“You’re pretty,” Drake countered.
Remi gave Drake his middle finger, then hurried to the door like he feared Drake might follow.
When he was gone, Dove threw a pillow at him. “What is wrong with you?”
Drake snickered. “What? He likes it.”
“He likes you pretending you’re into him so he can do your homework? What is this, eighth grade?” Dove asked.
“He likes my attention. My time is valuable. I give him my undivided attention and he gives me free time to pursue other things.”
Dove snorted. “Other people, you mean?”
Drake shrugged. “He’s got a little crush. You know how neurotypicals are. He’ll get over it eventually when he realizes I’m a monster, and he’ll be better for it because he won’t let his other charges do to him what I’m doing now. I’m a life lesson.”
Gift shook his head. “You’re a cautionary tale.”
Drake grinned. “At least I’m not a twenty-one-year-old virgin.”
“Better a virgin than a man-whore,” Payton countered.
“Hey, whose side are you on, anyway?” Drake said, feigning hurt feelings. “You can’t let the feelings faction get to you.”
That was what their instructors called the handlers behind their backs. The feelings faction. It wasn’t an insult. If anything, the program went out of their way to distinguish the students by anything but what they were. They used words like neurodivergent. Neurotypical. Handler. Asset. Psychopath. Sociopath.Feelings faction.Anything to avoid saying what truly divided the handlers from the assets: those who felt remorse and those who didn’t.
“If the instructors find out you’re using Remi as your personal slave in exchange for that bizarre eye fucking thing you were just doing, they’ll kick you out of the program,” Dove warned.
“How will they know?” Drake asked. “Besides, I’d fuck him with more than my eyes if I knew he wouldn’t fall in love with me.”
“You really are a monster,” Dove said, but with no real heat to her words.
“We all are,” Drake countered. “That’s why we’re here.” He looked at Gift. “Well, not you, cupcake. You’re here as Payton’s pet human.”
Payton launched himself onto Gift’s bed, wrapping his arms and legs around him. “Don’t listen to him, cupcake. You’re not my pet human. You’re my baby. My cute, puffy-cheeked body pillow. I just like to squish you.”
“He’smybaby, actually,” Dove countered, trying to wrestle Gift free of Payton’s hold. “Come to Mama,” she teased.
For all of Dove’s and Payton’s manhandling and attention, they were still, at their core, psychopaths. They lacked guilt, empathy, remorse. But their care felt real. It felt sincere. And Gift was starved for affection. He was okay with being their school project if it meant he got to pretend someone loved him. Maybe that was how Remi felt, too? Any affection was better than none at all.
Park suddenly popped into his head. What would Park’s affection look like? What would it feel like to have him look at Gift as something other than a burden? To have him give him that heated look like he’d done just minutes ago but…mean it? To have him touch him and tease him and play with him in a way that had nothing to do with familial obligation and everything to do with pleasure?
Gift would do almost anything to find out. Could he seduce Park? The thought of just kissing him made him flush from head to toe, but it also stirred something low in his belly and made him half hard just thinking about it. And he couldn’t afford to think about it while Dove and Payton still fought over him.
Instead, he just closed his eyes and concentrated on the warmth of their embrace, not wanting to think too hard about how two psychopaths had become the closest thing he had to a real family.
It was only hours later when he, Payton, and Drake were lying in their beds, shrouded in darkness, that Payton said, “You awake, G?”
“Yeah,” Gift said, staring up at the ceiling.
“If you want Park, I can help you get him.”
The abruptness of the statement stole the air from Gift’s lungs. Did he want Park? Of course, he did. Was he willing to try, even if he knew he would most likely fail? Failure meant losing everything.
“How?” Gift managed, choking on a dozen emotions suddenly flooding his system. “How are you going to help me get Park?”
“I emotionally manipulate more people before seven a.m. than most people do all day,” he teased.
It was true. Nobody said no to Payton. Not even the teachers. Well, one teacher. The main teacher. The headmaster, technically. Boone. And Payton was working on breaking Boone down more and more every day. If anybody could teach Gift to get under Park’s skin, it was Payton.
