He chirped. Then trilled. Then squawked and carried on a conversation as if I could understand every caw. After his noisy argument about why he never behaved nor did what I asked, he let my finger go, plopped onto my desk, and rolled onto his back, giving me his white fluffy belly and yellow chest.

“Hello. Please. Now!” His scaly legs waggled, just tempting me to scratch him.

“No way am I falling for that game again.” Grabbing my pen, I poked him in the stomach, only for him to curl around the expensive limited edition implement and flap and squawk, biting and scratching as if he wouldn’t stop until ink spilled in death.

Despite myself, a smile tugged at my lips.

Pika…was special.

I’d rescued him, like most animals that hid within my jungles on Goddess Isles. Some I brought to this island, so I could keep an eye on them, and others, I let loose on the more uninhabited shores, letting them revert to the way nature intended.

But Pika…he’d been an egg when we met. So had his sister, Skittles. They’d been born in the lab—totally random from the caique parrot my father’s scientists had been testing acne medicine on. The parrot had lost all her feathers. She’d been depressed, lonely, and intensely sick from what humans did to her. No one knew she’d been fertilized before she’d been brought in from another lab.

I’d found four eggs in the bottom of her wire cage early one morning. Two had smashed. Two were whole. For the first time in forever, I’d felt the familiar empathy that’d gotten me in so much trouble in my youth.

Before anyone arrived, I’d scooped the eggs up, placed them in a disease incubator where Petri dishes grew sickness rather than nurtured life, then smuggled them home when no one was looking.

It’d been a full-on job looking after the eggs.

And then the hatchlings? Fuck me, they were even harder. I’d had to take the week off work to feed them every few hours until they left the naked, ugly alien stage and became pin cushions with quill-like feathers.

The week after Pika and Skittles came into my life…my parents died, and the company became mine.

The day I took control, I’d made changes to Sinclair and Sinclair Group. Lots and lots of fucking changes. I reclaimed a piece of myself again. I began to make up for all the shit that I’d done wrong.

Pika hopped away from annihilating my pen, knocked over the stapler, got his talons stuck in the tape dispenser, and ripped a laptop key out of the keyboard before I could stop him.

He was carnage on wings.

A little hurricane of nightmares.

“Pika.” I tried to grab him, only for his cute green wings to snap open, shoot him into the air, and deposit him on the top of my head. There, he grabbed strands of my hair and hung upside down over my forehead, putting our eyes within millimetres of each other.

He squawked and bit my nose.

I gave up.

Slouching in my chair, I spread my hands the way I knew he liked and allowed him to distract me from the fantasy I had to code and the knowledge that Jinx was one hour closer to being consumed.

Pika flopped down my face, kept his wings tucked in total faith that I’d catch him under my chin, then lay on his back in the centre of my palm, rocking on his wings as I tickled his downy feathers. “Had a good few days, little nightmare?”

He blinked as if he understood everything I said. He chirped back with a very clear, “Yup!”

It never failed to astound me how quickly he’d learned to speak. Sure, I’d shared my life with him for almost fourteen years. Sure, his sister wasn’t as friendly as him and preferred to live with the wild parrots in the palm trees with the occasional visit to me. But Pika had chosen me as his mate.

He was never far from my shoulder, disappearing for a few days only if the hibiscus flowers—which were his favourite—were blooming. He’d grow drunk on the nectar, pass out in some tree, and not come home for a while.

Those nights, I tried to convince myself that I didn’t miss the stupid bird. That it would be best for all of us if he just reverted to his wild side and forgot about me raising his scrawny ass.

But…he always came back.

And he always made me a little bit better when he did.

Sighing heavily, I raised my hand until I slipped him onto my shoulder. There he snuggled into my ear, chirping and chattering, content and calm.

Bracing myself, I let my eyes fall unwillingly onto Markus Grammer’s fantasy.

I read each page with my stomach coiled and my cock hard as a fucking rock.

I wanted to kill him but I also understood him.

Understood his fantasy because it was based in the roots of mankind. The need to dominate, manipulate, copulate.

It was a fantasy I could enjoy, if I ever let myself dabble in my creation.

Swallowing away inconvenient lust and violent possessiveness, I picked up my phone and arranged Jealousy to get Jinx ready.

Her vacation was over.

It was time to become a goddess.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

ALL DAY I’D EXISTED in a state of panic, terror, nausea, and claustrophobia.

The island no longer had the power to distract me with its sublime sea and comforting heat. After running from the guests on the beach, I’d curled in front of my door, and fallen asleep. Emotionally exhausted, I was determined never to leave that spot again.

However, when I woke up, a dinner tray with a carved-out pineapple holding delicious fried rice and tempeh had been delivered on the table outside. The knowledge that the door to my villa wasn’t the only way in reminded me all over again how vulnerable I was.

How anyone could swim to the small beach in front of me or slither through the jungle and enter easily through the open driftwood sliders.

There was no point camping out in front of my door.

None whatsoever.

The only thing I still had control over was eating, so my body didn’t crash again, and then I studied my hand-drawn map well into the night, racking my brains for scenarios on how to get free.

By the time the clock said three a.m. and I’d exhausted all concepts—both sane and insane—on how to escape, I made a promise to myself.

Whatever happened, I wouldn’t let it affect me, just as I didn’t let Sully affect me.

I sneered at myself.

He doesn’t affect you?

I hung my head in my hands.

Sully was the secret I tried to keep even from myself. I hated him—there was no debate about that. But…I also couldn’t deny that hate dipped into lust every now and again. His despised handsomeness somehow did affect me, and that was something I could never tolerate.

My promise evolved.

Whatever happens, do NOT let it affect you. You might have to sleep with someone, but remember what you said: it’s just an activity…like skiing. And whenever Sully decides to torment you again, don’t retaliate. Just be silent. Be remote. Be untouchable.

As dawn cracked the inky black of night, curling more and more fingers of light and ripping back the curtain of stars, I fell asleep.

I had nightmares of men surrounding me. Men touching me. Men lining up for their turn.

I woke with scratchy eyes and a chaotic heartbeat, knowing that today…was the day.

My fainting spell had bought me three days. Perhaps I should injure myself again and buy another week or so. Or maybe I should just swim out to sea and sink where no one could find me.