[Invitation to Eden 20.0] The Island of Eden (5 page)

My heart’s desire is for this woman only, but ten years is a very long time to wait. And the need is growing again, too big to ignore for much longer.

I think I need to plan another trip off the island to satisfy my alternative needs. It’s only in sex—a very specific kind of sex—that I can momentarily forget about the defining moment of my life.

Closing my eyes, I lift my head toward the sun as it rises. I sigh as the warm air caresses my skin. As the first rays stroke me, I think that there is no judgment in the sun. It does not flinch away from the puckering of my burn scars. The warmth caresses me without revulsion. I do not have to hide away from its touch. Opening my eyes, I trace my fingers over the side of my face, feeling every hard ridge and valley of my furrowed flesh.

One day, one day I will find a woman who is as bold as the sun, who doesn’t care what other people think. It’s too much to hope that she’ll immediately see past the scars to who I am, but I have to hope that with time she’ll be able to accept them.

Hoping, dreaming, longing for this is

After taking in a deep breath of fragrant air, I pad back into the pool area and grab a towel. I quickly dry myself as I go into the change room. I push off my trunks and walk naked out into the terrarium that is connected to the pool. I don’t worry about running into anyone, as I live in this estate alone. I have employees that cook and clean for me, but they adhere to a strict schedule, so that they never see me with my guard down. Never witness the horror that is my face.

There’s only one person on this island who ever sees me as I truly am—Joely, our pilot, who flies in my guests. She’s been here since the beginning, since the island first communicated with me... since it communicated with her, as well. She’s my one confidante, my one true friend.

Not that I’d ever call her that to her face. She’s like the little sister I never had... the
bratty
little sister... and she teases me mercilessly at every opportunity.

Smirking a bit to myself, I walk down the stone steps, then enter the greenhouse, the modern structure of glass a stark contrast against the cliffs and ancient wood and stone of my home—new and old, they somehow work together.

The glass filters the light and brings wet heat to the flowers that I grow—again, Joely is the only one who knows of my hobby. I grow plants native to my home country—hyacinth, daffodils, cliff roses. I grow lilies and orchids as well, because they are harder to cultivate, and every time I succeed in bringing them to bloom it’s a triumph.

I’ve never grown the one flower that started it all though—the hibiscus. The scarlet blooms grow wild all over Eden, but to me that particular bud will always remind me of
the woman
. Of the way I once tucked the petals into her long flaxen hair.

I’ve held firm in my belief that she will come for over ten years now. I can’t imagine that the island would show her to me if she didn’t exist.

Ten years is a long time. Every day that passes without her arrival has me growing more and more restless. Usually time in my greenhouse soothes me, but today...

Today I feel like something is crackling under my skin. The helpless feeling reminds me too much of the months after the accident, and I won’t tolerate it.

Work is my salvation.

Dressing quickly, I make my way to my office. One of its walls faces the cliffs and is made entirely of glass, so on cold days I can have the view of my island. Most days it’s warm enough that I can press the button on my desk and retract the window altogether, allowing the tropical breeze to caress my skin.

I do this today. I need Eden to soothe my restless soul.

A steaming brass
briki
and a stoneware mug are waiting on my desk as I sit down, and I inhale the scent of the sun and coffee as I review the guest arrivals for the last few days. Though I don’t employ any staff here at the house, the coffee I still drink even years after leaving Greece is always on my desk when I return from my morning walk. Pouring from the
briki
into the cup, I sip, and, as always, find the brew perfect—the perfect temperature, the perfect taste, exactly to my taste.

I could have food delivered from the castle, could hire staff—it’s what most people would do. But so far Eden has indulged my need for seclusion. Meals that I begin to crave appear in my kitchen, everything from traditional
souvlaki
and
baklava
to Chicago-style deep dish pizza.

My house is always clean. My clothing pressed and hung. After so many years here, I know that it is Eden’s way of thanking me for respecting her, her cliffs and jungles, her magic.

