Page 37 of Caging Darling

“I was just wondering how,” he says, almost wistful.

I somehow manage to summon the energy to tilt my neck to the side in question.

“How you never managed to break the curse,” he explains.

Lead hardens in my gut. I laugh softly. “Well, that’s easy. No one wanted me.”

Something about what I said makes Peter wince. “But how, Wendy Darling, is that possible?”

The lead in my gut begins to melt.

It’s a silly thought, the idea that Peter can’t see the truth. “No one wants a girl mated to another man.”

Peter lets out a laugh that almost sounds desperate. “I do. Wendy Darling, I’m afraid I’d want you if you were mated to every man in the world but myself.”

My smile is softer than I mean it. For once, I feel pity for Peter. “That’s the Mating Mark’s fault, I’m afraid. You wouldn’t feel it so strongly if it weren’t for that.”

I know that for a fact now. The Mating Mark has been the only thing ever to make a man think I’m worth keeping. Ironic, since it’s the same thing that kept them all away all these years.

Peter shakes his head, still staring at me intently. His blue eyes are glazed over, not with a greedy hunger that I’m used to seeing from him when he wants me, but a quiet desperation. A feeling of already having played the rest of his hand and this being his last card.

“I want you so badly. It’s as if I’ve been three days without water every day for the past year.”

I swallow, uncomfortable, though I can’t quite place why. “Again, that’s the Mating Mark.” I’m so tired, I just want to crawl into bed.

But Peter shakes his head, knitting his brow. “No, Wendy Darling. I don’t think it is.”

“What do you mean?”

“I…” Peter frowns, closes his mouth, like he’s working himself up to admit something he’s never told anyone. “I researched it. After Astor transferred the Mark over to me. I could feel myself going crazy, being apart from you. Especially knowing that he still had a fragment of the Mark. Still had some claim over you.”

My stomach goes hollow at the mention of the claim I severed.

“I grew jealous, hated him for no reason. Wendy Darling, it didn’t seem possible that anyone would give you away. I couldn’t fathom it. I just knew Astor had tricked me somehow. That he was planning on taking you away from me at some point. That there was some other reason he transferred the Mark over besides his relationship with Iaso. I just couldn’t imagine what that would be.”

“He loved her. More than he could ever love me. It’s not any more complicated than that.”

Peter runs his hand through his hair. “I can see that now.”

It’s wild how much that stings—hearing him confirm a truth I already knew.

“But don’t you see?” He scoots to the edge of the bed now, letting his feet hit the floor while he sits upright. “It affected me—being Mated to you—more than it ever did him.”

My heart stops inside my chest. “Didn’t stop you from trading me away on the beach.”

Peter shakes his head. “The Sister’s curse made the pull of the Mating Mark easier to set aside. As much as I felt a tug toward you, it was more of a deep pressure and less of a cut. But when Iaso broke the curse, it’s like that scar spewed open again. What I’ve never been able to understand…” Peter says, looking up at me again. His eyes really are beautiful. I find myself shifting back and forth on my feet. “…is how he ever, feeling like I felt, let you go. Wendy, I…” He stands from the bed, and it creaks at the shifting of weight. When he approaches, I don’t obey the urge to step back.

He’s close now, and he traces my Mating Mark on my cheek with the pad of his thumb, tracing it down to the curve of my jaw. “I love you so much, it aches. I want you so fiercely, it feels as if I’m being torn limb from limb. But every time I want you, every time I desire you, I remember… I was in so much pain the nightIaso broke the curse. Every evil I’d ever committed at the Sister’s hand came flooding back over me all at once.”

I remember Renslow, slaying him. How I imagine I’ll feel when I actually allow myself to process that.

“I love you,” he says, “and I know that it’s because of you, who you are.”

“How do you know it’s not just the Mating Mark talking?” I ask.

“Because, Wendy Darling,” says Peter, his eyes looking so boyish, so bright. So sad. “If it were only the Mating Mark, you would love me back.”

My heart skips. “I do love you,” I say, because that’s what the bargain wants me to say. “I choose you.”

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