WICKED PARADISE | JENLISA

SIXTEEN

LISA
***

“HER LEVELS ARE DANGEROUSLY low. Her iron, glucose, sodium…they’re all way below what is required for a woman of her height and weight.” Dr. Campbell snapped off his gloves and turned to swivel his chair to face me.

The vial holding Jennie’s blood lay abandoned in the centrifuge machine. The droplets he’d tested all glowed in different stages of experiment in test tubes and on microscope slides.

“What has she had to eat since her arrival?” Without waiting for me to reply, he added, “I don’t think she’s sick or suffering a long-term illness. However, I’ll have questions when she wakes. It is worrying that she fainted, though. Her blood pressure is extremely low—that will be the cause of her blacking out, and the wounds left over from her relocation could also have drained her of energy.”

He paused, looking at me expectantly over his half-moon reading glasses. Pushing sixty, Dr. Campbell came highly recommended and exceedingly expensive. But he was the best consultant and surgeon for my populated islands.

Leaning against the shelving on the other side of the small medical room, I kept my arms crossed. I didn’t glower at Jennie as she lay prone and lifeless on the gurney. I didn’t relive the moment of triumph when I’d found her wet, then the frustrating annoyance of her crumpling at my feet.

At first, I thought it was a trick. A way out of our fierce debate.

But when I’d nudged her with my shoe and she hadn’t moved, I’d hauled her into my arms, stormed to the doctor, and demanded he figure out what the hell was wrong.

I didn’t like weak things.

I didn’t like feeling as if I’d caused her to collapse, all because I’d pushed her too far. I’d been pushing her since she fucking arrived. I’d hounded her and tortured her, and this was my penance.

“Manoban… are you listening? What has she eaten since arriving? Maybe she’s intolerant to something? Perhaps she requires medicine that she hasn’t received? The sooner I know—”

“I don’t know her medical history, but I don’t think it’s anything to do with what she’s eaten… more like what she hasn’t.”

She stood, glancing at Jennie. Her long hair cascaded off the gurney, a waterfall of gleaming chocolate. Her lips were slightly parted, her forehead smooth in slumber, her eyelashes feathering shadows on colourless cheeks.

She no longer looked like an avenging immortal but a hapless human who’d gone to war with a god and failed.

“You don’t think she’s eaten a thing since landing yesterday morning?” His white eyebrow rose in shock. “She arrived early. That was over”— he checked his wristwatch —“twenty-nine hours ago.”

I shrugged, cursing him for making me responsible for her passing out, all while I wished I could blame someone else. But really, the problem was entirely my fault. She’d arrived, I’d force-fed the elixir so her only concern for the rest of the day had been sexual hunger rather than bodily starvation, and then exhaustion sucked her deep with no reprieve.

I should’ve ensured she’d eaten, or at the very least had something to drink the moment she stepped out of her room. Instead, she’d picked a fight with me, ensured my guests witnessed our unsightly domestic, and then had the audacity to keep standing up to me when all I wanted was some space to think. Some understanding of why I found this woman so goddamn enticing.

She wasn’t special.

Sure, she was gorgeous but so were my other goddesses.

Why did she have the power to make my blood boil and cock pound?