“I’m not going to apologize for not taking you seriously before.” She held up a hand when he parted his lips in preparation of rebuttal. “You kidnapped me, terrified my friends, and are currently jeopardizing my job. I have every right to be pissed off at you. I told you once that my fallback is sarcasm, and you know I’m a skeptic. So if you don’t like it, you can take me to the nearest town. I’m out here right now for answers. You”—she pointed at him for emphasis—”are going to open up and let the words spill from you like viscera.”
Peter snorted and then motioned for Kat to take a seat on the edge of the fountain. She complied, and then rested her arms on her thighs. He pulled the panpipes he ‘d played the night before out of his back pocket and sat them on the lip of the fountain as he joined her. She noted that he must be able to reclaim what was in his pockets before or after he shifted forms. Good trick.
“Okay. So...you’re the Jersey Devil, but also a satyr out of Greek mythology. I, um, guess that makes ‘mythology’ improper terminology, as it implies it isn’t real...” Kat shook her head, refocusing on the topic. She was already rambling on. “And Peter isn’t your real name.”
“No.” He didn’t specify if he was referring to her comment about mythology or his name. She chose to go with the second option and continued that aspect of the conversation. She wasn’t quite ready for the mythology part as it made her world a scarier place than she wanted it to be.
“As I told you before, my name is Pan.”
And the mythology part refused to go away. She wanted to deny it, to keep calling him Peter to keep her sanity.
“But I thought Pan was, uh, is a demigod?” Knowing she wasn’t handling the conversation well, she looked down at the glaringly obvious set of panpipes and recalled his quip about the origins of the word panic. He’d tried to hint it to her, but she’d ignored the signs. He had told her his name over the breakfast table and she’d laughed in his face. And her occupation was based on her ability to observe. Shameful.
“More like god. Minus the demi. My father, you may have heard of Hermes, never told me who my mother was. Many women claimed they were she, but it was always a lie. Hermes took great pride in relating the story of my origin to the human storytellers, ensuring I was known as only half a god, as it protected the identity of the woman who birthed me, even from me. Unfortunately, the majority of the tales that survived were his embellishments.” Smirking, he added, “He stopped that shit when I spread my own version where he wasn’t my father. He didn’t appreciate that very much.”
Of course. His father would be one of the most well-known figures in the tales of the ancient Greeks. One of the ones who had a whole freaking planet named after their Roman title. “I take it you two aren’t close.”
“With that prick? Pfft.” He looked appalled. “Last time I saw him was after the curse when he’d found nothing other than amusement in my plight. Sure, he’d tried to be fatherly at the time, but it was too little, too late.”
Daddy issues. Also noted. It always goes back to parent issues with men suffering from some ordeal. Violent men. Drunken men. Men with hooves for feet. Perhaps she should find a better group of men to classify him in because Peter...
“Wait a second. Seriously?”
Pan arched a brow. “Are you questioning whether I’m not really best friends with my asshole father or that he is, in fact, a prick?”
“No! Your name.” Kat almost smacked herself in the forehead for not seeing it before.
“What about it?”
She shot him her best unamused glare. “Peter. You told me your name was Peter, but your name is really Pan. Did you seriously roll with the name Peter Pan?”
He flashed her a devastating grin befitting of Puck, and considering that comparison, she decided she wouldn’t be surprised if the two were one in the same. But that smile... Her mouth went a bit dry. Damn the man, er, god/satyr/humanoid being was sexy.
“Don’t knock it. It’s a classic. Besides, Barrie and I go way back. He got his inspiration for that book from me, you know.”
“Are you taking credit for a character that lives and behaves as an eternally immature child?”
“You wound me. Peter Pan played one of these.” He picked up the panpipes. “He was named after me, and he was pretty clever. He always outsmarted the pirates.”
“He also tried to attach his shadow to his foot using a bar of soap,” Kat replied in a flat tone.
