And for the first time all day, I let myself move forward without looking back.
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.
