My mind skipped back to last night. Of holding Eleanor. Of my heart kicking when she snuggled close. Of all the other bullshit that’d happened since she’d arrived.

It was a minutely struggle not to ask him how she was this morning. Not to stalk to her villa and make sure she’d drunk her smoothie, taken her vitamins, and stuffed her face with life-giving food.

Had she enjoyed Euphoria?

Was she in pain?

Did she hate me less or more?

Ah, Christ.

He was right. I let her have way too much monopoly over me…and I couldn’t fucking stop it.

Sighing, I sat down and pinched the bridge of my nose again, trying to squeeze out her curse like an ugly zit.

“Look, Sinclair…I get it. She’s unique. There’s obviously something going on between you two. You’d have to be blind as those fat-ass fruit bats you rescued. But…I’m only doing what I promised—” He held up his hand in surrender. “—Guarding your back.”

Before I could argue, apologise, or agree, Pika flapped through the see-through curtains and landed on my laptop. Squawking and doing his little foot-stomping dance, he attacked the letter K, going at it like a feathered Rottweiler.

“Ah, no you don’t.” Plucking him from the computer, I held his little body, so vibrantly aware of his tiny thrumming heart in his very breakable chest. His sharp beak pecked at my fingers. His black glossy eyes gleamed with mischief as he squeaked like a dog’s chew toy, trying to get me to free him.

“Ugh, why do you do this? Your cuteness is pissing me off.” I opened my palm, expecting him to fly away, but he flopped upside down instead, rolling on his tucked-in wings, a strange aerial version of a turtle on its back. I rolled my eyes at his scaly little legs waving in the air. “Yeah, yeah. Good morning to you, you little nightmare.”

He squawked loudly, making me wince. “Morning! Morning. Pika. Pika. Pika!”

My eardrums physically ached. A swim was definitely needed. I refused to waste the entire fucking day to this residual agony.

“God, you and that bird.” Cal scoffed. “Get a room.”

My lips twisted into a half-smile, glad our previous conversation was over and fully aware that Cal had a soft spot for this little menace, just as much as I did.

After all, Cal had been in my life almost as long as Pika. He’d been the first to learn of Pika’s origins. The only guy I trusted when it came time for my massive liberation.

My second-in-command held my stare for a moment, reliving the path we’d travelled together. I’d told him to go off on his own multiple times. He had the brains to cook something equally as profitable as I had. But, instead, he decided to hang out with me, mastering the art of irritation.

Fuck only knew why.

Some might say it was a mistake bringing Cal with me to my islands. He wasn’t trained to be a personal assistant, manservant, or my second. He’d been a junior university geek when I’d taken over my parents’ pharmaceutical company. Training to be a pharmacist, he was doing some very underpaid research in the lab, so he could understand how drugs were mixed and blended, ready for the illnesses he’d be dispensing for.

We’d met in typical unplanned fashion.

I’d been nineteen; he’d just turned twenty.

I’d been head honcho of Sinclair and Sinclair Group for precisely five days. The policies I’d put in place had ruffled the delicate feathers of the stuffy board members. I’d done things they weren’t happy with. I’d implemented new rules they despised. But they couldn’t stop me as I owned the majority shares and had the wishes of an iron-clad will from my recently deceased parents.

Sullivan Aiden Sinclair…their new ruler and king.

My older brother, Drake, had also been in the will and testament. However, his inheritance came in the form of the ridiculously expensive mansion my parents owned, the summer house in Greece, and the entire contents of their lucrative bank accounts.

He was the golden child.

I was the second born kid who didn’t fit in with their family squad. I hadn’t been left cash or property—I’d been gifted Sinclair and Sinclair, not as a reward but as a punishment.

However…I was grateful. And I’d used it to my full advantage.

On the sixth day of my ownership, I’d sent out a blanket email announcing the immediate ban on all animal testing. I didn’t care what it was for—face cream, acne prevention, cancer eradicator—all animals were forthwith freed from their miserable existence.

When I’d bumped into Cal on the elevator, a monkey was wrapped around my neck wearing a diaper, his skin peeling from the latest tests and his eyes bloodshot from a new form of conjunctivitis medicine. In my left hand, I held four leashes, all tethering timid and terrified beagles to my heel. And in my right, I had a cage holding a dozen dying mice.

He’d stumbled into the mirrored elevator, lost in the humongous skyscraper of Sinclair and Sinclair, and came face to face with his boss’s boss’s boss who also happened to be evacuating a zoo.

Without a word, he’d taken the beagles.

We’d descended to the glass-caverned, travertine-coated lobby, and he’d helped me stuff the diseased and ill-gotten creatures into a massive truck destined for the airport.

That had been the beginning of an incident I was both deeply proud and immensely ashamed of. It’d also earned me a ruthless reputation.

Before I’d moved permanently to my Goddess Isles, I’d heard what they whispered in the fancy corridors. Human killer. Animal lover. They claimed I had the heart of a wolf instead of a man—choosing four-legged beasts instead of his own brethren.

They meant it as a slur.

I took it as a compliment.

Because it was true.

Humans deserved the worst from me. Animals were guaranteed my protection.

From anyone.

Pika fluttered to my shoulder, nibbling my ear.

I shivered and nudged him away with my chin. “Fly away, little flea. I’m busy.”

He twittered and tweeted, mimicking the sparrows and other birdlife that regularly serenaded the garden outside my office. My headache crested with each of his little chirps, not finding comfort in his song, when usually, my heart would settle and my stress would evaporate.

Fuck it.

Standing slowly, I pinned Cal with a stare. “You code Nathan Fisher’s fantasy. I’m going for a swim.” I smiled cynically. “And who knows…maybe I will take a sick day, after all.”

I left before he could rub my downfall in my face.

Pika fluttered after me, his wings snapping in the humidity.

Chapter Four

I SPRAWLED ON THE sand like a discarded toy that’d had all its stuffing removed.

The sun was at its zenith, directly above me, doing its best to chargrill my skin, even with the generous lashings of sunscreen I’d applied.

I willed myself to sit up. To eat. To focus on this stunning, glittering day.

But…the sand cradled me too well. The effort of clenching stomach muscles and corralling arms to push up was too much.

So, I lay there. The sun painting bright red patterns on my closed eyelids, stealthily streaking my dark hair with strands of bleached copper. I’d always been a sun lover, acutely attuned to its alternating shades and strengths in different countries.