Page 14 of Caging Darling

“Well, we know that now. But John suspected that she might have been stalking Peter. That she might have seen something. So he went looking for her. That’s how I ended up staying back at the Den and watching Michael.”

I shift, because this part makes little sense to me. I’ve come to trust Victor during my time at Neverland, and it’s not as if I’ma better caregiver for Michael at the moment, but it seems odd that John would have left Michael in Victor’s care.

“He told me he hadn’t found her…” says Victor, staring at the gravestone as if the slab of onyx stone had been the one to lie to him. Hurt flashes across his face.

I guess John didn’t trust him as much as he’d thought.

“Did he start acting differently?” I ask.

Victor shrugs. “You knew John. It wasn’t as if he wore his feelings for everyone to see.”

The truth of that stings. How little I knew my brother compared with how well he could read me.

“She was weeping over his grave,” I say, voice far off, carried away by the impish breeze.

“Maybe they had a secret relationship he didn’t want anyone to know about,” says Victor. “I could see him being private about it.”

I bite my lip, unable to voice my feelings. Not when they sound so naïve, petulant. Tink has attacked me more than once. My cheeks still burn at the memory of her claws. My lungs still spasm at the memory of Tink shoving my head underneath the waves just for the joy of watching me drown (though I can’t recall if I ever told John that bit). Still, it’s difficult for me to imagine John pardoning her attempts to hurt me. Could my brother have really cared for someone who hurt me?

The idea might bother me more if it at all felt plausible. No, something is off.

“She was weeping over his grave…” I say again.

Victor looks at me like I’ve finally lost it. Like he hasn’t noticed me slipping into my mental abyss until this very moment.

“Victor,” I ask, rubbing my hands over my thighs. “You said that before Simon’s death, he was acting strange. Paranoid. On edge.”

Victor nods. “Yeah. I wish I had figured it out at the time. That he was seeing and hearing things.”

“And what about John? Did he show any of the same signs as Simon?”

Victor scrunches his brow together, watching Michael as he sorts the train cars by color atop John’s grave. “He stopped eating the onions.”

I press my splayed palms into the earth where John’s body rests, and straighten my spine. “But his behavior, his demeanor, did they change at all?”

Victor stares at the gravestone, like he’s silently asking John to remind him. After a moment of contemplation, he slowly shakes his head. “No. No, he was the same.”

I rise, feeling the soft earth against my feet as I pace. “It never sat right with me—the idea that John would take his own life. Not when he held so much responsibility for Michael’s safety. Not when he’s always been so logical. Even if the wraiths tried to talk him into it, I can’t think of anything they might say that would make it seem rational to him.”

Victor frowns. “Winds, you saw the body. He?—”

“Hung himself, I know,” I snap. I can feel the wild frenzy building within me, tapping against my veins. “But what if he didn’t? What if?—”

I watch it over again in my mind’s eyes, Tink weeping silently over John’s grave, digging her claws into her chest until she drew blood.

Punishing herself.

“What if she did it?”

Victor stands, brushes the dirt off his pants, then approaches. I step back. “Winds, why would she do that? You just said she was weeping over his grave. If she loved him, why would she hurt?—”

The question appears to get caught in his throat as he stares at me. It happens in the span of a blink. The way his gaze rakes my Mating Mark. The bargain in the crook of my forearm.

“Loved ones don’t like it when you try to leave them, Victor,” I say. “They don’t like it when you don’t love them back.”

I’m notsure how I find myself on the beach. The onyx sand delves between my toes, wanting me to stay put, but I have to move. Have to pace. There’s an anxious energy building within me. Too much to contain. My body, my fragile bones and frame, can’t hold it all, and I feel as though I may burst. I can’t tell if it’s anger or grief or just the cravings, but I have to do something.

Anything.

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