“You’re just a, what is the term the cool kids say these days? Hater.”
“Whatever. Is that the name you use if you have to go into a town or a city? Peter Pan?”
“Hell no. Draws the wrong kind of attention. The name on my illegally created identity is Peter Panic.” The corner of his lips twitched as he attempted to keep a straight face.
“Um...”
“What?” Pan waved the panpipes around. “I’m a musician.”
Her face met the palm of her hand. “I bet you invented the term ‘panic’ to create a legacy to yourself in human language.”
“I admit to nothing.”
Unsure how else to respond to his easygoing banter, she snickered. His gaze heated, and she choked. As he dropped eye contact to stare at her mouth, her lips suddenly felt sticky and dry. Kat had an incontrollable urge to moisten them with her tongue. She’d read enough romance novels to know the man always considered such a move as invitation. As though her body had a mind of its own, it urged her to invite him, but in her mind, she wasn’t sure it was such a good idea.
The dampness between her legs mocked her brain and its objections. She knew getting it on with Pan was wrong, but she grew a little wetter as she imagined allowing it to occur. Traitor. You’re mad at him. Stay mad!
He’s a god. A freaking god wants you bad!
Ugh. She was ashamed even her thoughts could be so shallow. It didn’t matter that he was a god, if he really was. Or sexy as all hell, even with the freakish satyr legs... What does that say about me anyway? She glanced away, covering her mouth with her hand in a motion to scratch the opposite cheek. While her lips were covered, she licked them to dampen them again.
Ha ha! Because I’m sneaky.
The movement broke Pan’s focus, and he closed his eyes. Could he be fighting his response to her as strongly as she was?
“I enjoyed that.” When Kat didn’t respond, he elaborated, “The conversation. You have a quick wit and the most beautiful laugh I have ever heard. Musical even.”
“Oh, uh...thanks.” How does anyone respond to something like that? Drop trou?
Her lady parts were totally down with that idea. She was back to feeling the way she did at the hotel when she met him, wanting him terribly, but not understanding the ferocity of her lust. And his junk looked human enough. It was the knees down that looked wrong. Maybe if he wore pants...
She mentally slapped herself out of it. Kat knew she should continue being mad at Pan, but she wasn’t an angry sort of person. She hated to admit it, but they kind of got along pretty well when they joked and teased.
I can’t get Stockholm syndrome overnight, can I?
“I suppose I should explain why I took you.” Pan fidgeted with the panpipes. “I heard your laugh the day I made that ruckus in the woods for your camera. I was moving on to another area when you and your friend showed up. Then you laughed.” His emerald eyes sparkled. “It seeped into me, grabbing hold. I wanted you desperately. More than anyone before you.” He peered over his shoulder to the face of the statue. His skin paled slightly and sadness seemed to overcome his features. “More than her...”
Before Kat had a chance to ask about whom the statue depicted or even comment over why one did not simply kidnap people based on their pretty laughs, Pan turned away from the stone woman. “I hadn’t even seen you yet and I wanted you. At first I believed it had to do with the curse. If you know anything about satyrs, I am sure you’ve heard we are most often seen chasing the nymphs and women around because we are lascivious beast
s. Sadly, in the first century of the curse’s hold, it was true. Over time, we have managed to recognize when our urges are out of control, and we take to seclusion, or at least I do. So it was very possible my reaction was because I’d denied myself for nearly thirty years.”
He’d been celibate for thirty years? Kat shuddered at the thought. She’d assumed going one year had been terrible. Life didn’t revolve around sex, but where was the fun in that? Although, she had also never been forced to have it due to a curse. She couldn’t begin to understand what he’d gone through. Realizing her train of thought was becoming sympathetic toward him, she shook her head to clear it.
“Then you made a retort about the Jersey Devil, and I wanted to play with you. Make you believe in the unknown. Give you hope that you were not hunting a fantasy.” He smiled. “Impulsiveness has always been a burden I live with. As you’ve noticed, I have the tendency to act before thinking things through.”
