I still love her. I know I do. That one fact spurs the darkness inside me into a raging storm, just like the one howling outside as I study her laying in my bed after all this time.

My eyes lift and find John’s. He hasn’t looked away from my stare, observing, watching me the whole time I’ve been consumed, once again, with thoughts of Wendy. He studies me with an inquisitive glare, almost making me grow nervous, like maybe he can read my thoughts.

When Wendy deserted us years ago, John stayed in Neverland. Loyal to a fault. One I know I’m responsible for. It seemed only fitting I make him my first mate after everything that happened. Everything that was, eventually, ruined forever. Stolen, in a blink of an eye.

“Traitor,” John exhales slowly a moment later, looking down at his sister spread out on my sheets. The smoke from his cig circles above Wendy’s restless body as she continues to writhe in sweat on my bed. “Not a guest. Traitor, Captain,” he clarifies, and I feel the sting of his words pierce my black heart, reminding me of why I took so long to go back for her. “Of all of us, you know that best.”

Fuck yes, a traitor. A hypocrite. Someone who betrayed me worse than I thought anyone ever could. Deceived me even worse than Tink did all those years ago.

As the words take hold, the memories resurface, and my breath becomes shallow. My last nerve threatens to break, and my hands shake as I reach out and grab ahold of the rum, quickly bringing my glass back up to my lips.

When she left, the darkness took hold and it quickly consumed our world. I thought nothing could make me feel worse, more dead inside. Watching her breathing across the room, lying in a bed we once shared, I know I was wrong.

“What do you plan to do with her,” John sighs, gesturing towards his sister.

She lets out a soft, sad whimper as the pixie dust wears off and she’s thrust back into a world I know she never thought she’d visit again.

My blood boils as it rushes through my veins. Thoughts of Wendy and I the first time we were together in Neverland have haunted me since the second she turned her back on us all those years ago. A curse fell on my life when she walked away, and I’ve never been the same since.

“What I always planned to do with her,” I seethe. “Use her. Break her. Take what I want from her. The only way I know how.”

“She never liked your dark side, Cap,” John says, as he turns and makes his way back towards the exit. “Always frightened her. She took better to Peter.”

That fucking name.