I also know that when the island feels that I need to start mixing with humanity a bit more, she will cut off these luxuries abruptly to force me out.

She’s like that.

As I read the list of names, I ponder the fact that I think of my island as alive... and more than that, as a woman. I’m fully aware that this is not normal behavior... but then, nothing about my life is normal.

Normal or not, this is my life. And as I scan the list of names, for the millionth time I debate whether I am happy to have the hope of love in my life... or if I wish the island had never shown me the mystery woman’s face at all, giving me hope that I’m starting to wonder might be false.

There are only four names on today’s list, and as I run my fingers over the final one, I jolt, struck with the image of a faceless blond woman, one I sense needs some special guidance—my specialty here on the island.

Tessa Savage.

“Tessa Savage.” I say her name out loud, rolling it over my tongue. I like how it sounds. Could it be my woman?

I’d expected more of a... I don’t know. A spark, I suppose, after waiting so long.

Still, the very fact that I’m wondering has anticipation rioting through my veins. Setting down the list, I reach for files of information that I have gathered for every person who sets foot on Eden. I thumb past the first three before grabbing Tessa’s. There will be a photo inside so I can know for sure if she is the woman I’ve been anticipating.

My hands shake as I flip open the file, but my haste makes me clumsy and I knock over my coffee cup. Hot steaming liquid splashes over my teak desk and soaks the file.

“
Skata
! Shit!” I jump up so that the coffee doesn’t stain my slacks. Holding the dripping file folder in one hand, I flick off coffee drops from the papers. The sleek bar in the corner of my office has a towel so I grab that and wipe off the photograph, but it’s too late, the damage is done. I can still read the notes but the photo is smeared to the point of ruin. All I can make out is blond hair, shapely shoulders. It might be my woman, and it might not.

I could look her up online, I suppose, but now that the spill has forced me to wait... I realize that I want that moment, that shock and awe when I finally do meet my woman face to face. That dawning recognition.

I will wait. My sexual... proclivities, let’s call them... have taught me that delaying gratification always leads to more intense pleasure.

Tessa Savage should be on the island right now, but despite how strange I feel today, there’s no particular sense of urgency. I’ll let things unfold as they were meant, attend to my other duties as Master of the island. Tucking her dossier under my arm, I head towards the front door of my estate. Before I leave, I grab the black silk balaclava that hangs on its own hook near the door.

I watch in the hall mirror as I slip it on over my head, tucking in my dark hair—

covering my horrible scars.  It is snug, with slits for my nose and holes through which my eyes, a blue so dark it often seems black, can be seen. Mesh covers my mouth, so my voice is not muffled when I speak.

As always, I feel like a freak of nature in this mask, like an abomination.

I feel like more of one when the mask is off.

I have meetings this morning, and I don’t wish to scare anyone, so this is how it will have to be.

***

T
wo hours later, I find myself at loose ends again. My meetings were successful, but being around others always sets me at least a little bit on edge.

I feel myself tugged down a barely discernible path in the trees. I don’t want to go—I want to go stand on my cliffs and watch the waves crash against the rock. It’s not the first time I’ve found myself heading someplace on the island that I wouldn’t choose to be.

Somebody needs me, and as Eden’s instrument, I have no choice but to go.

The tiny thatched shack comes into view once I’m deep in the jungle.  I can feel my heart start to pound.

This shack, it’s where I first had my vision—where my mystery woman first came to me.

Could it really be?

I push through the rickety door and look around, disappointment crashing over me when I find nothing I haven’t seen before—a bed draped in mosquito netting, a small table, two chairs. I am alone.

I fall into one of the chairs, crushed, then elated once more when a whiff of pleasant, flowery perfume tickles my nose.

Please. Please, let it be her.

I blink, and suddenly the shack is transformed. I’m inside a far bigger building, the wood dark with age, the air cool. The floor beneath my feet is just earth, and the décor simple, but the air inside pulses with the same feeling that I have inside the shack.

