Page 63 of Losing Wendy

Frustration rims Freckles’s brow as he struggles for the wordsand fails. “Too friendly, too likable to be real, I guess. I dunno—that doesn’t make any sense, I know. Forget I said anything.”

I offer him a gentle smile. “Just maybe don’t mention that around Victor,” I say. “He and Thomas must have been close.”

“Close?” says Freckles, snorting. “Victor practically worshipped Thomas. But I suppose I can’t blame him.”

“Why not?” I ask.

Freckles scratches the back of his neck, actually looking sympathetic. “Because they were brothers.”

CHAPTER 25

Dark, wet sand pounds against the bottoms of my feet, slugging through my toes as I run.

It’s not quite climbing. I don’t get the same high that I do from scaling a tower or edifice, but since I fear that climbing the cliffs will end in another encounter with a nightstalker, running it is.

It’s not as satisfying as I’d like for it to be. The sand on the beach is packed in from the tide last night, but it’s still soft enough against my feet that every step feels as if I’m expending way too much effort for how far I’ve traversed.

Still, it’s better than nothing.

It’s better than the tightness in my chest. The exertion, the gasping for breath, unravels the cord wound around my ribcage. At least when I’m running, I have an excuse for why my heart pounds, unlike when I lie awake at night, my pulse accelerating wildly despite being sedentary.

It’s not climbing, but it makes the images of my parents’ deaths not seem so vivid. It leaches the crimson from their bloodstains, douses their gargling underneath the lapping of the waves. It takes the touch of Peter’s hand against my skin, the way it lights me onfire, and allows me to blame the sensation on the burn of my body gasping for air, my muscles tearing and rebuilding themselves.

Mostly, it just makes everything go quiet.

Over the horizon peeks the sun, coming up from the nighttime bath in the salty water, reinvigorated and ready to start anew.

The waves are frigid when they bounce against my feet, but there’s a part of me that wonders if that would help, too. Submerging my aching body in the freezing waves. Allowing them to chill the rot threatening to decay my muscles. Do to my throbbing heart what a physician might do to a wound before it’s amputated.

These are the kinds of things I get to thinking about when I’m alone.

“Have you ever justlain?”

I hear the voice just in time to go crashing into a set of firm arms, to feel the weight of a sturdy chest. I know who it is before looking up, recognize the scent of amber and shadows, the casual amusement in his voice.

I stop, staring up at Peter’s beautiful face, lit in orange from the rising sun as he smirks down at me. His hands coax my shoulders, though as soon as his eyes land on my Mating Mark, it’s like he remembers I belong to someone else. He drops his arms, stepping back and placing space to breathe between us.

My pulse races, my head spinning. I tell myself it’s from halting mid-run.

“Excuse me?” I ask.

“Have you ever just lain? Out on the beach, maybe? Or even in bed until the sun was already high in the sky?”

The answer is yes. The answer is that I’ve lain in bed with the covers pulled over my head, praying for just a few more moments before I had to rise, foolishly pretending my blankets into a set of armor, ready to protect me from the assaulting demands of the coming day.

“It’s too cold to lay out on the beach,” is what I say instead.

“I’d keep you company,” says Peter, his voice tinged with teasing.He flexes his wings. “Laying in these makes for great protection against the wind. Then there’s the body heat…”

“I thought you were staying away from me.”

Peter cocks his head. “Somehow, I don’t remember saying that.”

“You didn’t have to.”

It’s true. Peter’s been avoiding me since the moment we shared in the Den, the memory of which still lingers, tingling my skin where he traced the blotches on my arm.

“Where would be the fun in staying away from you?” he asks, still avoiding my question. It drives me insane the way he does that. “Though it seems you’re inviting adventure by running out here by yourself. I seem to recall a golden-haired faerie about who’s thirsty for your blood.”

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