She knew what he was asking. He’d not hurt her physically in the shower, he knew that too. It was another kind of hurt he wanted to know about, another kind of hurt which frankly, she hadn’t even considered in the light of the information that had flooded her.
So, she thought about it as he waited for her answer. She thought about how she’d felt when he’d seen her naked, how she’d felt when she’d pulled him closer, how she’d felt when he’d asserted the intensity that was as much a part of him as that limb holding her.
How had she felt? He’d been surprisingl
y possessive and unsurprisingly angry. In the light of the day, she could understand why. Not to say she agreed with a lot of shit that he’d said, but she could understand the anger. She felt for that pain.
But was she hurt?
She was thicker than that.
“No,” she told him quietly.
He waited a beat, blinking once before pulling back, dropping his hand and stepping towards the stairs without another word.
Morana looked at his retreating back, the beast in her chest clawing tighter and tighter until she thought it would choke her, and before she could even think about it, the words left her mouth.
“I know about your sister.”
Morana watched as he ground to a stop suddenly. He stilled, his arm on the railing, the muscles on his scarred back bunching, one lone muscle by one as he completely coiled his body, the action of his naked skin visible to her eyes. Her words were louder than bullets fired between them, confirming his worst suspicions and revealing her hand.
She didn’t know if she should have told him or not. She hadn’t even thought before speaking.
God, she was tired of thinking, of trying to decode every damn thing.
She swallowed, her bravado making her slowly get to her feet, her need to know, to finally know if that was why he hated her so acute it tightened every air cavity in her chest to the point of pain.
Because if he hated her for being alive when his sister most likely wasn’t, she really didn’t see any way forward for them. And looking at his back, at the multitude of scars littering his flesh like a lover’s kisses, after witnessing that moment of utter pain and agony bleeding from him not hours earlier, she wanted a way forward.
She clenched her shaking hands into fists.
“I know she was taken and never came back.”
He didn’t move.
Didn’t even breathe.
His back remained completely motionless.
Her heart clenched for him, for the pain he must have felt, still evidently felt. She remembered the softness with which he’d spoken of his sister.
Biting her lip, she took a step closer to him. “I know I was taken too.”
Another step.
“But I came back.”
Stillness.
“And she didn’t.”
Such stillness.
The air heavy between them, like it had been chafed too much, rubbed raw and had swollen in pain.
Morana closed the distance between them on shaky legs, until she stood beside him, and looked up into his face, placing a hand on his scruffy chin like he’d held hers just moments ago. He turned his face towards her, a clean slate wiped of all expression, his eyes vacant, dead, just looking out at her.
“That’s what you hate me for, don’t you?” she whispered in the air between them, her voice wavering slightly. “Because I was found and she wasn’t?”