He’ll sell you to be rid of a problem.
To be rid of the mess between you.
I couldn’t breathe.
I hated taking elixir. I hated serving in Euphoria. I hated having my own body and mind work against me.
But at least, I could trust in my boundaries. I had a friend in Jealousy. I had shelter and food and clothes.
I have a parrot who chose me for her own.
The thought of having all that stripped away? Of being given to another man who might not grant the same level of care? Of being taken to another country? Of being nothing more than a possession, bouncing from master to dictator?
I…I can’t.
A silent sob swelled in my lungs, suffocating me.
God, why didn’t I try harder to escape?
Why did I step out onto the helipad when Sully flew above me?
Needing fresh air, I bolted to my feet and flew out of the villa. Skittles chased me, squawking with fear over our potential separation.
I didn’t stop running until the warm tide licked at my ankles and the sun slipped in a fiery crimson blaze into the sea.
I wedged a fist in my stomach as the last dregs of sunlight faded, seeming so final, so resolute.
A sunset on my time here.
* * * * *
Nine forty-five a.m.
I studied myself in the mirror.
My skin held a cast of ghostly white with foreboding, my eyes rested in shadows from lack of sleep, and my pulse pounded visibly in my neck from panic.
As a girl who’d barely slept, whose own life didn’t belong to her, whose future was so uncertain, I was a mess.
But for a goddess who’d been summoned before her owner, I was every bit a bewitching immortal.
It’d taken me since dawn to perfect the mirage.
Sully traded in chimera mockery and deception, well…I had learned from the master. I might not have elixirs and sensory deceptors, but I did have determination and the undying need not to be sold.
If I left this island.
When I leave this island…
I would be going home. Not to someone else’s bed.
Skittles sat quietly on the vanity, nestled in the cotton buds that I’d strewn across the surface in my haste to complete my fallacy.
I didn’t recognise the girl staring back at me. I’d lost the ability to call myself Eleanor Grace because that was a human name…and today, I was no longer human.
I was as myth-like as I could get without sprouting angel wings.
My hair was loose. Washed with coconut and kaduka plum, rinsed in icy water to bring ethereal shine to each and every strand. Sepia and bronze, mahogany and henna, the length and glossiness hung in a heavy veil down my back. Frangipani flowers decorated the length, randomly placed so I looked as if I’d been birthed by the very island that Sully adored.
My paleness had been hidden with finely applied make-up. I’d never been talented with a brush or pigments before, but I’d kept washing and reapplying until I’d achieved an otherworldly look.
Dewy lips, smoky eyes, harsh cheekbones, and perfect glowing skin, even my breasts had been amplified—a lash of bronzer down my cleavage to highlight their fullness.
But it was the dress that turned me from normal to extraordinary.
A gown I’d found in the wardrobe, tucked in a zipped bag in the shadows.
Champagne glitter and fawn crystal.
Straps kissed my shoulders, breaking into a V down my chest to swoop low between my breasts. Intricate panels of jewels hugged my belly and hips, before hanging heavy and full of glamour to the floor. It moulded to me like a second skin, granting the illusion that my own flesh had been inlaid with caramel gemstones and flawless diamonds.
I’d never worn something so glitzy, nor felt quite so unlike myself.
Nine fifty a.m.
Ten minutes before I would come face to face with Sullivan Sinclair.
Ten minutes before I strode into battle wearing an amour destined to break thy enemy.
This dress wasn’t for Roy Slater.
This masquerade wasn’t for Sully Sinclair.
The glowing goddess who stared back in the mirror was for me.
My parting gift to men who thought I could be demeaned with a price tag.
If Roy wanted to buy me and Sully wanted to sell me…then so be it.
But I would make both men see just how much I was worth.
I would make them understand that money was worthless.
That I was priceless.
That this whole sick charade was over.
Chapter Thirty-Three
NINE FIFTY-NINE A.M.
She’s late—
Calvin’s grunt ripped my head up from studying my watch. Roy Slater practically fell off my couch. And I—
I fucking ripped out my pumping, spurting heart and laid it bloody and warm at the feet of the most stunning creature I’d ever seen.
My body malfunctioned.
My cock hardened to stone; my pulse went haywire; my eyes couldn’t drink her in fast enough.
Fucking
wow…
Eleanor strode from my garden, past the mermaid fountain and bird table where local sparrows ate their fill, and padded barefoot into my office. Her dress trailed after her, gracing a trail of golden sand as if she’d been summoned from the very sea I idolized.