"What's wrong?" Liam inquired as he placed his bags by the dresser.
"I think Kathleen is planning something with Mike."
He looked up at her as he opened a bag and pulled out a sweater. "That bothers you?"
"Yes. I don't want him to hurt her."
"They're both adults."
"That's not what I meant." Sera put her bags down and walked over to the small window. "How do you survive?" she asked. She hadn't asked yesterday because her mind hadn't actually thought of the question, but it did now and she needed to know.
"Sera..."
She folded her arms over her chest as she turned back to him. "You said no more secrets, no more lies."
He ran a hand through his hair as he studied her. "I know what I said, and I meant it, but there are some things that are better left unexplained."
"I want to know," she whispered.
He leaned a hip casually against the dresser. "You won't like it."
"I don't care. I need to know."
"Fine," he relented. "It's easy enough to be able to survive in a frat house. Plenty of drunken girls, parties almost every night of the week. At first it feels like an annoying hickey, and then that goes away."
Sera blinked as she thought over his words. The thought of it disturbed her. How many girls had he done that too? She hated to think about it. She bit into her lip as another thought occurred to her, a more hurtful thought. He had never done it to her. Suddenly she felt as if there was something wrong with her, that there was something about her he didn't want.
She turned her mind from those thoughts, and focused her attention back on him. "Did you sleep with them all?" she whispered.
"Sera come on," he groaned.
"Did you?" she asked.
His eyes flashed angrily as he clenched his jaw. "Most, but not all."
Sera closed her eyes as pain clenched around her heart. Why had she even brought any of this up? All it did was upset her, and yet she couldn't stop herself from asking, from knowing. "How often," she had to stop and swallow heavily before finishing her question. "How often do you have to... to ah do this?"
"At least four times a week, preferably every day. Are you happy now?"
No, she wasn't happy. The thought of it turned her stomach in ways that she hadn't thought possible. That was a lot of girls. A lot more than she ever wanted to think about. "How did all of you become like this?"
He blinked at her, obviously thrown off by her change in topic, and from the look on his face, more than a little relieved. He pulled out another sweater, opened a drawer, and dropped it in. "I've known Mike, Doug, Jack, and David since we were kids. We went to school together, lived near each other, and joined all the same teams in high school. We were never apart. During our senior year, I met this girl at a party. She was beautiful, and vibrant, and she could have had anyone she wanted. For some reason, she wanted me.
"I saw her at a few more parties after that, and then she vanished. Last year, I ran into her again. She was at a frat party at my house in Buffalo. At first I was amazed that she even remembered me. It wasn't until later that I realized she had been looking for me."
He broke off as he bent and grabbed another sweater. "Why?" Sera prompted.
Liam shook his head. "Honestly, I don't know. For some reason she fancied herself in love with me. She had kept tabs on me over the years and had always known where I was. She came back for me last year because she thought that I was finally mature enough to be changed. Of course, I didn't know that at the time.
"I left with her that night. However, unlike the last time, she didn't just feed off me and leave. She changed me. She was lonely, and she wanted someone to spend the rest of her life with."
"And you didn't want to be that person?"
Liam ran a hand through his hair. "No, I didn't. I didn't know her, or what she was. When I found out what she did to me, I freaked out. Needless to say, I took it about as well as you did. The last thing I wanted was to ever see her again, let alone spend eternity with her."
Liam grew silent as he seemed to drift off to another place. It appeared he forgot that she was even there as he relived his own, tortured memories. "What about the others?" she prompted.
Liam's gaze remained briefly unfocused before settling on her again. "The others are my fault," he mumbled bitterly.
