I kissed him back, moaning as our tongues swept together.

Pika and Skittles took wing.

A gust of humid air whipped into the villa.

Energy prickled over our skin.

There was magic between us.

A rare, mystical connection. A bond that ought to be invincible and priceless...but Sully was determined to kill it.

He made a noise in his chest that dropped my stomach into my toes. A growl, a grunt, a groan of despair and damnation. His hands skated from my cheeks to my throat. His entire frame quaked with tightly reined rage, but his touch remained achingly soft. So, so soft as his thumb tickled my jawline.

My eyes snapped closed as he deepened our kiss.

Wet heat, endless belonging.

A goodbye neither of us wanted.

Ending the kiss, he wedged his forehead against mine.

His height meant he had to curl into me—a man who I could shelter beneath for the rest of my life if he’d have me. A man who could snatch that shelter away whenever he wanted.

Inhaling hard, he cupped my cheeks. “I only have the power to say this once. Don’t interrupt. Don’t argue. Nothing you say will sway my decision, so don’t waste your breath.”

I huffed with anger. “I’m not going to stay passive while you decide something I don’t agree with, Sully.”

His fingers bit harder into my cheeks. “What did I just say?”

“That you love me and you’ll come with me if you’re so determined to send me away.”

His jaw twitched with temper. “This is my home. I will not leave it undefended.”

“And you are my home. Therefore, I will not leave you alone.”

“Christ, why did it have to be you, huh? Why couldn’t I have fallen for a girl who obeys?”

I flinched, taking it personally because he meant it personally. He said he’d custom ordered me. He’d basically done this to himself by kidnapping me. “If you wanted a girl who obeys, you shouldn’t have chased after a dream.” I attempted to smile, despite the black cloud covering my heart.

“Yet the dream has turned into a nightmare.”

“You’re the one giving up on us.”

He winced. “I’m protecting you.”

“No, you’re taking away my choice.”

“Like I said, there is no fucking choice.”

“There’s always a choice.” My snappish sentence hung in the air between us.

For a moment, I believed I might’ve broken his shields—that he’d tell me what was going on instead of commanding what would happen. But then his gaze slid over me. He studied me as if he’d never see me again, and a heavy shadow fell over him, obscuring the man I’d fallen in love with, leaving behind a god with lightning in his blood, a vicious prince who wore anger as his crown, and a monster who no longer needed a mask.

He’d shut himself down.

He’d said goodbye.

I’d lost.

I sucked in a thin breath. “Sully...don’t.”

He shrugged.

A simple, staggeringly painful move. “I love you, but it’s not enough. It’s not enough because I can no longer live in a world where my brother has the freedom to do whatever the fuck he wants. I cannot think of myself while the smell of my creature’s fur still suffocates my lungs. I cannot put you in harm’s way any more than I already have. It’ll be the hardest thing I’ve ever done saying goodbye, but I will do it because I will not put myself first, do you understand?”

Without giving me time to reply, he winced and grunted with gravel and glass, “It’s over, Eleanor. I won’t repeat myself again. This fantasy of forever? This daydream of us? It’s finished. I’m done.”

Chapter Nine

I’D GOTTEN IT WRONG.

For all my science and theory, for all my successes in a sexual drug that reverted humans into animals and all the praise and profit I’d gathered...I’d somehow fucked up the recipe for happiness.

“Sully!” Eleanor clawed at my hand as I dragged her out of her villa and down the orchid-lined pathways. “Sully, stop!”

Orchids.

The main ingredient in my elixir and the trophy of my triumph. I’d spent years stripping every flora and flower down, seeking hallucinogenic, psychotropic, and experimental methods to tweak the human nervous system into accepting deeper pleasure, prolonged desire, and embrace the complete lack of inhibitions.

I’d achieved that quest.

Yet it’d been the wrong journey to chase.

Happiness was the fantasy, and sex was the consolation prize.

“Let me go, damn you!”

I ignored her.

I’d ignored her violent outburst when I’d told her we were finished. I’d ignored her rage as I’d carted her from her villa. And I would continue ignoring her attempts at fleeing because I had nothing else to give.

If we continued arguing, I would lose.

It was a certainty that stripped away my power as a man.

I could only repeat myself so much before my time ran out and Drake would hurt her.

“I’ll just come back if you put me on the helicopter. You don’t get to choose to keep me or send me away!”

My lips thinned as I swallowed back a retort. I could actually. I’d chosen to buy her. And now, I’d chosen to sacrifice her.

That was noble, right?

That showed some growth in my shadow-shaded heart?

If I didn’t care, I would just leave her with the other goddesses. If I didn’t love her with every fucking piece of me, I wouldn’t spare a second thought of her survival.

I tripped in the sand, my heart circumnavigating my brain and trying to halt my stride.

The thought of her flying away?

The idea of never seeing her again?

It was a level of pain I’d never felt before.

Eleanor had taught me a lesson I wished I could unlearn, but it was too late.

I knew better now.

I knew if she died...I’d die too.

I knew it wasn’t elixir that granted joy.

It wasn’t sex that gave unequalled ecstasy.

It was all the other shit that came from trading hearts with another.

The feeling of home. The sensation of staring into their eyes and knowing you were the most important person in the world to them. The most organic sensation of belonging.

Thanks to Eleanor, I’d tasted the first and only splash of sweet, sweet happiness I’d have. I’d finally learned, almost in my mid-thirties, that instead of bottling lust, I should’ve bottled love. A stronger more potent drug that mimicked everything a human searched, coveted, and died for. An ingested endorphin that eradicated depression and loneliness. A priceless imposter for the real thing.

“SULLY!” Eleanor scratched my wrist, digging her nails into my flesh. “Stop for God’s sake. We need to talk about this!”

I shook my head, gritting my teeth together.

Don’t answer her.

You couldn’t get up the guts to tell her you lied about how you felt.

You told her point-fucking-blank that you’re still in love with her.

You will lose if you speak.

I couldn’t be trusted to talk again.

My stride increased, dragging her kicking and screaming toward the beach and helipad.

Skittles darted like an aggravated hummingbird around my face, chirping and pecking, trying to get me to release her chosen mate.