E L A R A

The moment Adrian’s command cracked through the morning air, everything inside me went still. The gulls, the radios, even the sea seemed to hold its breath. I was still crouched beside the crates, hand pressed to the dust where the equipment should have been, pulse pounding so hard it hurt. Around me, men moved, voices barked orders, but all I could hear was the hollow sound of those boxes, the echo of every life they were meant to save. That silence burned, and something in me snapped. I stood, the anger clean and bright in my chest, and turned toward the mess that needed fixing.

The crate gapes like a wound.

Paper rustles in the wind, clean, white, useless. I dig through it anyway, tearing the foam trays apart, needing to see something solid, something that proves the world still works the way it’s supposed to. There’s nothing. No AEDs. No EpiPens. Just air and the echo of every patient I’ve ever lost because someone valued image over life.

My pulse roars in my ears. “They sent us nothing,” I whisper, but my voice shakes into fury before the sentence ends. “They sent us nothing.”

Around me, staff hover like ghosts. Asha’s hand covers her mouth. One of the delivery men edges backward as though guilt might be contagious. The sea wind stings my eyes, but it isn’t tears, it’s rage so sharp it could cauterize.

Behind me, Marina clicks across the dock in coral heels, tablet in hand. “Dr. Quinn,” she starts smoothly, “let’s not dramatize. We’ll issue a correction once procurement..”

“Correction?” My voice cuts her like broken glass. “You want me to issue condolences next? These boxes were supposed to save lives.”

She flinches, glancing toward the staff, then to Adrian. “You can’t let her..”

“She can,” he says, quiet but absolute.

The sound of his voice steadies me more than I want to admit. He steps forward, sunlight slicing across his profile, sleeves rolled, jaw set. “Let her finish.”

Marina opens her mouth, sees his eyes, and doesn’t.

I turn back to the crate. “This island keeps hosting parties while we beg for oxygen tanks,” I say. “Now we have a stack of empty boxes wearing the Valcrosse crest like a joke.” My fingers tighten on the manifest. “Every signature’s perfect. Every date. Someone forged it clean.”

Adrian takes the paper from me, scanning. “We’ll trace it.”

“No,” I snapped. “We’ll replace it. Today. I’ll call suppliers myself. I’ll pay out of my salary if I have to.”

“Elara..” His tone softens, a warning.

“Don’t tell me to calm down.” I shove the lid aside, wood splintering under my palm. “I’ve seen what happens when people calm down. They bury another body.”

The dock falls silent except for the sea hitting the pylons. The anger shakes through me, but it isn’t wild, it’s focus. I’ve lived too long letting systems fail people. Not here. Not again.

Adrian moves closer until his shadow folds over mine. “You won’t pay a cent,” he says. “Whoever emptied these boxes will.”

Marina exhales a shaky laugh. “That’s a bit dramatic, don’t you think? We can’t accuse anyone without proof.”

He turns on her slowly, the heir mask gone, voice low enough that even the gulls seem to hush. “Proof will come. But understand this, someone stole medical equipment meant to protect guests and staff. They didn’t steal from me. They stole from her.”

He nods toward me. The words hit harder than the anger ever could. I meet his gaze; the steel there is for me, not at me.

I swallow. “Then what do we do?”

His answer is simple. “We go to war.”

The phrase lands like thunder in my chest. Marina blanches; the workers edge back. But Adrian keeps his eyes on me, unflinching, waiting for the only approval that matters.

And I give it one sharp nod. “Then start with whoever signed that manifest.”

He smiles without warmth. “Already did.”

The wind shifts, carrying salt and something metallic, like the taste of a storm coming. Somewhere behind us, Ethan’s radio crackles alive.

Ethan’s voice snaps through the static. “Adrian, we’ve got something.”

He strides toward us, wet from the waist down, salt streaking his uniform. His expression says more than words, grim, controlled fury.

Adrian turns. “What did you find?”

Ethan drops a coil of thick rope onto the dock. Frayed ends, the fibers dark and slick. He kneels, turning one in his hand so the light hits the clean, straight slice. “From the skiff we recovered last week. I ran the trace. It wasn’t propeller damage.”

“Then how?” Adrian asks.

Ethan meets his eyes. “Cut. With a solvent-softened blade. The residue matches the formula stocked in one place on Seraphine, procurement.”

The word hits like a dropped anchor.

My stomach twists. “Inside procurement?”

He nods. “Someone on the island cut that rope from our own supply line. This wasn’t smuggling or theft from the outside, it was inside the house.”

For a heartbeat, the dock holds its breath. Marina’s heels click backward, soft and slow, like she’s trying to fade out of frame.

Adrian’s voice turns low, dangerous. “Who had clearance?”

“Every supervisor in the logistics chain,” Ethan says. “But the digital trail loops back to a ghost account in the internal system. Whoever did this knows our protocol too well.”

Betrayal feels physical, sharp, breathless. “They were inside my clinic’s supply chain,” I whisper.

Adrian’s gaze cuts to me. “No. They were inside my family’s system. And that’s over.”

He faces Ethan. “Lock down procurement. Every log, every employee, every delivery, frozen. Anyone tries to leave the island, you stop them before they touch a boat.”

Ethan keys his radio without hesitation. “Security grid, code Valcrosse-One. Full lockdown authorization.”

Marina pales. “Adrian, this is extreme. You’ll scare the staff..”

“Good,” he says flatly. “Maybe fear will keep them alive.”

The gulls scream overhead, restless. The sunlight feels too bright, glaring off the water like an accusation.

Ethan’s radio crackles again. “Copy that, sir. Docks sealed. And.. Adrian?”

He presses the receiver to his ear. “Go ahead.”

Static, then a pause heavy enough to bend the air. “We found something else. The request for the safety shipment wasn’t just signed under procurement’s access code. It was amended after approval, and the timestamp matches the night of the cave rescue.”

My breath catches. “The same night..”

Adrian’s jaw locks. “Someone used the chaos to slip it through.”

Ethan looks up. “You were right. This isn’t an outside hit.”
He straightens, voice low. “The skiff rope was cut from inside procurement.”

The words settle like lead.

Adrian doesn’t move for several seconds, then murmurs, “Then we start from the inside.” His gaze finds mine. “No more accidents. No more mercy.”

The wind tears across the dock, scattering the last scraps of packing paper into the sea, white ghosts sinking beneath the bright water. Somewhere beyond the cliffs, the island hums like it’s listening.

And I know, deep down, this isn’t sabotage anymore.
It’s war, and this time, I’m in it with him.

Author’s Note

End of Act I – The calm before the burn.
Adrian and Elara have stopped circling; the war has started, and so will everything they’ve been holding back.

Act II turns up the heat, closer rooms, slower breaths, rougher confessions.
If you’ve been waiting for the tension to snap… keep a cold drink nearby before you open the next chapter.