Pushing against my chest, forcing me a step back, she continues. “Nothing but a selfish. Fucking. Boy.”

I grab her wrist, but don’t use force. She pushes against my chest harder, backing me against a wall. Her tear-stained eyes lift, and her next words come out on a whisper, “Nothing but a selfish fucking bastard.”

Leaning in, I harshly restrain her arms, my heated breath coming out in a whisper as I study her eyes in anger. “Better a selfish bastard than a princess that won’t admit when she’s fucking wrong.”

“I’ve only ever been wrong about you.”

“Really?” I cock my head to the side, still not letting her go. “How so?”

She swallows hard, an anxious blush creeping across her face, but she doesn’t back down. “I thought you’d never leave me.”

“I didn’t.”

Her brow furrows. “The fact that I haven’t seen you for the past seventeen years would suggest otherwise.”

“You can’t leave something, or someone, that’s a part of you, Wendy.” It’s all I can manage to tell her, a small truth that’s bigger than she’ll realize, until she accepts the past for what it truly was. “You’ve always been a part of me, Darling. Even when I tried to fight it.”

Her eyes soften. Surprisingly, her temper deflates as she takes a step back, but I keep her wrists held tightly in my grasp.

“When you talk to me like this,” she says, shaking her head and closing her eyes, “it reminds me of the way things used to be. It makes me want to believe you.”

Her head shakes back and forth, trying to erase the words I couldn’t help but blurt out. Ones I can’t stop myself from finally telling her. After seconds that feel like hours, she opens her eyes and looks at me with a sad smile. “But time away has taught me that’s just your spell, Peter. The enchanting way you’ve always gotten what you wanted.”

“Bullshit.” I can’t help myself and try her word on for size. This time, it’s Wendy that cocks her head to the side and studies me. “I’ve never gotten what I wanted, because all I’ve ever wanted, Darling, is you.”

“You had me,” she hisses. “For a long time, you had me, and you gave me up, right after…” her voice breaks on a sob but her eyes harden, never leaving mine.

Turning her in my arms slowly, she lets me control the situation as I press her back up against the wall, lean in and whisper, “Did you really think I would finally have your pussy, finally take what’s mine, give you my hard cock, and never return to you?”

A shiver runs through her body, and I let out a hiss.