The scenery changed in a fraction of a second, but the sudden, hyper-vivid clarity told me exactly where I was. I wasn't just dreaming; the eerie, grounded feeling of being entirely awake meant he had pulled me into his subconscious again.
I was standing on a beach. The sand beneath my bare feet was stark white and powdery, meeting a crystalline, turquoise ocean that stretched endlessly under a twilight sky. It was breathtakingly beautiful, but the sheer serenity of it made my stomach churn with instant dread.
Wake up, I told myself, squeezing my eyes shut and trying to force my mind to snap back to the reality of my bedchamber. Wake up, Rachel!
"We don't have much time," a smooth, cultured voice resonated from behind me, cutting through the sound of the gentle waves. "I can feel your m
