“Peter,” I breathe, and for the first time, his name doesn’t feel like a curse. It feels like an anchor.
He closes the distance, his lips meeting mine with a tenderness that is far more shocking than his violence. It’s a slow, deep exploration—a kiss that tastes of salt, whiskey, and a devastatingly honest kind of hunger. He isn’t taking; he’s asking. He’s pleading with every soft movement of his mouth for me to stay in the dark with him.
I let out a shaky, broken sound, my hands sliding into his hair, pulling him down until the weight of him ispressing me back into the charcoal silk. It’s not the frantic, jagged desperation of before. It’s a slow-motion collapse.
“Don’t leave,” I whisper against his lips, the words a total betrayal of the girl I used to be. “Even when you’re bored. Even when I’m broken. Don’t you dare leave me alone in this house.”
He pulls back just enough to look at me, his face inches from mine, his expression so raw and filled with a terrifying, unhinged devotion that it makes my heart ache.
“Wendy,” he murmurs, his thumb tracing my lower lip. “I’ve been waiting twelve years to find you. I’m not leaving until the world is ash. And even then, I’ll find you in the smoke.”
He leans down again, his mouth finding the dip in my collarbone, his kisses slow and worshipful, marking me not as a prisoner, but as something holy. And as I wrap my legs around his waist, pulling him into the cradle of my thighs, I realise that the hunger isn’t just a leash. It’s a map. And it’s leading me straight into the heart of the man who ruined me.
Peter
She looks like a soft, bruised little thing sitting there, and it’s doing something to my sanity that no amount of bloodshed ever could.
The firelight catches the gold thread of her gown, making her shimmer like a coin at the bottom of a well. I spent three hours and a small fortune picking that dress out. It’s a deep, obsidian velvet that plunges dangerously low, clinging to the curves I’ve spent the last few weeks mapping with my tongue. On any other woman, it would be a costume. On Wendy, it’s a shroud for the girl she used to be.
Looking at her, even as she sits there with those fractured, grey eyes, makes me want to fuck the sadness right out of her. I want to drive into her until she forgets the smell of smoke and only knows the taste of me.
“You aren’t eating, Darling,” I say, my voice a low-frequency hum that cuts through the silk-thin notes of the cello music playing from the corner.
The room is dripping in the kind of luxury that feelslike an insult to the war raging outside our gates. The table is a slab of rare black marble, set with heavy silver and crystal that catches the flicker of a hundred beeswax candles. We’re dining on Wagyu beef seared in bone marrow and truffles that cost more than most people make in a year.
It looks like a romance. It feels like a funeral.
Wendy looks at the crystal glass of wine—a vintage as red and thick as the blood I’ve spilled for her—and her lips curl in a tiny, suspicious sneer. God, I love that sneer. It’s the only thing keeping me honest.
“What is this, Peter?” she asks, her voice steady despite the way her collarbone trembles. “The final meal? Are you fattening me up before you put me on the wall?”
I let out a low, dark chuckle, leaning back in my chair. I take a slow sip of my own wine, watching her over the rim.
“It’s an anniversary,” I lie, the words tasting like sweet poison. “Twelve years since the fire. Six months since I found you. One day since you realised you’re never leaving.”
She flinches, but she doesn’t look away. She looks magnificent in that gown—the obsidian fabric making her skin look like polished alabaster, the sleeves long and tight, ending in delicate lace that brushes her knuckles. I want to rip it off her. I want to see that velvet crumpled on the floor while I worship the marks I left on her thighs.
“You’re trying too hard,” she whispers, her eyes darting to the shadows where my guards are stationedjust out of sight. “The music, the food, the dress… it’s all just more paint on the cage.”
“Everything is a cage, Wendy,” I murmur, standing up and walking slowly around the table. The floorboards don’t even creak under my boots. I stop behind her, my hands resting on the back of her chair, my head leaning down until my lips are brushing the shell of her ear. “The only difference is that mine is made of silk and gold. And it comes with a King who would burn the world just to see you smile.”
I reach out, my fingers ghosting over the delicate line of her shoulder, feeling the heat radiating off her. She’s terrified, yes, but she’s also hungry. I can see it in the way her pulse jumps under her skin, the way her breath hitches as I move my hand lower, my palm flat against the small of her back.
“Eat your dinner, Wendy,” I whisper, my voice dropping to a guttural command. “Because once the music stops, I’m going to remind you why you’re wearing that dress. And I’m going to make sure you’re too exhausted to ever think about the fire again.”
I see her swallow, her eyes closing for a brief, flickering second. She hates the luxury. She hates the attention. But she’s realising that the cage doesn’t just keep her in—it keeps the rest of the cold, lonely world out.
I don’t wait for her to finish the wine. I reach down, my hand sliding under her chin, forcing her head back until she has to look into the dark, viral heat of my eyes. I see the suspicion there, the sharp edge of the girl who survived the flames, but I also see the awe. She’s drowning in the opulence, and I’m the only thing keeping her head above water.
“Come with me,” I growl, pulling her out of the chair.
She doesn’t fight. She lets me lead her through the labyrinth of the estate, her obsidian velvet gown hissing against the marble like a predatory cat. We ascend a spiral staircase made of wrought iron and glass, climbing higher into the belly of the house until we reach the observatory.
The room is circular, filled with the scent of old parchment and expensive brass. It’s silent up here, the war at the gates feeling like a memory from someone else’s life.
“What is this?” she whispers, her voice echoing in the hollow space.
“The only place in this city where the light doesn’t lie,” I murmur.
