All it would take was one search on my name.
One article of who I truly was and her commitment to me would be over.
With that knowledge came a strange kind of peace, a solidifying dread.
I flinched against the slam of inevitability.
Fuck, I’m an idiot.
What did I think? That I’d keep her away from her family, friends, and facts for the remainder of her life? That I’d continue trading in goddesses and elixir, and she would stand by my side and plug guests into Euphoria?
That she’d still love me when she knew what I was?
It’d been a pipe dream.
A goddamn stupid fantasy.
And Drake had just woken me before it was too late.
I didn’t get to keep her.
There was no happily ever after for me.
I clutched her fingers, making her wince.
“What happened? What did you just decide?” Her gaze searched mine, prying and diving, yanking out my secrets and sins one by one.
The only problem was they’d all been buried by the truth. I didn’t even have to put a mask on to lie anymore.
“Okay, Eleanor...temporary.”
I expected her to smile, to hug me, to kiss me with gratefulness. Instead, she peered at me suspiciously. “You’re saying I can come back?”
“I am.”
“When?”
“In a few days. A week? Give me a week...and then, come back.” I shrugged. “This is my home. You’ll know where I am. I’ll be here...if you want me.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
I smiled away my sadness. “It means I’ll still be here, trading in women, selling their pleasure, being the man who bought you from traffickers.”
Her forehead furrowed. “Reminding me of your downfalls won’t prevent me from returning, Sully. I know what you are.”
I nodded, reaching forward to do up her harness. “I’m aware.”
She shivered as my knuckles brushed the bottom of her breasts, clipping the buckle together. The pilots added more power to the rotors, making the cabin shudder in eagerness to leave gravity behind.
Giving myself one final good memory—a memory I would hold onto for the rest of my life—I linked my fingers behind her nape and tugged her forward until our foreheads touched. “Only you could turn an ending into a temporary pause. Only you could strike a deal with the devil about returning to his side instead of running away from him as fast as possible. Because of you, I know what it feels like to be happy. And thanks to you, I’m now condemned to a half-life without you.”
“No.” She shook her head. “Only a few days. I’ll come back...you’ll see.”
I wanted to trust her.
I wanted to trust that I would survive Drake’s invasion, that I’d be a better man afterward, that I could move on from Serigala, and somehow find the strength to trust in us.
But...trust had always been my downfall, and I knew deep in my gut that this wasn’t temporary.
This was permanent...Eleanor just didn’t know it yet.
I pulled away.
Our time was up.
Her hair slipped over my hands as I released her with reluctance.
Cal’s presence lurked outside. The pilots were seconds away from soaring into the sky. I tried to order my tongue into saying something poignant, something that she’d always remember.
I love you.
I need you.
You’re mine...even if I’m letting you go.
But in the end, I just kissed her.
I sank my hands into her hair one last time and crushed my mouth to hers.
I braced for harsh finality.
To kiss her with savagery and sin.
Instead, I kissed her softly, slowly, longingly. A final farewell even while she said temporary. My tongue slipped past her lips, tasting her, groaning with regret.
She moaned, opening wider, inviting me to take her deeper, to blend us together, to twine her lust with mine.
Her hands swooped up and clutched my shirt, yanking me into her.
I stumbled, resting on my haunches while we kissed and the helicopter gave us its last jerky warning before it winged into the sky.
I needed to leave.
To plan for war.
But still, I kissed her.
I lost myself in her.
I gave myself one exquisite moment where I trusted in a future I could not have.
And then, I let her go.
I leaped from the helicopter.
I punched the fuselage with all the pent-up fury inside me.
I slammed the door, keeping my gaze far from my greatest jinx.
And I locked my knees against the downdraft as Eleanor soared toward the stars.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Fuck, it hurt.
Cal stood with me, silent against the slicing screech of the rotor blades until the pilots banked and headed out to sea.
I rubbed at the bleeding within my chest.
I’d been torn in two. Ripped apart. Turned into half of everything that I’d been.
As the palm trees calmed, and Pika and Skittles darted from the jungle, too late to say goodbye, Cal’s hand landed on my shoulder, squeezing hard. “You’re a fool, Sinclair. A goddamn fool.”
I growled in warning. I felt exactly like a fool, but I didn’t need the goddamn staff rubbing my face in it. “I’d stay silent if I were you.”
“Someone has to knock some sense into your thick skull. I don’t envy you, but...I get it.”
“Get what precisely? That I went against my every rule, and now I’m paying the price?”
“Get that you didn’t have a choice.”
“I did have a choice.” I flashed him a cold smile, doing my best to ignore the lacerating holes in my heart. “I just chose wrong. I fell, and now she’s gone.”
He scowled. “I’ve never seen you lie that well before.”
I sighed. “It wasn’t a lie.”
“You told her she can come back?”
“I did.”
“And you meant it?”
I shrugged, doing my best to stand still without stumbling with regret. “It doesn’t matter what I meant. It’s over.”
“She was good for you, man. I think you’ve made a mistake.”
