Lily's POV
"You're having a nightmare," a low voice says breaking through the dark abyss of my mind.
My eyes snap open and the nightmare fades, though the feelings remain lodged in my chest like black tar, slipping into my veins like invasive dread. I was being hunted by the dark shadow of Neverland. The shadow sank his teeth into my flesh, lapped at my tears, and feasted on my blood. He latched on to my soul and fed off my pain like a black terror crushing air from the lungs. No matter how hard I try, I can't escape him. The shadow morphed in the form of a beautiful devil with clashing blue-and-green eyes and a smoldering, disarming smile. Those eyes quickly shifted to dark chocolate brown and the features shifted as well. His eyes pierced mine. It wasn't anger or resentment I saw there in that evil gaze; it was amusement.
The dark shadow. Pan. Cullen. They all haunt me and confuse my senses. I shake away the dream and it's meaning trying to focus on the now. My whole body thrums with a painful, visceral reminder of the night. I hear footsteps in the dirt coming from behind me and slowly make their way to the front.
Pan's eyes hold mine with a look of pure possession. He looks menacing and monstrous and beautiful. I hate the fiery ache that claws at my chest at the beautiful sight of him.
I don't realize what's happening until I feel coarse rope binding my wrists. My arms are wrenched above my head. Yanking my wrists against the binding, I try to loosen the rope. My back bears the scrapes from the bark where I am bound to a tree. "Untie me," I demand. He spares me a quick glance before he lowers himself to the ground to grab a discarded knife. Relief uncoils the tension until he places the blade against my skin threateningly. My heart plummets. I struggle until Pan grips my jaw. His eyes—raging blue and green flames—hold me captive. A tremor ricochets through my body, but I try to keep still. Fury etches his chiseled features and he tilts his head. Then he captures my mouth and bites into my bottom lip. Rough bark scrapes my back where he presses me against the tree, his body bracing mine. He turns even more aggressive and I want to lose myself in him, until I feel the piercing bite of the blade break my skin. I look down as he wields the knife to carve my flesh ever so lightly. He sinks to his knees where he's cut my flesh.
"You're mine," he whispers across the inflamed skin. I close my eyes, my head falling back against the solid support of the tree. The intensity of Pan's hungry gaze meets mine as he holds me to him. He hovers his hand over the wound healing it instantly.
"You're mine, Lily. You belong with me."
It's taken me until now to understand the draw Pan has had over me since the moment our eyes collided. I have feared him because of that, because of the logic he drains from my mind. I lose more than rational thought around him—I lose myself. I feel the primal truth rumbling through my chest. Watching him does something violent and dangerously erotic to me.
"I'm yours," I say.
Pan's gaze flares, a hunger banked in the depths of his clashing gaze. Demonstrating his claim in the most violent and gruesome manner wasn't only a punishment, it was his proof.
"If Cullen touches you again, I'll flay his skin from his tendons and carve my initials in his bones."
His words chill me to the bone draining the blood from my face. I know he means it. I want to deescalate his rage as best I can but am at a loss on how to.
"Why did you kiss him?" I knew this was coming. His cold gaze compelled me to speak. "I'm sorry." My voice trembled and sounded foreign to my ears. "But it's not what you think. I don't want him. I want you."
"You have a funny way of showing it," he spits.
"Why didn't you come for me sooner!" I demand. My anger and question throwing him off. "You knew he had me. You have something he wants and he said if you gave it to him he would give me back to you. This all could've ended sooner. So why? Why did you wait for so long?"
"I came as soon as I could..." he begins but I interrupt. "Bullshit!"
"Whatever is going on between you two needs to end," I plead.
"Oh, I'm about to end it all right."
"There must be a way for you both to walk away from this happy. You were close once before." He snaps his head up at my words. Clearly not knowing the backstory Cullen gave me.
Pan answers coolly, "We have a complicated past. I doubt he told you the full truth. Don't be so foolish to believe what he has to say."
"I'm not saying I believe him. I'm not saying I don't. You haven't told me anything. What happened between you both?"
A flash of raw vulnerability registers in his features, but he quickly conceals it. "There's nothing insightful to learn here, Lily. Just an unoriginal story about a bastard with impossible expectations. We didn't see eye to eye in the end. Period."
Pan is clearly not willing to give me anything else.
Pan's POV
Lily is digging where she shouldn't. I feared this would happen. Cullen would fill her head with his version of lies and truths. Confusing her. Every day that stretched on without her I feared. Cullen is an increasing threat to Lily and my secrets—secrets I've sacrificed my fucking freedom to keep buried.
I cast a look down at my hand. Dried blood gathers dark in the creases of my knuckles. The skin split over bone. A garish mix of red and violet bruises wrap the flesh from the violence of the night. I saw red when Derek was choking Lily. Betrayal and hot rage took over. The slashed flesh of my palms stings and demands I feel the pain. And still, there is no physical pain that can rival the anguish which tore through me the moment I saw Cullen kissing Lily.
Cullen wants what he can't have. I'm an obstacle in the way. Too bad for them, my obsession runs so much deeper than his. No one can take Lily from me.
I look back to Lily and she traps me in the intensity of her gaze, refusing to release me. She's beautiful. I close the gap between us, where I clasp her chin and lift her face, then gently brush her hair behind her ear. Her mouth parts, and I daringly sweep my thumb across her bottom lip, a wicked craving sparked by the union we can achieve together.
Despite the gruesome scenery of our surroundings, or maybe because of it, I'm captivated by her all the more. Blood, sweat, and dirt cover us both. She has me under her spell, and yet she still has no idea how much power she wields. I cut her arms free but still hold her tight in my arms. Her throaty little moans vibrate through me, setting me ablaze and making me fucking insane as she threads her fingers into my hair. She presses her lips to mine. I crush her harder to me, unhinged at the feel of her deepening the kiss, her tongue slipping over mine to claim her territory, her thighs locked around my hips. I fight the demand to grab her hips and rut into her like a depraved beast.
Lily's POV
"I fucking love you, Lily. I'm crazy for you. It's forever, and I won't let anyone get in the way of that." He licks his lips, his gaze locked with mine. He holds me to him like I'm his lifeline.
What we shared was deeper than love. It was a mad and unyielding obsession, and it was mutual. And the flames from it would likely kill one of us some day but I couldn't bring myself to care. I'd rather have this passion with him than a hundred years of mediocrity with another.
"You'll never be free of me," he tells me.
"I don't ever want to be," I say breathlessly. A lopsided smile breaks across his face, that fucking dimple squeezing my heart.
"Tell me you love me."
I feel a thrill in my tummy. "I love you," I say softly, bending to kiss my way along his hard jaw.
"No matter what." My heart drops. With anyone else, that would mean something entirely different. With him...
"Pan!" A lost boy comes into view but Pan ignores him. I notice it's Michael and he looks at the two of us and darts his eyes elsewhere awkwardly.
"What is it?" Pan asks but never taking his eyes off me.
"It's Cullen. He's been captured. We've got him."
