“But he’ll be okay?” I press, and Brad and Seth exchange a glance.

It reminds me of my conversation with Brad, who, despite his assumptions about me, obviously didn’t have the answers for what’s going on. But they have to know more than me, so I start asking the questions nagging at me since my chat with Brad. “You said you’ve had these powers since freshman year…”

“Yeah,” Brad says. “Seth, me, and Cody would come out here to hang out—”

“Remember when we said the less we tell him, the better?” Seth snaps.

“So something in this old church is how you found out about your powers?” I persist, and Brad nods, which earns a groan from Seth.

“That’s all you need to know about why we can do that,” Brad says. “That better?”

Seth rolls his eyes.

“Nowyou,” Brad says. “When was your first experience feeling like you could do something that you shouldn’t have been able to do?”

“That thing with Cody.”

“Bullshit,” Seth says. “I know you did something when I pushed that suggestion on you and you resisted me.”

Pushed? So that’s what they call what he does.

“That first time,” I say, “if I did something, I didn’t know it. And I haven’t done anything since I’ve been in here.”

“I told you: he thought you hypnotized him,” Brad explains.

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