“It was always worth the wait, Darling,” he insists, climbing on top of the bed and wrapping me in his arms. My thighs clench and my center pulses in anticipation as he pulls my back tighter against his chest. He doesn’t push anything further, just holds me close as if he knows what’s coming. As if he knows we need each other to survive it.

Just before I drift off to sleep, I hear him whisper, “You were always worth the wait.”

Chapter 17

Peter

“The boys on the island vary, of course, in numbers, according as they get killed and so on. And when they seem to be growing up, which is against the rules, Peter thins them out.”

Peter & Wendy

- J.M. Barrie

SEVENTEEN YEARS AGO

Fascinated. That’s all I am. Wendy is alluring. Tempting. Bewitching at her best.

She’s always at her best.

I’m always looking for something that fascinates me. That can keep my attention. Like my Wendy.

I watch as she looks out over Mermaid Lagoon and smile.

Breathtaking.

That’s what she is.

Too beautiful for words.

So, I watch her laugh as the wind catches her hair and she looks down upon the lagoon. I know that I can search the whole world and never find anyone, ever again, that fascinates me as much as Wendy does.

“Back home,” John starts, finishing his climb up to the top of the rock and standing next to my side. “We’d say something like ‘take a picture, it’ll last longer.’”

A picture?

“What would I do with a picture?” I frown.

John laughs and nudges my side just as the rest of the lost boys reach the top. “Stare at it, you ass. It’ll stay just the way you like it, longer than that sister of mine ever will.”

My smile grows as I watch Wendy struggle to stand upright. She leans over the edge of the rock cliff, dangerously close to falling over, just to get a closer look at the mermaids below.

I like to watch her dance with danger. It does something to me. I like to swoop in and save her, just in time. Be her hero. It makes me feel prideful, but I also love the look it puts in her eyes. That startled, loving, excited, flushed expression is what keeps me up at night.

“No,” I shrug as my smile grows. “My Wendy will never change in my eyes.” Turning to John, he studies me with a frown. “She couldn’t. I won’t let her.”

Her gasp reaches my ears and I take flight immediately, swooping in to catch her just as she tumbles over the side of the cliff. Sometimes, I think she does this on purpose. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t like it.

It gives me an excuse to hold her close. A reason to feel her skin touching mine.

Fascinating.