Authors Notes: Because, for me, there was such a huge gap between me reading the first and second Forbidden Game books, I was constantly thinking of how all the characters had felt after the paper house. Mostly I was thinking about Julian. Here are my ideas about what he went through between the first and second books.

Disclaimer: None of the characters are mine, they all belong to LJ Smith.

Behind the closet door, Julian was fuming. Tricked? Him? He couldn't have been, not by a human! He'd long ago given up banging on the door – it wouldn't give. Stuck in this closet again? He couldn't believe it.

He had been so naïve. Naïve with love, his curse. His one imperfection. He could see Jenny now, her golden hair, green as the Nile eyes and her smile – such a perfect smile. How many times had he gazed upon that face? Loving every bit of it, longing for it. He'd thought he had it, just then, he truly believed she was finally his. Ecstasy had shut down his warning system, or he would have known. Known it was too good to be true.

She would be his some day. She had to be. He loved her so much there was no way she could deny him. A love so strong could not be ignored. He had loved her from the moment he saw her, so young, so afraid. He wanted her, not in the same way the other shadow men had, in his own way. He wanted to love her, to hold her, for her to be his shadow queen. His heart ached for her.

He had watched her for so long, unable to touch, waiting for the moment, knowing that one day it would come. He had seen her grow up. He had spent the time scheming, learning everything about her to use it against her. Working out how to trick her into being his.

Had he needed to trick her? She'd said so herself, he could just have asked. But he knew, he'd always known, that she would never have come. She'd have been too scared, she'd have been angry with him, she would never have understood. Why should she give up a life of light and happiness and a kind and caring boyfriend to come and live with a shadowman? She had Tom. And Tom loved her, he knew that. Not as much as he, Julian, did, but a lot.

He'd watched Tom's every movement, watched him grow closer to Jenny. He'd seen their first kiss, and he'd longed to be there. He envied Tom – far from perfect though he was – because he had the love of Jenny. He wanted to hurt Tom, to make him suffer, even to kill him completely, but he couldn't. He couldn't, because it would hurt Jenny. He couldn't bear to hurt Jenny.

But he had done, and that made him guilty – an emotion he had never before felt. She thought Summer was dead – she wasn't – but she may as well have been. It had caused the same amount of pain for Jenny. He would have to give them Summer back. Originally, he had planned to use Summer against them, but he had under estimated the power of friendship. Jenny cared about Summer more than Julian had known. And when Summer had "died", it had upset Jenny.

But she'd got him back. Oh yes, she'd shown him. He remembered the kisses on the couch, the sweet softness of his lips on hers, the lightening jolts running through his body. And then she'd shut him in a closet.
But the joke was on her. "All I refuse and thee I chuse". Jenny was his, and as soon as he got out of this closet he'd go and claim her back. He was angry now. Furious. He had been tricked – humiliated. No one crosses a shadowman and gets away with it. Not even Jenny.

The closet door opened…