“You hadn’t planned on kidnapping me?”
Pan shook his head. “I almost lost my hold on this form when I was in your hotel room and you produced Dionysus’ wine, which is why I shot out of there like my ass was on fire. I apologize for that. I wanted to believe Dionysus had nothing to do with you being here, but there were too many coincidental factors at play.”
Kat nodded. “At first I thought you were a super-weirdo. Then I worried you didn’t like me, or I was, uh—” She almost revealed she’d been ready to jump his bones so hard the hotel quaked. “I don’t think I would have reacted very well to a satyr standing in my room.”
However, the way he’d revealed it had been about a hundred times worse.
The wind blew cool air in their direction. Kat rubbed her arms through her sweater. It was a chilly autumn day.
“I stayed away as much as I could, trying to come up with a way to be less awkward and approach you again after the previous mishap, but I kept expecting Dionysus or someone else unsavory to show up. They never did. So I promised myself I wouldn’t seduce you until I knew for sure you weren’t in cahoots with anyone.”
Kat wondered who he meant by someone else, and her eyebrows rose when he’d implied he’d seduce her as though he’d succeed.
“Then you went out at night in bad areas of the Pine Barrens,” Pan continued. “Wearing bright colors and being reckless. I thought you wanted a monster to find you since you behaved as such, so I became that monster and granted your wish.”
He put his head in his hands, tugging at his dark hair. “Once I had a hold of you, I couldn’t think of what to do. If I let you go, you’d have left New Jersey and disappeared. I can’t flash myself to other locations like I could before the curse, and flying with a cloaking glamour expels a lot of energy. Chasing you across state lines may not have worked in my favor, so I brought you here.”
She almost felt sorry for him. Almost. He’d scared the hell out of her. If he’d eased her into the fact he was more than human, showed her gradually, she may have been able to deal with it better. Accept it. And, yeah, she might have even thrown caution to the wind and slept with him had things ended differently.
There was no telling what would happen anymore. She desired him, strongly, but having sex with him wouldn’t do more than make him believe he hadn’t done anything wrong because he would be getting what he’d wanted from the start. Just because he apologized didn’t mean the actions were erased. Not to mention the idea of having sex with a satyr was...weird. Not horrid, but strange. And having seen him as the full-fledged JD, sort of terrifying.
What she wanted was to make contact with Cindy and Rick, but doubted Pan had a phone. No utilities lead to no landline, and who would he be talking to on a cell phone? She knew asking would bring nothing but failure, so she placed the wish on the backburner. Not to mention, she needed to know more before she brought anyone she cared about back to his attention. She would worry more about her friends later.
Instead, she focused on what information he was willing to give her currently. “This was your home once, wasn’t it?” The thought had crossed her mind several times. The bedroom, the graffiti on the walls, and his reaction to the fountain. The woman immortalized in marble must have been a great love of his.
“Yes. I built this house in 1697. The forest was dense and uninhibited by colonists for the most part. At least in this section. Native tribes knew I lived in these woods, but having seen me in my true form as I built the house from the foundation up, they knew I was more than a man. It was because I was a creature of nature that they showed me no ill will. I returned the favor likewise.”
“So you weren’t the thirteenth child of the Jersey Devil legend?” Kat joked.
“Unfortunately, no. The legend of the Jersey Devil was created by superstitious men and women, using the names of neighbors they disliked.” He cocked his head to the side.” However, I’m sure Hermes would have loved that version of my supposed origin.”
“Seriously, though. How did the Jersey Devil arrive in New Jersey?”
“Are you asking because you genuinely want to know, or because you are paid to seek out answers regarding me?” he teased.
“I want to know. I mean, I did find you...”