I glowered. “Back off, you don’t know a goddamn thing—”
“She’ll come back, you know. You can’t be that stupid to think she won’t.”
Keeping my eyes on the night-beacon flashing in the sky, I balled my hands. “Once she learns who I truly am, she won’t. She’ll make the decision for me. I won’t have to break her heart...she’ll break mine.”
“She’s not like the others, Sullivan. She’s fallen for you, but she’s smart, too. She’ll figure out a way.”
I turned to face him, dislodging his hold on me. “We both know I don’t do well in love. Either they get killed because of my good intentions, or they die directly at my hand. This way, she stays alive.”
“She might break the pattern.”
“Or she might be exactly the same.”
“She’ll still attempt to come back.”
“She can try...but she won’t succeed.”
Cal’s green gaze sparked with understanding, shaking his head. “Oh, you sneaky son of a bitch.”
Striding up the gangway, I held out my finger for Pika. He descended gently, chirping with worry, sensing my scrambled emotions. Skittles continued to zip in the darkness, her mournful squeaking breaking my fucking heart all over again.
Cal sniffed. “She won’t be able to come back because no one without an invitation can find us.”
I gritted my teeth, swallowing more pain. “Exactly.”
Without the dark web coordinates, my islands were only accessible by fluke or fortune. I’d sent her away knowing that. I’d agreed to her promise of temporary, all while knowing she could never return.
Permanent, Jinx.
It’s over.
C
hrist, will the pain ever stop?
“Fuck, she’s gonna be pissed when she realises,” Cal muttered.
“She’ll be grateful because she’ll hate me.”
Cal followed me toward the beach, tossing the unneeded rope on the sand. “I don’t envy you, Sully. Not one fucking bit.”
I huffed, placing Pika on my shoulder and yanking the gun from my waistband to check the safety was off and the chamber was full.
I didn’t have time to be tired or sad.
Those two words were no longer permitted in my vocabulary.
She’s gone.
Drake’s coming.
I would ensure my shores were fortified with every weapon I had in my arsenal.
I ignored Calvin; I’d done enough talking without dissecting my doomed relationship.
“You know...if she does find a way back, I think you should keep her.”
“She’s not a goddamn pet, Cal.”
“She could be.”
I bared my teeth. “I preferred it when you cockblocked me. Stop with the psychological bullshit. She’s gone. It’s over.”
“I only cockblocked you because you asked me to. You ordered me never to let you get close to another human. You asked me—”
“To stop me from falling because I honestly don’t have the strength. Animal or human, I’m done with loss, alright? She’s gone. Serigala is gone. It’s done. I suggest you shut your mouth before I shut it for you. My last warning.”
He pulled out his own handgun, checking he had a full clip. “Fine. Noted.” He huffed before shoving it back into his trousers. “Just for the record, though...I like her. I think—”
A shot boomed over the ocean, shutting Cal up.
We spun around, our eyes shooting skyward, skating over stars just as gunfire blazed through the night, aiming straight toward the helicopter.
Chapter Ten
SULLY GOT HIS WISH.
I was no longer on his shores.
I gasped at the suddenness, the aching grief, the plummet of my tummy as we climbed higher and higher.
Sully stood below; his hair tussled by the wind as his black shirt snapped around his powerful torso. The harsh brackets of horror around his mouth, the stress etched into his forehead, the grim stamina and exhausted despair in his gaze vanished as intimate details were hidden by distance.
Why did I tell him I’d go?
Why had I obeyed when every part of me screamed that I should never have left?
This was a complete reversal to my unwanted arrival here.
This eviction hurt a thousand times worse.
The higher I climbed, the more my chest ached. My heart fisted with thorns as two parrots dashed from the forest, no longer buffeted by the downdraft—two tiny birds who’d wrapped their talons around my soul.
God, Skittles.
It didn’t matter he’d agreed to temporary. It didn’t matter that he loved me.
Nothing mattered against the bone-deep foreshadowing I’d felt when he’d agreed to let me return. He’d agreed, but there’d been something—something wrong lurking behind his voice. A harsh resignation. A decision that agreed with my suggestion yet reeked with a lie.
Had I adopted too many of his traits?
Had my trust turned so fragile that I couldn’t believe he shared the same need for me? That he could survive sending me away forever?
No, he loves me.
This doesn’t need to be permanent.
You’ll be back in a few hours...you’ll see.
I balled my hands in my lap as we climbed higher and higher, blurring both parrots as they circled Sully, refusing to land while he remained drenched with goodbyes and grief.
I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was the last time I’d ever see him.
I couldn’t stop the god-awful premonition that this was permanent...for him.
His island shrunk from a place I’d found such torment and pleasure to something so small I could pluck it from the ocean and place into my pocket for safekeeping.
The helicopter banked.
The pilots added speed.
And a streak of light blazed up the sky beside my window.
I baulked. My pulse thudded with adrenaline.
Was that a shooting star?
Another came, followed by the unmistakable screech of metal punching into metal.
“Shit!” The captain’s curse filled the cabin, despite the din of rotors.
Grabbing the headset beside me, I shoved it on. “What’s happening?”
