Screw my swim. I would just work through my foggy pain and get on with it.

I’d just clicked on an email from Peter Beck, my head scientist over at Sinclair and Sinclair Group, when Cal knocked and came in without waiting for my approval.

His habit of barging into places without an invitation had become highly inconvenient.

“Nice of you to wait for admittance.” I scowled, hoping he got the memo.

He shrugged. “Got things to do. No time to waste.”

“One of these days, you’re gonna barge in somewhere and regret what you see.”

He smirked. “Already happened. On multiple occasions.”

My eyes narrowed, wondering what incidents he referred to. Seeing me butt-ass naked after I’d had a shower and decided to air-dry instead of using a towel? When he caught me mid-masturbation a few years ago? Or how about walking in and cock-blocking me when I’d been seconds away from taking Eleanor last night before Markus fucking Grammer could claim her?

My hands curled into fists. “Some days, I truly want to fire you.”

“But you won’t.” He laughed. “Who else can you trust around here?”

He had a fucking point.

Ever since I’d opened my islands to my exclusive guests, I’d fought a never-ending carousel of people wanting to steal my idea. Virtual reality was huge in today’s society. Kids played it. Teenagers lived in it. High-class athletes and expensive professions employed it as a training tool.

It’d become common, easily accessible. However, none of them had the fully immersive experience like I did. Goggles and headphones with an interactive chair were the extent of what was available.

Mine, on the other hand?

The sensors, earbuds, contacts…it all ensured you lost yourself in the hallucination. It became so real that it wasn’t a hallucination. Your own nervous system and brain accepted the sensory clues I coded and treated it as true.

That was what people wanted to replicate.

And I wasn’t open to selling.

Which meant I’d made more enemies from my VR creation than I had through my pharmaceutical formulations…which—honestly?—was fucked up.

Drugs were better than gold in today’s market.

Create a drug that granted happiness?

Instant billionaire status.

Conjure a drug that offered salvation to disease or pain, but in turn caused side effects that needed a whole other box of pills to cure?

Instant presidential status.

Control the health of the masses, and you became a true god in every sense of the word.

I’d had people bow to me for what my lab had created. I’ve had councillors and governors try to kill me for not conforming to their rules. For delivering drugs that didn’t cause the suffering that they so readily relied on to thin out the population and make money from their misery.

And now, I had jealous assholes who wanted my technology. Yet another reason I appreciated the seclusion of my shores. No one could sneak up without being fully visible upon the sea. No one could take what was mine without being murdered long before they could claim it.

“What do you want, Cal?” I massaged the base of my nape, cursing the persistent headache. I should probably pop an anti-inflammatory, but just because I pumped out pills and marketed medicine like new fashion lines didn’t mean I partook very often.

I preferred natural cures. Cures grown in my gardens rather than in my lab.

“I didn’t think you’d make an appearance today. Figured I’d screen any important emails so you didn’t have to later. Also, Jupiter is in Euphoria tonight. That Nathan Fisher guy’s fantasy is twisted.”

Cricking my neck, I rolled my shoulders. “Twisted how?” Did I miss something when I let him play on my island? Should I have revoked his invitation as I did so many others?

“He wants a full underwater experience.” Cal carved air quotations on either side of his head. “His words: I want a slutty, hornier version of My Little Mermaid, but not on land, in that cave where she has all those knick-knacks and forks and shit.”

I rolled my eyes. “He watched way too much Disney as a kid.”

“Either that or he has a fetish for fish. His last name probably predisposed him to marine life.”

“How the fuck am I supposed to code something like that?” I bit my lip, working through the computer algorithms that I’d have to write. The gravity wires in Euphoria would have to be used so they felt weightless underwater. Even without half my brain throbbing with agony, I doubted I could design a mermaid that could have decent sex. Where were their sex organs anyway?

They’re mythical, Sully.

They don’t have pussies because they don’t exist.

Ugh, my temper was the length of a shoe-lace and threatening to snap.

Ocean.

I needed to wade into that wet haven and drown away my pain.

Cal noticed my huff of annoyance. “I can write the cipher. No big deal.” He chuckled. “Be kinda cool to see what sort of human-world rules I can break.”

My eyes swooped to his. “I can do it.”

“Yeah, but you don’t have to. That’s why you pay me. I do the crap you don’t need to—”

“When have you known me to take a sick day?”

He frowned, legitimately thinking. “You know…I don’t think you have.”

“Precisely.” I grimaced and straightened my spine. “I’ve put myself through worse and survived. This is nothing.”

“Yeah, but…” He came toward my desk, his suit pressed and slate-grey sleek. “I haven’t seen you that drained in a very long time. Ever since you—”

“Enough.” I gave him a warning glare. “It’s just another day, Cal. That’s all.”

“If you say so.” He sniffed with history, glowering with his own temper. “But you fucked up last night. You know that, right?”

“Quit it,” I growled.

“You shouldn’t have prepared her or removed her from the VR hook-up. You should stay the hell away from her.”

“For fuck’s sake—”

“No, just listen.” His jaw flexed as he gritted his teeth, knowing he shouldn’t say what he was about to but was going to anyway. “You never usually interfere with the everyday housekeeping…so you shouldn’t start now. And you know full well why.” Planting his fist onto my desk, he muttered, “You gave me one clear guideline when you started his place. One unbreakable rule that doesn’t make a shitload of sense to me, but you made me swear…so here it is. You said if you somehow forgot, I was to remind you why you choose animals over humans.”

I bristled. “I remember.”

“I don’t think you do. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have done what you did last night—”

“I told you to back the fuck off.” I shot upright, ignoring the disgruntled pain of my body.

“And you told me to keep you away from anyone who threatened everything you’ve become. You told me that you’d rather stay alone than let someone else have a power over—”

“Leave.” I pointed at the door. “I know what I said, and I know why you’re reminding me, but I have things under control.”

He snorted. “Yeah, if this is you under control—unable to stay away from that walking Jinx of a curse—then you’re in deeper shit than I thought.”