13. Peter

I'm grinning like a skull, gazing down at Wendy as she wheezes, still caught in her orgasm, her legs trembling, her chest heaving. The gun is still inside her pussy that's dripping juices all over the covers.

I can fucking smell her cream. Smell the sweetness of it. The flush on her neck and cheeks is bright red, and I imagine it spreading down, over her tits. I can imagine the swell of them, the hard nipples. I lick my lips and I can almost taste her skin, salt and sugar and roses and pretty girl.

It's driving me wild, and that means… mad.

Madder.

I can feel my mind slipping, my shadow detaching, my memory fading. As I stand there, I don't know who I am and who she is, only that she smells good.

Too damn good.

Delicious. Buttery. Soft. Honeyed. Everything I don't have in my life, everything I'm starving for. A full dessert buffet.

And I crave her sugar.

Still vibrating with dark energy, I bend my head, sniff at her skin where her neck meets her shoulder. I lick at it.

Being here with her is bad.

Dangerous.

Fucking lethal.

I knew it from the first moment I saw her, I think, I knew she'd be my fucking undoing, and frown as the memory slips out of my fingers again.

I stalk around the bed once more, taking in the whole of her, so wanton, limbs loose, legs spread, the gun sticking out of her pussy looking so… wrong and yet right, so depraved and sexy.

Her hands are still tied over her head and her sweater and shirt have ridden up a little, too, showing me the black lace of her bra. Her blond hair spills around her head like a sunburst.

Her cheeks are red, her lids heavy, her mouth bee-stung.

She's beautiful.

Hot.

I want her. Have wanted her for a long time. Yeah, I fucking want her and I take what I want. I want…

"Hell." I shake my head to clear it but it only ratchets up the tension, the headache spiking behind my eyes. "Goddammit."

With another curse, I make a quick job of untying her wrists and she moans as her hands fall limply on the pillow by her head.

I stare down at her. Why shouldn't I have her? Why the hell not? I can't… fucking remember. Who is she? What's her name?

Does it matter?

"Peter," she rasps.

"Don't say my name," I growl. Dangerous, I think again. I'm not letting her get under my skin, gripping me, changing me. I grab her shoulders, slam her to the bed. "Don't."

She moans.

I stare at her. Am I the crazy one, or is she? "Aren't you scared?"

Now she whimpers.

"You should be." I slam her back to the mattress.

Instead of yelling at me, she lets out a breath, her lashes lowering and her breathing changing—and I can smell her arousal flare.

Sugar and roses.

Fuck.

It messes with my head, grabs me by the balls, by the cock, and won't let go. A pretty, aroused girl in my bed, at my mercy, ready for the taking, and more than that…

More than the power trip…

What? What, Peter? What the fuck are you forgetting now?

It doesn't fucking matter.

Grabbing the handle of the gun, I yank it out of her, wrenching another whimper from her throat, and throw it aside.

Then I lie over her, press her down with my entire body, crushing her smaller, curvy one into the lumpy mattress, my breathing shallow, my dick rock hard. I press my knee between her legs and she moans, eyes fluttering closed.

I press my hand to her neck, cutting off her air and she arches up, rubbing against me.

She likes it.

God fuck.

Red descends over my vision. My shadow spreads, pulls, making my spine bow. It gathers itself from my body, my flesh and bones, from under my skin and inside my veins, rising.

And then it shoves claws into me, entering me instead of wandering, taking over me.

It's an alien thing and yet it's mine, it's me but it has been apart from me for so long—barely attached to me like a graft on a tree that hasn't quite caught—that it has a form and life of its own.

It's everything that's dark in me, and that's a fucking lot. Dark desires, dark thoughts, dark dreams, dark wishes. The animalistic part of me, the one with fangs and claws, the one that bites and scratches and fucks like a beast.

I am it, and it is me. We're one right now, and fleetingly I think that I'm fucking thankful we're usually apart, even if it hurts like a bitch, because my shadow is a motherfucker.

It pushes into me, through me, taking me over—and I grab her blouse, tear it off her, shredding it into strips. Her tits are full and round, encased in fine black lace, her nipples pink and hard.

So easy to tear the lace off her, my nails leaving red lines on her pale skin, on the mounds of her tits. She arches up when I slide my hands over her curves.

I take her nipples between my fingers and twist.

She cries out, gripping my forearms, her own nails digging into my shirt, into my muscles underneath the fabric, and another dark rush goes through me, another red tide rising over my eyes.

My shadow roars.

I cup her neck again, pressing my thumb against her windpipe, cutting off her air, and think of my knives. Of drawing a different kind of red line on her skin, of watching the blood well up.

Fuck, I'm so hard right now.

She's gasping for breath and I let up just a little, letting air trickle into her lungs. She's making these little kittenish noises of need and pleasure, and how the fuck is she aroused by my roughness when other girls run away screaming?

Damn.

It's feeding the beast inside of me, feeding my arousal until my balls are like millstones and my dick a leaden club trying to drill a hole through my pants.

With a curse, I sit back as she coughs and gasps, tears spilling from the corners of her eyes, and unbuckle my belt, undo the button and yank my zipper down, almost ripping my pants in two.