“I let you find me, but that is beside the point. In actuality, my coming to be the Jersey Devil was an accident. I had lured a woman into the woods through the song of my panpipes. Because my human form is retained by illusion, in the middle of things, well...illusions can falter when you stop concentrating on them. We were caught by a group of drunken adolescent boys. The woman, I regret I never asked her name, didn’t see my satyr form as I was taking her from behind.” He laughed. “Don’t give me that look. If they can’t see the horns or the hooves, they can’t be horrified by the sight of them, and I don’t have to explain myself or placate them. Anyway, the woman was very, uh, vocal and drew the attention of the boys.”
“Then what happened?”
“The boys saw what I was and thought a woman who would lower herself to a monster would be open for a round with all of them. They attempted to kill me and rape her.”
Kat gasped. The story had not gone how she expected at all. It was terrible. Pan furrowed his brows as he retold the events. She could tell he was still infuriated by the actions of those men.
“In my anger, I manifested the form immortalized today as the Jersey Devil for the first time. Later, I was able to study it, learn how I achieved the form, and realized it was how I was meant to have been changed by the curse. I’d frightened the boys so badly that half of them pissed themselves. They ran away, screaming and crying like small children. The woman fainted under the duress.” He added softly, “I played her a song to forget the whole evening ever happened and took her home.”
“Let me guess. Tales of your existence were spread in a state of panic and skepticism?”
Pan winked. “Yup. And occasionally I would hop out and scare someone new to keep Jersey on its toes. Old habits never die and all that.”
“If you don’t mind me asking...” Kat stood up and stretched. Sitting for long periods of time sometimes cramped her scarred leg. “How did your house become so rundown?”
With a shrug, Pan said, “I’ve been spending days, and then months, sometimes years, wandering around the woods. On occasion I travel into other states, losing track of time. I’ll live in town for a while, catch up on the current literature and films. Keeps me from feeling too old. I had the electricity and modern plumbing installed sometime in the late 1990s when I came back from exploring the Pacific Coast. The men who came out thought it was strange to have such a large house out in the woods no one knew about. I played them a song to forget; I’m not one for many visitors. They have the information in their systems somewhere, but no one from the electric or water companies remember this house until they have reason to come here. As to the current state of the place, I just never got around to repairing the building since then or paying the bills.” He shrugged. “I cast an illusion over it using the panpipes
when I am not around. Humans will stumble upon it, some spend a night here and leave, but they cannot find the house again after.”
That explained the graffiti. Someone must have suspected.
“And the woman in the fountain?” Kat gestured back at the figure.
He sighed. “She is a long story.”
“Well, I am a captive audience. Emphasis on captive.”
He rolled his eyes playfully. “It’s a story I can’t really tell you. Syrinx”—he gestured to the woman—”is the start, middle, and end to how the curse of the Satyroi came into being. The only way to really tell the story is to show you.”
“Can you do that?”
“Why, woman, must you constantly doubt me? I’m a god. Of course I can.” He stood and put the panpipes back in his pocket. He gestured to the pile of leaves in the empty structure. “Now help me clear this rubbish, and I will play the song of my memories for you.”
“Song? As in an actual song?”
“Doubting again. Remember the conversation in which I am a musician? Less questions. More clearing.” He grabbed two armfuls of leaves and tossed them outside of the fountain, not seeming to care where they ended up.
Kat bit her tongue, on the verge of retorting that he should just swoosh it all away with his wings like he had the night before with the dust, but then she remembered the hurt in his eyes when he had glanced up at the statue. He needed to do this by hand. Guilt perhaps? She’d give him this boon.
Chapter Nine
“Tell me where that asshole is hiding,” Silenus demanded as soon as Dion stepped out of the bathroom stall. He had flashed to one of the men’s restrooms at the airport in Atlantic City, one of the few areas where surveillance was not an issue. Pavlo, Melancton, and Silenus were waiting on him, having arrived not too long beforehand from private jets owned by Bach Industries.
The Cursed Satyroi: Volume One Collection Page 9