Third a Kiss

When four people had been reduced to two, I turned back to deal with Eleanor.

She’d stood, brushing granules off her knees, her simple dress looking like a robe upon a queen. That damn invisible crown had somehow adorned itself with yet more diamonds, frosting her in courage and transparency.

Her silver stare repeated what she’d confessed.

I love you.

I’m in love with you.

Despite what you are…

She’d admitted something I’d guessed while on Lebah yesterday. Yet I still didn’t trust it.

I didn’t trust her.

I didn’t know if I ever could.

Therefore, a game was in order.

A final game where I knew all the rules, and Jinx knew none of them.

A game that would prove her loyalty…once and for all.

Snapping my fingers, I prowled around her, and growled, “You’re serving in Euphoria.”

She gulped. “When?”

“Right fucking now.”

Chapter Seventeen

I PADDED BESIDE HIM.

I didn’t say a word as he stalked mercilessly down the lane.

My stomach ached.

It burned and snarled corrosive with denial at how swiftly things had been destroyed between us and full of barbwire knots at the blistering betrayal in Sully’s eyes.

The way he’d looked at me?

The pain.

The absolute horror.

It’d been a gunshot right into my useless heart.

Snatching his phone from his pocket, he called Cal as we continued walking in nasty silence. Cal answered straight away, his voice echoing loud enough for me to catch what he said.

“What’s up?”

Sully’s body was a coil. An explosive spring ready to detonate at any moment. “Tell the pilots they’re due to taxi Adam Marks back to Jakarta. He has a plane to catch.”

“Sure. Consider it done.” A pause before Cal asked, “Anything else?”

Sully narrowed his eyes, shooting me a glare. “Finalize the fantasy for Conrad Smithy.”

“I just finished the coding. But he’s not due in Euphoria until tomorrow.”

“I expect it to be loaded within twenty minutes.”

“Okay…” Cal’s voice changed to suspicion. “Why? What’s going on? He getting stroppy and wants an earlier fuck-fest?”

“Tell him I have a goddess ready and willing.” Sully’s hand tensed around his phone. Blackness filled his blue eyes as he bared his teeth in my direction. “She’s willing to work a double shift this week. Triple if there are guests requiring special care.”

Cal stayed silent for a moment before guessing far too much. “This goddess…it’s not Jinx, is it?”

Sully tore his furious gaze from me, striding faster.

I trotted to keep up with him. Partly because I didn’t want to make him any angrier than he already was and partly because I wanted to continue listening to their conversation.

“The one and fucking only,” Sully hissed. “She just volunteered.”

I wedged a fist in my belly.

Somehow, even if I hadn’t served a guest yet—thanks to Sully’s tampering—that seemed like it was all about to change. His temper was a monstrous entity clouding the sky, tainting the air with another thunderstorm. Electricity crackled between us, but this time, it wasn’t full of lust but rage. Shards of power crackled over his suit, his movements jerky with fury.

He wouldn’t forgive or forget.

Not until I’d sufficiently paid in pain and disgrace.

Cal muttered, “You let him fuck her and you’ll severely regret it.”

“Don’t tell me what the fuck I’ll regret, Calvin,” Sully snarled. “Have the cypher ready and keep your goddamn thoughts to yourself.”

“You’re the boss, sir. Consider it done.” Cal hung up.

Sully shoved his phone into his pocket and picked up his pace.

I jogged faster, running to my demise, my death, my doom.

* * * * *

“Go stand in the centre,” Sully snapped, shoving open the door to the Virtual Reality playroom of his Euphoria villa.

I didn’t try to argue or attempt to persuade him otherwise. The Sully who’d dropped a little of his barriers, allowing me to witness pieces of himself, had well and truly frozen me out. He’d returned to the ruthless bastard who’d force-fed me elixir, then made me sit on his fingers in delirious intoxication.

He’d shown no empathy then. He had no empathy now.

I swiftly made my way to the centre, standing beneath the delicate metal harness hanging from the ceiling.

Sully turned and closed the door behind him. Silence fell thicker as he kept his back to me, inhaling a huge gust of air before curling his hands and spinning to stalk toward me.

My mouth was dry as the beach, my tongue pierced by tiny shells and throat lodged by poisonous coral. If I had words to speak, I doubted I’d be able to give them sound.

I’d tried to convince him.

Even the guest who’d been the reason for this awful mess had vouched for me. Yet Sully’s ability to believe me was broken. Any faith I’d earned had just vanished like smoke from an extinguished candle. All that remained was the soot of our strange relationship and the waxy shards of consequences.

Without speaking, he pulled out his phone and pressed a button. Immediately, the harness descended, whirring gently to swing behind me.

I tensed, waiting for Sully to step into me and truss me up in the imprisonment. Maybe if his skin touched mine, if his body thought for him—rather than his battered ideals—we could stop this before it was too late.

However, unlike the other two times in Euphoria, he didn’t reach out to equip me himself. He didn’t take away my choices and dress me in sensors that stole my taste, touch, sight, hearing, and smell.

He made me do it.

“Take off your clothes and put the harness on.” His voice resembled an iceberg. Impenetrable, icy blue, and cold, cold, cold.

Heading toward the cupboards ringing the arena where sex took place between two people who saw an entirely different world to the one we currently resided in, he yanked open a door and removed a trolley full of black boxes with a purple orchid stencilled on the top.

The sensors.

Swallowing hard, my stomach ached even worse. A tumbling, tightening mess of worry of what would happen after this and an excruciating feeling of loss.

I’ve lost him.

Before I’d even had him.

Tears prickled my gaze, but I sniffed them back and did what he’d asked. Grabbing fistfuls of my dress, I pulled it over my head and threw it to the side. Standing in a turquoise bikini, I undid the bows behind my nape and lower back, tossing the top piece aside and repeating with the bottom half.

Sully’s jaw locked as he stole a glance, bringing the trolley to a stop beside me.

He remained in his expensive suit, looking every bit a pissed-off mogul with no mercy. My nakedness dressed me in goosebumps. Not from the cold—the island was never cold—but from the coldness of the man who I’d given my heart to.

I’d rescued him from drowning.

I’d accepted his body into mine.

We’d shared parts of ourselves that we’d never shared before.

And to be on the precipice of throwing all of that away made me sadder than any other time in my life. Sadder than when I’d been stolen, trapped, and sold. Sadder than when I didn’t think I’d see Scott or my family again.