Page 4 of Crocodile Tears
I'd managed to secure the Holloway Estate for my team since it was the off-season on Prickle Island. My father had been the head butler for the rich family, and apparently they were “tickled” by the success of one of their former employees’ sons. I was paying an extortionate amount to stay in their home now, but I had money to blow and it was a personal vendetta of mine to stay there.
The image of the giant, sprawling estate was still branded into my mind. I’d told myself every single day over my childhoodsummers that one day I'd live there. And even if it was only for three weeks, I was going to make that dream a reality.
Of course, those summers I’d spent almost no time at our little cottage in the corner of the Holloway Estate and every waking moment at Prickle Island Zoo. It had been the first time I’d felt like a celebrity—getting to waltz through the front entry and skip the lines, being waved through by the front desk people. I’d been so proud thatIwas personal friends with the family who ran the zoo.
Even though my older brother and younger sister had spent summers on Prickle Island too, they hadn’t thought romping around the island with a bunch of feral zoo children was as much fun as I had. I wondered how many of the Lachlan kids still lived and worked at the zoo. I wondered the most about one particular person who’d called me out of the blue two years ago like a ghost from my past.
“I really thought we should’ve taken the chopper—what’s the point of having a helipad if you don’t use it, you know? But you’re right, man. The boat is the best way to see the island,” Zeke said as Prickle Island came into view. “You remember much about this place?”
"Not much," I lied.
The summers between the ages of nine and twelve had been the best of my life. Fifteen years had passed by and still the memories were perfectly preserved in my mind. Well, not all of them, just the ones that involved one stubborn girl with taped-together glasses and permanent space buns that had made me wonder if her hair just grew in that shape.
The fondness of the memory warped as I remembered our last exchange.
"Never talk to me again."
That was the last thing she'd said to me. Dove Lachlan had called me out of the blue after over a decade of radio silence,asking me if I had any need of the zoo for swanky events or for a movie I was working on. I could hear the panic in her voice, knew she must’ve been desperate to even call me, and I’d instantly said yes. We’d called back and forth a few times working out the logistics—something I normally would’ve passed on to my team, but I’d just wanted an excuse to walk down memory lane with her. But then all of the Zap stuff had come out, and when I’d tried to call her to explain, she’d texted me “never talk to me again” and that had been it.
She’d deleted all her socials and disappeared after that text, and I wondered if it was because she didn’t want to see me splashed all over her feeds, wondered if it made her stomach sour to look at me now. I had plenty of people who hated me, plenty more who thought I was a talentless hack, but I’d learned to develop a thick skin and not care what they thought. But there was one person apart from my family who knew all the holes in my armor.
My stomach dropped just thinking about it. I needed things between us to be set right, needed to prove to myself that I wasn’t the guy she thought I was. The thought nettled me. In a life that was anything but normal, one where thousands of keyboard warriors professed their hate for me every day, I needed my childhood best friend to still think of me as a human and not a brand.
And now I'd be staying on her island, filming at her zoo for three weeks—something that I had thought would be a fun reconnection with an old friend, but now I knew would be an awkward reminder that I was no longer that kid who’d loved hearing her bird fun facts and binge-watchingLord of the Rings.
If I tried hard enough, I could probably manage to avoid seeing Dove altogether. My assistant, Luca, was incredibly skilled at shielding me from people I didn't want to see.
But I already knew I'd be seeking her out. This was a vendetta I couldn’t let go. I set myself a challenge right then and there as the springtime sun shone down on Prickle Island: I would get Dove Lachlan to accept my apology and be my friend again before the three weeks were up, so help me God.
Chapter Three
Dove
I had once considered myself a member of many nerdy fandoms . . . but seeing the horde of fangirls outside the zoo gates was making me rethink what it meant to be a “superfan.”
“Of all the places,” I muttered as I held Eddie the toucan for his blood draw. “How did they even get here?”
Finch released a huff as she grabbed a fresh pair of rubber gloves. “Petey said they’ve added another ferry slot to the spring timetable to handle them all.”
“Seriously?” I grumbled. “One of the many benefits of living at a private zoo on a tiny island is that we don’t get unwanted visitors—including crazed fans and paparazzi. Increasing the ferry trips is only encouraging them.”
“Not their fault.” Finch’s lab jacket bunched at the neck as she shrugged. “They’re just keeping up with demand.”
Prickle Island was a sanctuary for the rich elite who flocked here in the summer months—the remote location giving them more anonymity than the Hamptons while still being a stone’s throw from New York City. But apparently for mega-stars like Deacon Harrow, there was no such thing as privacy, even on a remote island.
Deacon’s die-hard fans existed on a whole other level. Word had gotten out that the zoo was about to become a shooting location for his latest film and they’d popped up at our gates like locusts coming out of hibernation.
I gave a disapproving shake of my head as I heard the chorus of squeals in the distance. “All their squealing is going to disturb our patient.”
Finch shot me an incredulous look, a smug smile on her face. "Disturb him more than that?" She shouted to be heard as she tipped her head to the five yellow-headed Amazon parrots in a quarantine aviary squawking so loudly that my ear drums might rupture.
“The squealing set them off! Parrots are allergic to fangirling,” I said but couldn’t even hear myself over the piercing racket.
"Ooh, this guy has really got your claws out, Dovey.” Finch laughed as the parrots died down again. I shot her an angry look that only seemed to egg her on. "Hey, I invented that death stare. It’s powers are useless against me. Besides, you know I'm Team Lachlan, always. It’s just fun to see you frazzled.” She placed a sticker label around the test tube in her hand. "Do you want me to ask Petey if he can set up some barricades in the parking lot? We’ve only got two and a half more weeks of this and then they’ll be gone. Seems like a lot of work for a couple weeks.”
"Yeah," I gritted out. "It's fine."
There were only twenty or so frantic fans outside the front gates, hoping to catch a peek of Deacon. Luckily, the crewwas filming in the rainforest walkthrough, which meant that they couldn't be viewed from outside the zoo premises. The towering barbed-wire fences, cameras, and electrified gates were designed to keep the animals in, but they were also excellent at keeping unwanted visitorsout. Still, that didn’t seem to deter them from congregating at the gates every morning.
