[Invitation to Eden 20.0] The Island of Eden

Title Page

Copyright Page

Master of the Island | Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Master of Pleasure | Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Read on for an excerpt from One Night With The Billionaire by Lauren Hawkeye, coming soon!

One Night With The Billionaire Excerpt

About the authors

Master of the Island

“I
’ll take it.”

I study the castle that stands alone at the top of a lush green hill. An Irish castle, it is built of dove grey stone and rocks that have crumbled with age, but it caught my attention—my imagination—as soon as I saw the photographs. In truth it’s not much to look at right now...but then, neither am I.

Originally home to the wealthy and privileged, the once proud structure shows nothing but decay and disrepair on the surface. But the tallest tower still stands, spearing the dull, misty sky proudly, as if to say
I may not be much to look at anymore, but I’m still here
.

It’s a sentiment that resonates with every fiber of my being. In my gut I know that this is the place I’ve been searching for.

The one that I saw in my dreams.

“I’ll take it,” I repeat firmly, nodding at the realtor and giving one last look at the seven hundred year old ruins, fixing them in my mind before turning on my heel and striding back to the hired car. I hear an exclamation of surprise from the man behind me, but it doesn’t slow my steps.

“Mr.Vardalos.” He is panting when he catches up to me, though the distance between the car and where we were standing just moments before is miniscule. “Don’t you want to look inside, at least?”

I turn to face him, and though I know I appear outwardly calm, inside I still feel the burn of pain when I see him flinch. It isn’t a reaction I’ve been able to get used to. In fact, each time I get that look, the ache inside me intensifies. But he doesn’t need to know that.

He won’t meet my eyes as I regard him calmly. “I’ve seen all I need to see. Draw up the paperwork. You’ll be contacted next week regarding transport of the structure.”

My fingers, clutching the car door, tighten when the man dares to look at me and can’t quite hide his wince. “Mr. Vardalos. You understand that I can’t be held responsible for the condition of the interior if you don’t care for it after you’ve seen it.”

I focus on him for a moment. He is overweight, and his bald head shines both with sweat and the drizzle of moisture in the air. A man whose opinion would mean nothing to me...before.

His gaze flicks to mine briefly and clings to the only feature he saw before we arrived at the castle, before I’d removed the silk hood that I normally wear over my face. I wonder, briefly, if I should reach into my pocket and put it back on.

As if he can’t bear to look at me, he pulls off his glasses for something to do, polishes them with the hem of his shirt. He’s a bit like a cartoon character to me, out of place in the mystical beauty of Ireland.

That’s not his fault. I know that to his eyes—to anyone’s—I look like nothing so much as the beast from one of the many fairy tales that haunt this land.

“What do you mean, transport, sir?” He frowns as my words catch up to him. “To where?”

I sigh a bit, inwardly. The billions that pad my bank accounts let me get away with a lot—like wearing a balaclava with my designer suit—but I suppose I was hoping for too much, thinking that I could make a request like this and not be asked any questions. I slip my hand inside my pocket and retrieve the hood, casually concealing myself once again.

The realtor’s shoulders instantly relax and he takes a relieved breath.

“This castle will be reconstructed, stone by stone, on an island off the coast of Florida.” I don’t elaborate, don’t tell him of my plans for it, though curiosity—and sheer disbelief—is plain on his face.

“Mr. Vardalos. May I call you Theo?”

“No.”

He is clearly startled by my refusal, but I don’t much care. A man who feels sick at the sight of my face isn’t my friend. And if he were, he would know that I much prefer the full form of my name—Theodosius—to the abbreviated version that Americans always want to use.

After a moment’s pause, he presses on, undeterred. “Mr. Vardalos. I would be remiss if I did not tell you...”

He lowers his voice, as though we are sharing a secret. “...I am shooting myself in the foot here. But to buy this castle and move it overseas... it’s worth nothing away from Ireland. Why not just build something new?”

I refrain from rolling my eyes. He won’t actually be losing much if he fails to earn a commission on this building. Though this castle has been such an obsession that I knew I would pay any sum once I found it, in actuality it is not listed for very much at all—likely due to the state of decay.

No one else sees what I do—the beauty underneath.

“If we’re quite finished?” The expression on his face amuses me as he sputters and I close the car door. Once sealed inside the cool, dim interior, I sigh and turn to take one final look at the castle, adjusting the hood as I do.

I run my fingers beneath the silk and over the raised ridges of my scars as I study the tower of crumbling stone. How does one explain to someone who hasn’t experienced it that it has to be this castle and none other? That the island demands it?

The island—a small, deserted outcropping of rock in the middle of the soothing waters of the Bermuda Triangle...

It
showed me this place. And there isn’t a single cell in my body, not even the ones that have been horribly altered and maimed, that does not believe that the course of action I have set out upon is not meant to be.

