The Never King (Vicious Lost Boys, #1)

by Nikki St. Crowe

This is the nineteenth house we’ve lived in. I know the number of houses, but I can’t remember most of them. And when your walls blur together, it’s hard to ever feel like you’re home.

I don’t like to watch a Darling cry, but I love to watch them bleed.

“Trouble,” he tells me. “Filthy little Darling whore.”

“We don’t fuck Darlings,” he tells me. “Stop fucking around or you will regret it.”

“Three, two, one. One, two, three. Better watch out: Peter Pan is going to murder thee.”

“Take it all, Darling. Be a good girl.”

Your mother is supposed to protect you,

Her love was hard to take some days.

“Pretty little Darling whore,” he says. “Trying to pretend she’s bigger than she is.” “Vicious shadow of death,” I say, “trying to pretend like this is all beneath him.”

“I’m not going to make you my pretty little broken fuck doll,” he tells me, and then he stalks from the room and I gulp down air.

But maybe he’s right—wanting that might make me a glutton for punishment. And oh how sinister that punishment would be.

This one is like a feral cat that wants to push the saucer of milk off the table just to watch it spill. I like that about her. Brave little Darling girl. Wild and reckless, always up for depraved adventure.

“Even the mighty oak believes she is strong until a man comes along with an ax to chop her down.” “Is that you then? Do you have an ax?” “All men are born with an ax in their hands, Darling. To take the measure of a man, you just have to pay attention to how he wields it.”