Episode 238
BORN TO RUN
Misty
I don’t say anything right away. Just stare at the screen, letting the words settle like poison in my bloodstream.
You were always good at running, Misty.
He’s not wrong. I ran for years. From him. From what he did. From who I had to become just to survive it.
I guess I’m still running.
I came to the island to meet the guys, to find out about my birth mother.
Instead, I found a brother.
And I’m no longer running.
Not anymore.
Evangeline makes a soft sound beside me, but I can’t look at her. Can’t speak. My heart is pounding too hard, filling my ears with a roar. The air in the room feels thinner now. Like he’s already here, stealing it from my lungs. He was good at that, depriving me of air.
“I… I need to get back downstairs,” Evangeline says quietly. “The bachelorette party… There are vendors arriving. Security protocols to approve. I’ll have security with me.”
She’s rattled but trying not to show it. And I get it. She needs the structure, the order, the normalcy. That’s her shield. Planning things to death. Making sure every detail is perfect so nothing can fall apart.
But some things you can’t plan your way out of.
“Evie,” I say, my voice flatter than I mean it to be. “Don’t go anywhere alone. Not for a second.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
I meet her gaze, penetrating her with my own. “Is it? Someone put that onesie there. Someone who had access to your suite.”
She says nothing.
Until— “Only the staff—”
“Anyone on the staff could have easily been corrupted. Paid off. After all, they still have their cell phones, don’t they?”
She nods. “They do. But I had all of them fully vetted.”
I don’t reply. Everything she’s been through at my father’s hand, and still she doesn’t get it.
Richard Holmes can do whatever the hell he wants.
“Just be careful,” I finally say.
She glances toward the window before she walks out, brushing over her stomach.
When the door clicks shut behind her, I sink onto her couch. I feel like I’m sitting on a fault line. As if at any moment, the ground could open and swallow me whole.
You were always good at running, Misty.
That means he’s been watching. Not just Evangeline. Me.
How long has he been on this island?
How long has he been watching me pretend I’m something shiny and sharp, when deep down I’m still a girl who used to hold her breath to survive?
It’s a game. A power play. And I know the rules because he taught them to me.
He wants to rattle me. Make me feel cornered.
But he forgot something.
I was raised in the dark.
I became sharp because of him.
If he wants to come at me again, he better come armed.
Because this time, I’m not a child.
And I don’t flinch anymore.
I push myself to my feet. I need to think. I need to move. Sitting still is just a slower way of falling apart.
I head out the door and into the hallway, letting the distant noise of preparations ground me. Voices drift up from the kitchen—laughter, music, the clink of glasses. They’re setting up for the parties like everything’s normal.
Like there’s not a ghost crawling the grounds.
I take the back staircase down, avoiding the main walkways. Instinct, mostly. I’ve always been good at reading spaces, sensing when I’m being watched. And right now, I feel eyes on me like fingers on the back of my neck.
I round a corner and nearly collide with June.
She stops short, one hand on her hip, eyes narrowing like she’s about to say something catty. But then she really looks at me. Sees something in my face.
“What the hell happened to you?” she asks, less snide than usual.
“Nothing,” I lie.
She raises an eyebrow. “Your version of ‘nothing’ looks like someone just walked across your grave.”
I start to brush past her, but she reaches out and grabs my arm.
“Misty.”
I look down at her hand and then back at her face. It’s rare for June to show concern that isn’t wrapped in sarcasm.
“Let go,” I say, but my voice is softer than I intend.
She does. “Jeez. Sorry. But guess what?”
“What?”
“I just ran into Evangeline, and she okayed my idea for tonight.”
Crap. In Evangeline’s current state, she’s liable to okay a freaking orgy.
“What idea?”
“A full moon ceremony. Seductive and exciting.”
“It’s not a full moon tonight,” I say. I actually don’t know, but I’m playing the odds.
“So what? Doesn’t mean we can’t do the spiral dance naked under the stars. The guys will join in after their party is over, and then…”
I can’t help a sarcastic chuckle at my previous thought.
Evangeline, indeed, just okayed an orgy.
“Is this what Ariel wants?”
June just laughs. “Who wouldn’t want this? It’s going to be beautiful and lusty and out of this world! Come on. You can help me set up.”
“Set what up?”
June’s eyes sparkle, like she’s been dying for someone to ask. “The moon altar. The flower path. The candle ring. We’re doing it in the courtyard, so we’ll be near the house if we need… You know…”
I blink. “You’re serious.”
“As a stolen virginity.” She grins like this is the best idea she’s ever had. “We’ll need white silk, big lanterns, and incense burners. I already snagged some eucalyptus and ylang-ylang oil from the spa.”
Of course she did. Where she thinks she’s going to find white silk, I haven’t the foggiest. I suppose she could use the spa bathrobes. And incense burners? Hardly Evie’s style.
“June…” I start, unsure how to explain that I’ve just gotten a message from a monster, and she’s planning a moonlight sex ritual like we’re in a damned fairy tale.
But she tilts her head, watching me too closely.
“You’re pale. Paler than usual, I mean.” Her voice is softer now, not playful, not mocking. “And that’s saying something, considering you’re normally pretty darned white.’”
Has she forgotten I was sick and dehydrated earlier? And that next to Evie—or even Emily, for that matter—I look like I overdosed on tanning pills?
“I’m fine,” I say.
“If you say so,” She steps back, her expression sliding back into the usual mischievous smirk. “Then come help me. Unless you’d rather hang out alone. That does seem to be what you do best.”
Back to her usual self.
At least it keeps my world constant.
My mind keeps circling back to the message, to the onesie, to my father’s voice echoing inside my head like a curse I can’t unhear.
But if I don’t keep myself occupied, I’ll spiral. And not in the sensual, naked-under-the-stars way June has in mind.
“I’ll help,” I say.
“Good girl.”
We walk in silence toward the back door. June hums something vaguely witchy under her breath, and the whole time I can’t shake the feeling that someone’s following us. Watching us. Smiling.
Not the sexy kind of smile.
The kind that says I know exactly where you are.
And I’m coming.