I hadn’t been able to decipher Elder all that well. His stern face and unreadable black eyes gave nothing away about who he was, but he couldn’t hide the protective possessiveness he felt toward the quiet, quick-to-jump-but-fast-to-smile woman who’d captured his heart.

“Pim and I endured a storm ourselves.” He cracked a rare smile. “A tropical typhoon caught us while we were out to sea. It was...an experience.”

“Pim?” I asked.

Elder’s jaw clenched. “Slip of the tongue. Tasmin.”

“Pim is...” Tasmin spoke up in her husky voice. “I guess it’s a nickname. Pimlico—like the train station in England.” She braced herself, standing taller as if shoving away past memories.

I narrowed my eyes at the history in her tone. Had something happened at that train station?

Tasmin caught my stare, and her guarded fierceness that I’d seen a few times on the tour blazed in her green eyes. “The storm was ferocious.” She laughed lightly, dispelling whatever had brewed inside her. “I didn’t have enough respect for the ocean back then. I was new to the sea and decided the best place to ride out a storm with waves bigger than us was on the balcony.”

“Oh, my God.” I gasped. “I’m surprised you didn’t fall overboard.”

“She would have if I hadn’t strapped both of us to the railing.” Elder’s black gaze smoked with other things that’d happened that night, not just wild weather.

I smiled and nodded politely. “I’m sure she was grateful you kept her safe.”

“I’m grateful every day,” Tasmin murmured, her body curling closer to Elder’s.

Elder cleared his throat and gave her a look before his face slipped back into indifference, and he resumed his attention on the contract Sully had just finished reading.

“Everything in order, Sinclair?”

Cal had been reading over Sully’s shoulder, and he answered on Sully’s behalf. “And the warranty is fifteen years?”

“If something breaks in twenty years, I’d be suspicious you weren’t the cause.” Elder scowled. “My builders are meticulous, and our products are high end. The warranty is merely a formality. I give you my word that this yacht is built to the highest of standards and will last long after you are dead.”

Cal pursed his lips as if to argue, but Sully nodded. Placing the contract back onto the bar, he said, “It all looks satisfactory. Apart from one minor detail.”

“What detail?” Elder frowned.

Sully looked up, catching my stare before his attention swept over the gorgeous sun-drenched lounge and out the windows to his islands beyond.

Large ones, small ones, all of them cradling us with their palm trees and reef breaks, housing so many rescues and rehabilitation centres.

He was ready to go home.

Me too.

Smiling gently in my direction, Sully muttered, “It’s not me who needs to sign.” Holding up the expensive-looking pen Elder had given him, he motioned me closer. “Eleanor.”

I padded to his side, hiding the flutter in my belly as my skin kissed his when he passed me the pen. Electricity sparked in our fingers as it always did when we touched. “You sign. Rapture is your baby, and this yacht officially belongs to that company.”

“But we’re both directors of that company.”

“But you’re the managing shareholder.” He smiled, wrapping my hand around the pen and pressing the nib to the contract. “Rapture’s success is all down to your innovation and ideas. Calypso is yours.”

I looked across the bar where Tasmin watched me carefully. Her eyes had widened at Sully’s abdication of authority to me, as if she wasn’t used to men being nice to women.

Our gazes caught.

They held.

Then she smiled and nodded, her shoulders relaxed and her head tipped to lean on Elder’s shoulder. I didn’t know what’d happened to her, but everything seemed like a shock to her system, followed by swift acceptance. Almost as though she’d been denied basic kindness and now found the very hint of it absolutely shocking, followed by a reminder that simple sweetness shouldn’t be a rarity but common.

Sully kissed my temple, whispering in my ear, “Sign, Jinx. I want to be back on our beach.”

With his breath tickling my nape, I did what he requested and scribed my signature. I took ownership of Calypso and Thimble, and Jess clapped her hands as a waiter brought around six glasses of champagne.

“A toast,” Jess said. “To new friends and new adventures.”

We all raised our glasses and clinked.

And my dirty mind went to what Sully had promised in the master bedroom of this floating palace.

He said he’d code me an underwater fantasy. A hallucination I’d been wanting to try for a while now. A fantasy that’d been born thanks to Sully’s affinity with the sea and my lust for his body dripping with water.

Soon, I wouldn’t just be a woman who bought yachts as if they were seashells.

I would be some water nymph with a dangerous man begging at her feet.

I can’t wait to see what he comes up with.

Chapter Five

I HELD THE STEERING WHEEL of Singa Laut, ready to cast off from Calypso and return to my island. Cal and Jess already sat down the back, speaking between themselves, Radcliffe and Rory stood on either side of the hull, ready for war even in paradise, and my delicious wife stood beside me, grinning as two emerald flashes appeared just before Pika and Skittles fluttered from the sky and descended on us.

Pika on my head. Skittles on Eleanor’s shoulder.

“Decided you missed us, huh?” I shook my head, making Pika squeak.

Tasmin sucked in a breath from where she stood by the railing. “Are they tame or do wild birds have a habit of landing on you out here?”

I chuckled. “They’re tame. A part of our family, really.”

“Skittles adopted me,” Jinx said, shading her gaze from the sun as she looked up at Tasmin. “However, thousands of birds live on Goddess Isles. Some native, some imported from our rescue efforts. All beautiful and unique in their own way.” Giving me a quick look, Eleanor padded barefoot to the side of the speedboat and leaped back onto the watery platform of Calypso. Moving toward Tasmin, she encouraged Skittles to hop to her finger before presenting her to the brown-haired girl beside Prest.

“Here. She won’t bite.”

A few years ago, I would’ve disagreed with her.

Skittles’s trust issues had been numerous, and if she felt cornered, she had a wicked nip on her. But ever since Eleanor had come along, Skittles had been a doting, adorable companion who no longer vanished into the jungle for months on end but slept each night on Eleanor’s pillow while Pika slept on mine.

“She’s beautiful,” Tasmin murmured, reaching out to stroke Skittles’s bright green wings. Skittles puffed up in warning but then smoothed her feathers as Eleanor cooed at her.

I’d be jealous of the relationship between that caique and my wife if I didn’t love them both.

Pika, not one to tolerate being ignored, shot from my hair and flapped around Prest’s head, squeaking and cawing, making a fucking spectacle of himself.

I sighed. “Don’t mind him. He’s all bark.”