Page 36 of Devour the Dark

“I know.”

Her arms come up over her chest as if she means to shrink in size, to hide in plain sight. She’s bearing her soul and cannot stand bearing her body at the same time.

“Do you remember what you told me? Why you took James’s hand?”

I don’t like talking about my single greatest regret.

“Yes,” I answer.

She waits, then huffs out, clearly expecting me to parrot the answer back to her. But I won’t.

“You said you cut off his hand because his hand touched what was yours.”

“You,” I supply.

“Yes.”

“What are you getting at, Your Majesty?”

“Did you ever have feelings for me? Or was it just a game? Was I just property to claim?”

So we’re going down that road.

“I could ask you the same. Back on Neverland, you leapt from my bed to the Captain’s with very little restraint. And in the end, you chose neither of us. So is it wrong of us to find solace in one another?”

She scowls up at me, her arms tighter over her chest. “Solace. You fight him at every turn.”

“Because I like it when he gets bratty. What are you getting at?” I repeat.

“I don’t know. I don’t want to be jealous. I want you to reassure me. I want you to tell me that I’m not just a bonus piece of candy, that I’m something more than a chess piece, a game to be won and?—”

I close the rest of the distance between us, hook my hands beneath her thighs and hoist her up into my arms, slamming her against the wall.

She lets out a startled little gasp, but I swallow it with my mouth, tasting her wholly and completely with my mouth, my tongue, my fucking soul.

If she wants to doubt my intentions, I will show her instead.

She moans into me, wiggling her center against my crotch.

The heat of her pussy is impossible to ignore.

“Tell me,” she says between gasps. “Promise me.”

“I am moved by very little, Wendy Darling.” I sink to her jawline, kissing down her neck. “I wouldn’t have crossed an ocean to find you if you were nothing more than a game.”

“Do you love us both?”

I nip at her ear and she hisses.

“I don’t know if I’m capable of love anymore.”

My brother’s advice replays in my head.

But I don’t want to think about love. Or contemplate the consequences of losing what is loved.

I just want to feel.

Pleasure and lust and temptation are close enough and I know pleasure like I know the sunlight. It’s familiar and warm and I don’t have to worry about it abandoning me. It’s always there.

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