Then I'm on her again, shoving my dick into her wet pussy without any fucking preamble. Ready or not…

But she's ready, alright. Fucked into an orgasm with a gun. Dripping and hot, loosened enough for my dick to wedge itself inside.

It's a tight fit, of course. It always is. And as her gasps turn into hiccupping breaths and she tries to shove me off her, fear making a return, so my pleasure grows.

Pressing her back down, I grab one of her legs and lift it. She curls it around my thigh instinctively and I slide in deeper, a groan making its way past my lips.

So damn good. So damn snug. So fucking tight.

Hot like hell.

And she looks even hotter, her cheeks flushed, eyes wide, her hands that were trying to shove me away now clawing at my arms.

I grunt as I thrust harder, wedging my dick just a little deeper. It won't fit completely, it never does, and—

Her other leg lifts, curls around my other thigh, and she opens up a tiny bit more, just enough—

Oh fucking dammit.

Her lashes lower, her head falls back and her mouth drops open on a long moan as I somehow push inside of her all the way.

It's never happened before, in all my long fucking years. Never had a girl to take me in completely.

Her pussy grips me so tightly I can't fucking breathe, my dick swelling more, twitching. My shadow jerks and twists. The dark spills inside me like ink, spreading, making my spine bow and my muscles clench, my stomach cramping from the force of it.

Oh. Fuck. Me.

Fuck.

Crashing down on my elbows on the mattress, I cage her head with my arms as I start fucking her, my hips rocking with a will of their own, my body chasing its release with a single-mindedness that won't allow me any room to think.

I'm about to come and at this point, I don't give a shit if she gets any pleasure from it or not. She's a convenient hole, that's it. A convenient body to use for my own damn needs, just another nameless girl, a random victim.

And yet something is different, something draws me to her pretty face, her blue eyes. I recall the feel of her delicate wrist in my grip, her low voice and I…

Her pussy pulses around my cock, and a sound escapes me—half surprise and half pain at the punch of pleasure in the gonads. My goddamn ass clenches, my balls detonate, and fuck, since when did I get so out of control?

My head drops forward and shudders shake my frame as I shoot my load. The dark explodes inside of me, dark stars and supernovas, my soul sucked into black holes, vanishing into nothingness.

Empty, aching where my shadow pulls, aching fucking everywhere, I slump on top of her. I frown down at her flushed face.

"Don't I know you?" I breathe, smoothing my thumb over her velvety lips, her silky cheekbone. Her hair is silky, too, shorter strands tickling my palm when I brush them off her forehead.

There's that faint scent of roses once more.

She's like the sleeping beauty in the woods, that briar rose, and I'm the hunter who woke her up and carried her away.

Unless I'm the darkness that bound her there in the first place.

The shadow drains out of me, slides away, the tether between us stretching. It's always near, always a part of me, but my head is a little clearer now.

And she muddles my thoughts again when she puts her hands on my face and tugs me down.

"What are you doing?" I'm staring into her blue eyes. We're nose to nose, both of us breathing hard.

She lifts her head, presses her lips to my mouth. "Kissing you?"

"Oh fuck no." I start to push up, feeling her fingertips trail down my face as I lift myself off her. "I don't kiss. Never kissed anyone."

Why do I still feel her touch on my jaw, on my cheeks? Why do I already miss it as I get off the bed? What's this weird tug inside my chest?

I fight the feeling, throttle it.

Her voice is a breath. "Peter—"

No.

I tuck my cock in, zip up my pants. My shadow rolls against the walls, and I hide a wince. Hell. This was a goddamn mistake. I don't do this face to face. I never fuck a girl face to face. Never let our lips touch.

I don't let them touch me, kiss me, speak my name so softly.

I don't let them get to me, get under my skin.

So how is she doing it?

The door opens and Tink stands in the opening. "Peter, the island is changing and…" His eyes widen, then narrow. A glare settles over his features. "Peter, goddammit!"

"What do you want?" I growl.

"What I want?" Tink shakes his fist at me. "You, asshole. You said… you said she's the one and that we're not supposed to fuck her."

"I said that? She is?" I turn to look at the girl on the bed who is slowly sitting up, debauched and sexy with her tits bare, her skirt rucked up and her pussy glistening with her release and mine. Tears shine on her cheeks.

"Fuck, Peter," Tink breathes.

Fuck indeed.

"This was a mistake," I say slowly.

But… she was asleep. She was dreaming… Dreaming of me. Dreaming of this.

It was her dreams. They drew me to her. It looks like they drew all of us, but I'd bet my right nut that the others didn't experience her nightmares.

I did. I always do. My bad dreams aren't all mine.

But on their heels came this image of me between her legs, holding her down, pounding into her, and it woke me up with a start. Brought me to her.

How can this be a mistake?

"Tink, you said the island changed?" I drag a hand through my hair and sigh, still gazing at her. "Show me."

"What about Wendy?" he breathes.

"Yes," the girl says, not bothering to wipe the tears off her face, toying with the little thimble pendant hanging around her neck—Wendy, that's her name, right, then again it always is—"what about me?"

"I don't give a shit," I mutter, feeling again that inexplicable tug in my chest and ignoring it as best I can. "Sleep. It's what all hapless humans do."