“You’re on your own.”
The ambiguous response made her sick. Erin looked up at the ceiling again. “Just… give me time to fix this.” She ran out of the bunker this time, no automated locks to stop her.
She felt so exposed out in the open. Erin stepped onto the docks, the floats underneath the dock shifting her back and forth, her wobbly legs wanting to give way. The gun was heavy.
She stepped inside the villa and fell to her knees. Skye’s throat was slashed open and her skin was gray. There was so much blood. All she could see was the blood. She leaned forward on her hands at the foot of the bed. Her hands made perfect prints in the blood on the floor, warm and smooth, almost causing her to slip flat on her face.
She rose to her feet and stared at her dead friend with her hand over mouth. How would he have responded when Skye told him she couldn’t do it anymore? Couldn’t do it to her friend… She tried to convince herself it was someone else, but she knew. Trevor murdered Skye.
Leaning over the dock and washing her hands, the red drifted away into the ocean blue, leaving only her reflection. She couldn’t just leave Skye there, but she had no choice.
The walk back to Stefan’s bunker was quiet. Only the palm trees spoke in the wind.
Chapter Twenty-two - Trevor
Trevor stood outside the front door of Bruce’s cabin. What to do? He wasn’t exactly Special Forces. He held the gun out from his side awkwardly, paranoid about shooting his own foot or worse. He reached for the doorknob and turned it. He threw the door open.
Bruce sat in his Lazy Boy recliner, facing Trevor. The only element missing from the moment was a 360-degree swivel in the chair. Bruce didn’t appear startled in the slightest.
He had a mug in his hand. “It’s decaf. I have regular if you like?”
The image of Skye’s open mouth stained his mind. “Start with why,” said Trevor.
Bruce pulled a lever and his feet kicked out in a more relaxed position. “Why what?” he said. “I told you I got nothing to do with your relative’s tricks. Don’t have time or the care for it.”
“You killed her.”
“Killed who now?” He pushed his feet back down and clicked the footrest into place, leaning forward with concern. “You better tell me what in the hell you’re talking about.” Bruce’s eyes were hard, his wide brow narrowed.
The man was a sociopath. His mannerisms were on point on. They were believable. “Are you lying to the guy with the gun?”
“Are you gonna tell me who is dead or not?”
“You know, you son of a bitch.”
He leaned back in his chair, an understanding seeming to resonate within him as he took another sip of his coffee. He set it down on a stand next to him. “The who of it doesn’t matter. What matters is what will come next.”
“Which is?”
“I’ve been here for thirty years. And little by little, I’d stumble upon some, let’s say, interesting things… No, horrible things. I’d like nothing more than to shed some light on the matter, but I don’t think you’re of the right mindset to accept what I’ve got to tell you. So, I’m in a tough position, particularly with that gun pointed at my head.”
Standing up against the wall in the corner was a rifle. Trevor walked around and collected it while keeping his gun pointed at Bruce. He set it next to the door, then lowered his gun with distaste.
“I could give you a speech about my particular set of skills… but I think I’ll just let you know that before you get started, I can pick up lies. And I’m starting to like the feel of this gun in my hand.”
“Noted.”
“Explain these strange things,” said Trevor.
“There are the graves. For starters.”
“Graves?”
“Along the east beach by the trees. Rounding north.”
“And who is in these graves?”
“I don’t know for sure, but if I had to guess, I’d say other visitors. People such as yourselves.”
“Bullshit.”
“Just a theory, based on other things I’ve discovered, unfortunately. There are photographs of others. Happy tourists thinking they’ve stumbled upon some hidden gem, thinking they’re special, crusaders or some horseshit. But I got a strong inclination that many of them have ended up in the dirt.”
“And we’ve been the first visitors since you’ve been here?”
“No. Three other owners. All took off within two days being on this island.”
“And you have a theory for that?”
“The sleeping. Tell me Trevor; have any dreams since you’ve been here? Maybe memories? Anything else odd going on with yourself, things you can’t explain?”
Trevor was now sitting on the leather loveseat across from Bruce. He set his pistol down. Bruce’s eyes never left his.
“I’ll take that as a yes, my friend.”
“What does it mean?”
“It’s this island, sinking its hooks into you. Like when you’re fishing and you feel that tap, tap, tap, waiting for the right moment to set the hook. You stay here long enough, it becomes problematic.”
“How so?”
“Thirty years. You think I want to be here?”
There was an unmistakable sorrow that sunk his wrinkled, sullen face.
“I believe speaking these words to you could mean my death, but I don’t know that for certain either. What I do know is that I couldn’t leave, and I never will.”
“What are you talking about? We get Stefan’s boat, you get your ass on it, and we sail away from this shit-show. What’s so hard about that?”
He chuckled. “If it were that easy kid… I can’t. I don’t want to leave. It’s like a disease. Or maybe it’s a virus. They won’t let up. It keeps getting worse the longer you stay here.”
“Who’s they?”
“That’s the million-dollar question, isn’t it? When I first came here, I honestly felt like I could stay forever. I had just escaped a dreadful marriage. I wasn’t built for it. Wired wrong maybe, I don’t know. I shouldn’t have ever married, but we do things because we’re supposed to. It was ironic really, that I felt so incredibly free when I came here. Life’s a real twisted bitch. But… the dreams started after a few days of getting here. Regrettable moments in my life that I’m least proud of were continuously pounded into my skull over and over again every time my head hit the pillow. Never thought I’d be begging to be one of them insomniac people, but I was sure wishing for it then. Reliving one’s worst moment over and over again isn’t exactly daiquiri fun in paradise.”
Valencia.
Bruce continued. “And I know you know what I’m talking about because that’s the way they work, or the way it works.” He coughed hoarsely into his hand. “I don’t trust those folks that work here for Stefan. They came before him, with the last owners. There’s something wrong with them.”
“How so?”
“Intuition.”
“Intuition…”
Bruce leaned forward again. “It’s not normal having those kids here. What? A twenty-year-old girl and thirteen-year-old boy? They shouldn’t be here that much, or at all, for that matter. Mind you… If I’m right, the island has them all spun sideways.”
“What about the place on the other side?”
“No one lives in that dump. I take it you’ve seen the place?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, there you go. I think they got a hand in this. In the island’s power. Maybe there’s something more. Some great purpose for it. I’d go as far to venture mythical…” He smirked. “Probably doesn’t matter anyway. Seems as though we’re screwed either way you slice it.”
“Is there anything else you can tell me?”