ISLAND ILLUSIONS (#2 PARADISE ISLAND duology)

--seven--

When Miles' eyes opened, achy and dry as if he'd drained every tear from his body, it was early. Earlier than he was used to, he could tell. There were no clocks, no watches on the island to determine time. But by the faint light coming from behind his curtain and the soft chirp of birds, he assumed it was barely dawn.

He rolled off the bed, wincing at the soreness of his limbs. Had he gone on some kind of marathon in his sleep? Had he even slept? All he remembered was hurling his guts into the toilet, then shoving his face into his pillow while thinking of Kera. While thinking of how he never should have left her, but instead tried to help her with her plans to get out. She was far from discreet, but if he'd stuck with her, he never would have seen what he'd seen the night before. Never would have the image of his best friend in the nude ingrained into his mind, accompanied by the spilling of blood and Jessa's delicious curves covered in it.

His nightmares were red and foul-smelling, populated with bloody claws and sharp teeth and wolfish snouts snarling at him. Moonlight and fire, hairy, naked creatures dancing around a campsite, and suckling sounds that reanimated his nausea.

"Ugh," he said, slipping off the bed. "I need caffeine, and I need air."

He got dressed—cargo pants and a t-shirt—and waited as the coffee machine brewed him a sweet, vanilla-scented java that he'd found in the cupboard. The caffeine content was supposed to be high, and he hoped it was, because he'd need a lot of energy to keep his eyes open today.

Once the brew was poured into an oversized mug, he took it and meandered outside to take a few whiffs of the early morning oxygen. It was cool, but not frozen, and the tingling down his spine felt great. It felt real, not supernatural, not toxified like he'd been feeling for the past few days. This was nature in its raw form, untouched, and he smiled as the breeze passed over his neck and soothed him on the inside.

A gulp of the steaming coffee had his insides warming up, too. A good warmth, one that reminded him of evenings in front of a fireplace, studying science books that he'd taken from his parents' lab.

He stood on the stoop of his front door while admiring the view of the bay and the sun slowly rising above it. A beautiful sight, one he would have welcomed any other day—but not today. Not here. Not in this rotten place with its rotten gods and its rotten rules. Nature was nothing but decoration here; the gods would spray its pretty leaves with red and laugh about it.

His boots crunched on the grass, cracking twigs as he ambled over to the campsite. He wasn't sure what he'd been expecting to find, yet it still stunned him to discover red stains dried over one of the logs, and puddles of what appeared to be blood near other logs and surrounding the fire pit. He'd thought to light another fire, in case anyone had gone out to hunt meat for breakfast. But at the sight of the blood, the confirmation of what he'd witnessed the night before, he didn't have the stomach for it. He wasn't positive he'd ever eat again.

Instead, he sat on a log opposite the area where he'd watched Jessa and Vick fucking themselves into literal oblivion. Where they'd bled on one another, fed on one another. Miles hadn't seen Vick bite Jessa, but he had no doubt he had, once Miles had stopped watching.

He took a few swigs of his coffee to cover up the acidic taste in his mouth.

He'd been looking down at the worn tips of his boots when he heard twigs cracking again. Whipping his gaze up, he noticed Vick coming over, rubbing at a bandage over his neck.

Fuck.

The bandage was also proof that Miles hadn't hallucinated the night before. It covered the spot Miles had seen Jessa sink her teeth into; the spot where she'd drank Vick's blood.