It seems that the woman being led in by one of my employees needs to feel herself in a spiritual place. I’ve never built a church on the island, because the shack serves that purpose for me. Still, I understand other people’s need for something more formal.

I watch the woman through a latticed screen that appears to my left. Though the screen is all that separates us, it has the holy feel of a Catholic confessional.

I sense rather than see her sit down on the other side of the screen, her movements hesitant.

I want to believe. I want so badly to believe.

“It’s you.” My pulse begins to thunder in my chest. “You’ve come back.”

Her hand lifts and presses against the lattice barrier between us.  I reach out and press my own hand to hers.

“Do I know you?” Her voice is low, husky. Incredibly sexy... but I don’t recognize it.

“Yes, Tessa Savage, you do.” But even as I say the words, I falter. Something doesn’t feel right.”

“Who are you?”

“You don’t remember me?” I let go of the breath I’ve been holding, the breath that fills the hole inside me. Disappointment is crushing as my hand drops back to my side. “No. Of course you don’t.”

“What do you mean? Have we met before?” She is not the woman. She is my guest.  I have read the notes on her, so I know why she is here and what I need to say to her.

“Tell me.” Her voice is insistent. I sigh. Much as I want to believe, this is not the woman. Not
my
woman.

I begin to speak. I answer her questions, pleased with her quick wit and sharp mind. Damn it,
damn it
, I want this to be my dream woman.

Instead I feel nothing for her that I don’t feel for any other guest to my island. Not until I try to explain to her that the island is not magic in the bibbity-bobbity-boo sense, but something else entirely and she surprises me and makes me ache yet again. I’m using an analogy, a spider as an example of something people fear.”

“It is not the creature people fear, it is its ugliness. We loathe anything that is ugly, we fear being ugly. One of our greatest desires is to be seen for who we are, to not be judged by superficial criteria.” Pain accompanies these words, and I press my hand against hers, watching as the magic of the island helps me make her hand disappear... helps make her believe.

And briefly, before she pulls her hand away, she squeezes my fingers, just briefly. It’s the smallest gesture of comfort, one she probably didn’t even think twice about.

It’s the first non-sexual physical contact that I’ve had in years, and it nearly sends me to my knees.

As I sneak out of the temple, which to my vision again looks like a shack, I find a part of my heart, a part that I thought shriveled up long along, slowly unfurling like a bud in the spring.

Tessa Savage is not my woman, but we were meant to cross paths. She was meant to touch my heart.

What I’m supposed to do with that new soft spot?

The ground trembles beneath my feet, just the tiniest bit, as I laugh ruefully to myself. I have no doubt that the island will let me know what to do when it’s time.

NOELLE

I
know I shouldn’t let anger dictate my actions, but damn it all, my father, who also happens to be my boss, is pushing my buttons. It’s a weakness, I know, but he infuriates me so much that I do stupid things to get back at him, or to prove something to him.

Like the stupid thing I’m about to do. All for a story.

Not just any story, though.
The
story. The story that could make my career.

This morning was last straw with him. I’d gone into his office to show him the research I had done and the arrogant ass just sent me away with an indulgent pat on my little blonde head like I was still a child running underfoot in his office.

“Noelle,” he’d said in that condescending tone I loathed.  “Wouldn’t you be better served by concentrating on what
your
readers
want
to read?”  He’d even gone so far as to push the pages I had written away from him on his desk, as if they were contaminated. “Your readers aren’t smart. They want fluff. Isn’t One Direction in town? I’m pretty sure they’re doing some charity event.  Make sure you get a ticket.”

Your readers aren’t smart.

One fucking Direction

I have a masters degree in journalism. I graduated with honors. I’m damned good at what I do.

I remind him of none of this because he’s already well aware... he just doesn’t care. He’d allowed me to go to school because he’d thought I was sowing my wild oats. Now he wanted me to get married, make him some grandchildren, and stop bothering him about moving up in the family business.

This morning, I’d had to ball my hands into fists to keep from smacking him in his disapproving little mouth. I’d refrained—barely— just grabbing my pages, storming out...