Stuck in an Island with Twelve Beautiful Women
Chapter 1238

Chapter 1238: Chapter 1238

Zoey walked closer, crouching beside her. "Did Rose tell you something?"

Layla looked up at her, eyes glimmering. "She showed me. There’s a difference."

"And what did she show you?" Zoey’s voice was careful, low.

Layla leaned in. "That this island is a gift. That we are its flame. And that we were never meant to resist it."

Zoey stared at her, unsure of how to respond. Then Layla kissed her.

It wasn’t forceful. It wasn’t sudden.

It was soft. Familiar. Warm.

But beneath it, something stirred.

Something in the taste of her lips, in the pressure of her hands on Zoey’s arms - like a tide pulling her under. Zoey tried to pull back, but she couldn’t. Not because Layla held her physically. Because her body didn’t want to. Because part of her wanted to sink into it.

And just before the kiss broke, Layla whispered against her lips, "You’ll see soon."

When they returned to camp, Zoey was silent. She sat close to Layla, their hands occasionally brushing. Her eyes had changed - still sharp, still curious, but distant, distracted.

Jude noticed immediately.

He sat beside Lucy and whispered, "She’s different now too."

Lucy’s hand found his, squeezing tightly. "They’re spreading it like fire."

Sophie crouched beside them. "We have to act."

"Not yet," Jude said. "We need to understand what it is we’re fighting."

That day, the atmosphere shifted again.

Rose, Layla, and Zoey were inseparable. They spoke in soft tones, often glancing toward the others with secret smiles. They helped with chores, kissed like nothing had changed, laughed in the sun. But the others didn’t see the pattern. Not yet.

Jude, Lucy, and Sophie kept their distance, eyes always watching.

Later that afternoon, while the others collected fruit near the edge of the forest, Jude pulled Emma aside. They sat together under a wide-leafed tree, its branches heavy with white blossoms.

"I need to ask you something," Jude said quietly.

Emma nodded.

"If I told you something was changing... something in Rose, Layla, and Zoey - would you believe me?"

Emma looked at him, long and hard. "I’ve felt it."

Jude blinked. "You have?"

She nodded. "Since the tree. Since the visions. Something’s... following them. Or moving through them. I thought it was just the aftershock."

"It’s not," he said. "It’s growing."

Emma bit her lip, lowering her voice. "Who else knows?"

"Lucy. Sophie. Just us."

"Do you think it’s the island?"

"I don’t know. But it’s using Rose to spread. Layla’s gone. And Zoey might be already."

Emma’s hands tightened into fists. "Then we need to stop it."

Jude looked up at the sky. "Soon. Not yet. We need to know more. How it spreads. What it wants."

Emma’s eyes were fierce. "Then we watch."

That night, the seduction deepened.

Dinner was full of laughter. Rose kissed Jude in front of everyone, straddling him beside the fire, her body draped across his lap like silk. Layla pressed herself against Natalie’s back during cooking, whispering something into her ear that made her blush. Zoey danced slowly with Grace near the embers, their hips moving together like waves. Susan and Stella giggled like girls in love, pulled into it without even noticing.

Jude let it happen.

Watching.

Counting.

Sophie sat beside him, whispering each name as it happened. "Grace. Natalie. Susan..."

Emma joined the list next. She stared across the fire at Zoey for just a moment too long. Her lips parted. Her pupils wide.

Lucy kept writing in the dirt, symbols that pulsed faintly under moonlight.

By midnight, Natalie was kissing Layla in the shadows.

Susan was curled up beside Rose, her face pressed to her chest.

Stella had her arms around Zoey’s waist.

Only Jude, Sophie, Lucy, and Emma remained untouched.

But Emma’s hand had started to tremble.

Sophie noticed. Lucy noticed.

Jude said nothing.

The next morning, Emma was gone.

Jude woke to find her blanket empty, her scent still lingering.

They searched until midday. Found her at the river.

Rose was with her.

They were both smiling. That same smile.

Emma walked up to Jude and hugged him like nothing had changed. Kissed him on the cheek.

Then went to help collect wood.

Jude stood frozen.

Lucy came to his side. "We’re losing them."

Sophie’s jaw clenched. "Then we stop waiting."

"No," Jude said. "We’re not done yet."

"Why?" she snapped. "They’re changing. All of them. If we don’t stop it now - "

"Because one of them will come back," Jude said. "One of them will resist. And when she does, we’ll know how to fight it."

Lucy’s eyes searched his face. "And if none of them come back?"

He didn’t answer.

That night, they lit no fire.

And still, the air burned.

The air around the camp shimmered with a kind of heat that didn’t come from fire. Though no flames danced in the center of their clearing, it still felt like something was smoldering just beneath the surface of everything. The breeze had vanished. The insects had stopped humming. The island itself was holding its breath. Jude felt it in his skin, crawling like static. They all did - but only a few seemed to care.

Rose was humming.

Not loudly, but just enough for her voice to cut the silence like a fine thread. She was sitting near the center of the camp, brushing Emma’s hair with fingers too calm, too slow. Emma’s head rested in Rose’s lap, her eyes glazed but content, a soft smile stretching across her lips. Jude watched the rhythm of Rose’s strokes - metronomic, endless. It was the kind of motion meant to put someone under.

Layla was sprawled out on her back near the edge of the clearing, one leg bent, arms tucked behind her head as Zoey straddled her waist. They giggled at something only they understood, trading looks so intimate it would’ve once made everyone blush. Now it just felt ominous.

Lucy sat close to Jude, silent and rigid, her eyes never straying far from the fireless center of their camp. Sophie was beside her, fingers clenched tight in her lap, lips pressed into a thin line.