This calms me as I lean back against the smooth leather of the seat, as I order the driver to take me to the airport and leave the sweating, flinching realtor behind. Ireland is beautiful, to be sure, and I now understand why I felt pulled to come here.

But I’ve had enough of travelling. I’m dreaming of palm trees, of the smell of salt on the breeze, and air so thick with heat and magic that its touch feels like a lover’s hand upon my skin.

I’m tired.

I want to go home.

Six Months Earlier

T
here are too many people. They are everywhere, crowding the sidewalks, the streets, adding to the already unbearable heat of Miami.

Millions of eyes, all staring at me with disgust.

The rage boils up inside me, but what am I to do? And how can I blame them? No matter the injury done to me, no matter how much I rail at the injustice that people can no longer see past my hideous face... it doesn’t change my circumstances.

I am the same person inside that I always was, for the most part. Though I admit, storms of anger now taint my every thought, every feeling with red, because of what I’ve become on the outside. A monster.

It doesn’t matter. Soon I will be alone. Finally, blessedly and completely alone.

As I stalk down the crowded sidewalk to the office of the seaplane charter company, I try to push away the memory of how I came to be like this—once a rich, successful man on top of the world, now a mangled beast. Though I know I can’t focus on it if I want to survive, still the darkness dogs my every step.

Celeste. A beautiful icy blonde who loved the same things that I did: money, celebrity, and games of dominance and submission. But she loved one thing that I did not—her childhood sweetheart, a grifter more ruthless than I had ever been. I’d been so in love—at least, I’d thought I was—that I’d never seen the trap they’d set coming, the trap that left me bloody, scarred and very nearly broken. It also left me without a considerable chunk of my bank account, though not nearly as much as they’d imagined. I wish I could find more satisfaction in the fact that I’d withheld the enormity of my fortune from her.

The money? I can let it go.

The scars, both inside and out? They changed my life irrevocably. The prodigal son made a fool by love.

Never again. Where I’m going, it won’t get the chance.

A year ago I purchased the small island in the warm waters of the Bermuda triangle sight unseen, with thoughts of opening an exclusive resort of some sort. A fanciful dream made more tempting by my accountant’s promise of lower taxes. Maybe the fingers of fate prodded me towards that particular purchase, because though the accident has halted those plans abruptly, I have plenty of use for the island.

I need to heal. And a tiny, deserted chunk of land that doesn’t even have a name sounds like heaven at the moment. A place where there will be no one to see me. No one to stare.

No one to make me feel like less of a man.

The plane charter office is much as I expected it to be—a rundown interior housed inside a tiny bungalow by the edge of the water. The door is propped open, to let the sunlight in and, I imagine, the stuffy interior out. Only a handful of people are inside.

The woman behind the counter is young, perhaps mid-twenties—close to my own age. She’s attractive, with skin the color of copper, and long spirals of dark curling hair.

Once, I could have charmed her with nothing more than a slow smile.

Now? She looks up as I enter, and though she quickly recovers from it, she winces once, quickly, when her eyes find the scarred half of my face.

Though it makes my stomach do a slow roll, I ignore it, push it down. Approach the counter that she stands behind.

“Theodosius Vardalos.” Pulling a sheath of papers from the pocket of my jeans, I slide them across the chipped laminate. “I have a reservation for a private charter.”

Her smile is bright, overly so as she scans the papers detailing my reservation. Her smile falters as she reads to the bottom of the paper.

“Mr. Vardalos.” Smiling nervously, she looks at me—and immediately looks away. Staring at her hands, she taps on the ancient looking computer in front of her. “I’m sorry, Mr. Vardalos, but your charter has been cancelled. Your pilot is sick.”

“And I’m sure you have more than one. There must be someone available.” Calmly, I hand her a crisp stack of bills. I won’t entertain this turn of events. I hired this company and paid them a ridiculous amount of money to not only fly me the two hours that it will take to get to the island—alone—but also to procure all the items on the list of supplies that I gave them.

I don’t really care who pilots the plane, so long as they’re competent. What matters is that within the next few minutes I am on that aircraft, sailing toward the blessed solitude that I crave.

Have to get away. Need to get to my island.

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Vardalos, but we’re just a small operation here. We only have three pilots total, and the other two are booked up for the day.” She still won’t look at me, and the rage that I am becoming so accustomed to again beats beneath my skin.

I have been attempting to hide my scars, angling my face so as not to frighten her, but now I rotate my body so that I am facing her fully, so that if she looks up she has no choice

Look at the monster, little girl. Be afraid.

Her stare settles on me, and when she flinches I feel the pulse of satisfaction, deep in my gut. I don’t say anything; I know that looking at me is reprimand enough.