I uncork a bottle of wine and guzzle it back.
When the alcohol settles in my stomach, I sway a little on the edge of my bed and look around my room.
I should go.
Don’t even bother packing. Just slip out a side door and through the woods and find a ship I can sneak onto in Darlington Port.
The pit in my stomach is growing heavier by the second.
“Cherry?”
“Ahhh!” I jolt. The bed squeaks and I throttle the wine bottle like a weapon.
Bash frowns at me from the open doorway. “Are you okay?”
They’re going to find out. If Winnie hasn’t told them yet…they’re going to find out and then they’re going to do very bad things to me.
There is no one I can turn to.
I’ve always had no one but it’s hitting me especially hard right now just how very alone I am.
“I’m fine,” I answer. “What’s up?”
It’s been hours since Smee left. Bash has showered, his hair wet and slicked back save for a few strands over his forehead. He’s shirtless because he always is. Sometimes I would catch myself just staring at his abs and the tattoos that run over his torso.
I might have been in love with Vane all these years, but I always felt safest with the twins.
No, maybe that’s not right. I’m not sure there is such a thing as safe on Neverland.
But the twins made me feel less alone.
I can barely look Bash in the eye now.
“We’re throwing you a going-away party,” he says. “I’ll make you one party food. Your choice. What’ll it be?”
I need to leave. I take another drink from the wine.
“I have everything for lavender biscuits, the lemony ones you like.” He tilts his head and scans my face. “Or the honeysuckle tarts.”
I take another drink and wince.
“Cherry?”
“Honeysuckle tarts.” I’m practically vibrating. I want to vomit.
Bash comes further into the room. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Of course.”
“You know, it might be for the best, you returning to Hook’s territory.”
I snort. “Are you kidding me?”
Bash cocks his head. “Cherry, listen—”
“My brother didn’t want me in the first place. Do you know that when he left England, I snuck onto his ship because I couldn’t stand the thought of being left with our father? Our father beat Jas every chance he got and sometimes when he was really angry, he’d slap me around too. But Jas never wanted me around either. When you all took Smee, he came to me and convinced me it was ‘good form to make a great sacrifice for the family.’ He told me trading places with Smee would only be temporary. A few weeks at most. And then when the weeks drug on and on, I realized he wasn’t coming back for me so I decided to make the most of it and now look.”
I run my hand beneath my wet nose. “I made this my home because it was the only option I had.”
Tears spring to my eyes. I didn’t mean to admit all that. Sometimes my mouth runs before my brain does.
But don’t they know they left me no choice? Winnie changed everything. She is the only reason they’re getting rid of me now.
I sniff and a tear streams down my face.
Bash sighs and sits on my bed beside me. Our knees bump and I am reminded of what it felt like the first night I decided to say screw it and got drunk on faerie wine and made out with Bash for the rest of the night.
He didn’t fuck me even though he could have.
I would have let him.
There were nights after when he would come down to my room and climb into my bed and cast me an illusion that reminded me of the apple orchards not far from where I grew up. Every time he cast the illusion, the magic would become more accurate until it became so real, it made me sob and Bash would pull me into his side and run his fingers through my hair and just let me cry.
Kas may be the one with the bleeding heart, but Bash was the one who went out of his way to make me feel better.
More tears stream down my face and when I suck in a snotty breath, I catch the faint scent of apples.
When I look up, there is a shadow of an apple tree cast on my wall and bright pink petals are fluttering down from the ceiling.
The tears fall faster. I should have just asked Bash to help me. I should have begged him to help me stay.
I didn’t have to turn on Winnie.
But they’ll never forgive me now.
Why did I do that?
Bash takes my hand in his, threads our fingers together. His skin is dry and a little cold, but his grip is sure. “It’s going to be all right, Cherry. You’ll see.”
The tears return. “Bash.”
“Yes?”
“I have to tell you—”
“Cherry.”
Vane is suddenly taking up the space of my open doorway.
“Oh right,” Bash says. “I forgot to tell you, the Dark One is looking for you.” He gives my hand a pat.
My stomach drops to my toes.
I could risk telling Bash. I can never tell Vane.
“Come,” Vane orders.
“Where?” I look between him and Bash. Bash gives me a shrug.
“Get the fuck up right now, Cherry and come with me.”
I set the wine bottle aside and rise from the bed and sway a little. Bash stays where he is.
Do they already know? Is Vane about to kill me?
I’m sure Vane can hear the loud thumping of my heart and he knows I’m terrified even though he hasn’t turned his power on me.
Taking a deep breath, I follow him down the hall and out of the house.
Vane is silent for the first several minutes and I follow silently beside him as he follows the road that winds away from the house and to Darlington Port.