More streaks of light. A rat-tat-tat-tat of illumination. A few pings against the fuselage.
“Tighten your harness!” the co-pilot snarled. “We’re under fire!”
“What?” I bounced in my binds as the helicopter swerved up and to the side just as another spray of light originated far below us, spearing through the stars directly for us.
“Dammit!” The captain angled us steeply to the left, putting distance between us and danger.
Danger.
Shit, Sully!
“Take me back! Right now.” I grabbed the microphone, holding it close to my lips. “Please!”
“Quiet! Stop yelling through the damn headset.” The pilots angled us forward, encouraging rotor blades to slice almost vertically through the sky, soaring with speed.
My stomach flipped with weightlessness.
“No!” I struggled with my harness, my terror bouncing through me like a rogue frog. “Please, please go back!”
“Our orders are to take you to Java. We need to get to a safe altitude.” The captain reached across to his controls and flicked a switch, muting me.
“Hey!” I screamed. “Go back. If they’re shooting at us, they’ll be shooting at Sully. We have to go back!”
Nothing.
The pilots ignored me, their chatter of flying maneuvers and technical speak filling my ears but forbidding me the right to talk.
Sully!
“Please...” I ran my fingers over the headset, trying to find a button that would allow a two-way conversation. “Please turn around.”
No reply.
Nothing but their clipped curses and crackling feedback.
Daring to squish tight against the window, I looked down, down, down toward a black, black ocean and the flickering lights of Sully’s shores.
And my heart died as the spray of bullets that’d attacked us aimed for land instead.
A morbid firework, seeking victims, streaking with comet fire toward the man I loved.
Death in the darkness.
An enemy he couldn’t see.
Sully!
Chapter Eleven
“GET ME A GODDAMN radio!”
I ran up the jetty toward the guards lined up on my shores. Each had a machete, shotgun, and semi-automatic. Each was well-versed in hand-to-hand combat as well as being accurate shooters.
“Aim at the boat!” Cal ran beside me, yelling orders, preparing for war. “Sink those motherfuckers!”
The men moved toward the tide, a march of weapons and wrath.
A man ran toward me and slapped a walkie-talkie in my palm. “Here.”
Spinning to stare at the sky again, flinching as more bullet-fire shot toward the flashing light blatantly giving away the helicopter’s location, I pressed the radio button, and snarled, “Captain Jondal, turn off your fucking anti-collision light!”
A crackle of feedback hissed while everything I was as a man scrambled.
The pain at saying goodbye.
The rage at Serigala.
The suffocating fury at Drake’s tricks.
Fuck!
More gunfire, all aimed at shooting Eleanor from the sky. My heart ceased beating as I dropped my stare, following where the bullets had come from.
Squinting into the distance, I saw a boat ghosting on the horizon. No lights. No announcement. Just sly unfairness and my bastard brother who’d not even honoured his time for battle.
He’s an hour fucking early.
/> The gentlemen’s code broken because he was a cunt and I was once again a motherfucking fool.
Another spritz of bullets aimed straight for Eleanor.
The helicopter’s spotlight made them the perfect target.
“Captain! Turn off your goddamn lights!”
I thought I’d saved her.
Instead, I’d put her directly into harm’s way.
My rage ignited. A rush of wildfire through my veins, and this time...this time I didn’t try to leash it.
I let go.
I allowed heat and hate to lick through me.
I thirsted for Drake’s death.
I wanted his heart limp and lifeless in my hand.
I wanted to cut up his corpse and decorate every island in my atoll with pieces of him.
The helicopter suddenly vanished, and the radio came alive in my palm. “Done. We’re out of range, sir. We’ve gone stealth.”
My stomach clenched, fear blending with my fury. “Is she okay? Did you get hit?”
“A few pockmarks. Nothing serious. Cargo is intact.”
Cargo?
Fucking hell, it was my world up there.
A woman who’d turned me into a useless, stupid idiot.
“Get out of here. Fly directly to Java.”
“Copy.”
The radio went dead just as a crack of violence aimed not at the sky but my shores.
A few of my men grunted, tumbling forward as blood spurted from wounds.
For fucking shit.
My temper broke through the veneer I wielded. I bulldozed through my decorum and failed attempts at being civilised.
My eyes locked on the boat ahead. A boat that should never have been able to come so close to my shores, manned by a cocksucker who I should’ve killed decades ago.
Cal yelled at the guards, giving instruction to return fire.
I wasn’t needed.
He had his job...and I have mine.
Stepping into the fugue of fury, I ripped off my shirt and welcomed the insidious pull of demonic instincts. I embraced the part of me that I’d always run from—the part of me that tainted me as a man and kept me firmly ruled as a beast.
Unbuckling my belt, I strode toward the sea.
Drake would not be allowed onto my shores.
No fucking way.
As warm ocean lapped around my ankles and seeped into my shoes, I shed the final part of myself. My teeth felt sharper. My senses acute. My mouth watered for gore. I was wrong when I thought I’d harness the wolf I’d named Serigala for.
Fourth a Lie (GODDESS ISLES Book 4) Page 7