When he chased me not that long ago, we used the woods, not the beach.
Maybe everything is okay.
Maybe—
“Cherry,” he says.
“Yes.”
“Why wasn’t Winnie in the tomb when we got back?”
I swallow loudly and I know he can hear that too.
There is very little I can hide from Vane.
“I already told you—”
“Don’t lie to me, Cherry.” He stops in the middle of the road and pulls out a cigarette, lights it with a flick of the lighter. The flame paints light across his face as the sun sets beyond the island and the inner land turns dark.
“Is something wrong?” I ask trying to prolong the inevitable, trying to think of a good way to talk myself out of this one.
I used to be good at this.
I was young when Jas left England and I snuck away with him, but I was old enough to learn a thing or two from our father.
Our father might have been an asshole in the privacy of our home, but in public, everyone loved him. He was a respected lawyer who served as chief minister to the king. And what I learned from him was that it was always better to have two sides and best to hide the one that did bad things.
“Tell me what happened,” Vane asks. He takes a hit from the cigarette and squints against the smoke clouding up around his face.
It still hurts to look at him.
I know he doesn’t want me, but just being near him makes my gut hurt and my chest fill with butterflies.
If I could give something, anything, to make that feeling go away, I would.
“There was a bird trapped in my room,” I start and then someone flies out of the shadows and barrels into Vane and tackles him to the ground.
“Oh my god!” I screech.
They roll in the dirt several times until Vane is on his feet again, his boot pressed against the person’s neck.
The person on the ground, with the Dark One peering over him, laughs, though the sound is strangled beneath the sole of Vane’s boot.
“Roc?” Vane says.
The other man grips Vane’s foot and then shoves him back. Vane stumbles. Roc is up again and dusting off his trousers.
“The fuck are you doing?” Vane says, his voice devoid of any excitement to see his brother.
“Testing your reflexes.” Roc runs a hand through his dark hair. “You’re shit at it, apparently. You should have heard me coming.”
“I was fucking busy!”
Roc turns to me and a breath gets lodged in my throat. I’m still a little warm and fuzzy from the wine, and Roc’s attention on me makes me warmer.
Because holy stars, he is hot.
I barely remember him when he was here last, back when he cut off my brother’s hand for some perceived slight with Wendy Darling.
I can still hear Jas’s terror and later his groans of pain as Smee tended to the wound.
“Hi,” Roc says, “And you are?”
“Cherry.” I’m not dressed for meeting new company! Definitely not Vane’s infamous older brother.
He’s an inch or two taller than Vane, which would put him closer to Peter Pan’s height. He’s lean like Vane though, and has a certain litheness to him that would probably serve him well if he decided to become an assassin or a thief.
Or maybe he already is.
Honestly I don’t really know much about Roc other than he’s psychotic and known in the Isles as the Devourer of Men.
Jas is terrified of him.
I’ve never seen him twitch just at the mention of another man quite like he does with Roc.
Does Jas know his arch nemesis has returned to Neverland?
I might want to return to his end of the island just to be the one to tell him to see the blood drain from his face.
I am still nursing a grudge against my brother. And this might satisfy some of it.
Roc reaches over and takes my fingers in his hand, and bends my knuckles to his mouth. He plants a lingering kiss and keeps his gaze trained on me.
I shiver.
While he and Vane share the same bone structure—sharp cheekbones, a cut jaw, and full lips—his eyes are bright green.
Heat builds in my chest. I could get used to this kind of attention.
“Christ,” Vane says and bats his brother away from me. “Not that one.”
“She’s gorgeous though. Look at all those freckles. And you know how I feel about red heads.”
“She’s Hook’s little sister.”
“Even more of a reason.”
“What the fuck are you doing here, Roc?”
“I’m sure you know.”
They look at one another and I swear the air between them whirls with heat.
Why do I get the feeling that Roc’s challenge is barbed? There is a double meaning behind his words.
Vane narrows his eyes.
“What did the fae queen tell you?”
“Ahhh see. You do know.” Roc smooths over his hair and then hooks his arm around my shoulders. He smells like expensive cologne and sweet liquor and burning tobacco.
“Hi Cherry,” he says down to me.
“Hi.”
“Where would a man find Peter Pan around here?”
“Roc,” Vane says in warning.
Up ahead, the Treehouse is starting to light up in the coming night. I can already hear music playing from behind the house where the Lost Boys are probably already half drunk.
“I’m sure he’s somewhere in the house,” I tell Roc. “Probably with Winnie.”
“The new Darling.”
I swallow. “Yes.”
Roc looks over his shoulder at his brother and says, “How adorable. Take me to them, if you please.”
