A D R I A N

By the time Ethan finishes his report, dawn bleeds over Seraphine’s horizon. The message still burns behind my eyes.
LEAVE BEFORE LANTERN TIDE. OR ELSE.
I’ve read it fifty times and still can’t breathe past the idea of her name being a threat.

Elara’s asleep in the clinic office, curled sideways on the couch she swore wasn’t comfortable enough for patients. Her breath is slow but restless, her lips still swollen from the kiss we never got to finish. If I look too long, I forget there’s a threat waiting behind her name.

“Anonymous domain, rerouted through three VPNs,” Ethan says quietly. “But the signal pinged near the service pier cameras before it went dark.”
“So they’re here.”
“Or close enough to want her to see it.”

I stare at the windows, nothing but pale light and sea mist but my chest stays tight. Fear feels like a collar I can’t unclasp. “Assign a full detail,” I say. “Two at the clinic, two on rotation outside her suite. No gaps.”

Ethan hesitates. “She won’t like it.”
“She doesn’t have to like it.”

He nods once, but his eyes flick to where she sleeps. “You’ll have to tell her yourself.”
“I will.” I drag a hand through my hair, pacing once. “I’m not losing anyone on this island again.”

When he’s gone, the silence swells. The clinic hums like machines, the ocean’s low pulse, but beneath it all is the memory of her shaking under my hands, the way she trusted me for one stolen hour. That’s what the message targeted: not just her safety, but my control.

I step closer to her couch. Her lashes twitch; she’s already half-awake, the kind of rest that never fully lets go. I want to touch her shoulder, to promise she’s safe, but my palms are still shaking. I settle for watching her breathe.

The sun edges higher, slicing gold across the glass. Another day that wouldn’t exist if the wrong person had pressed “send” sooner.

I text Ethan: Implement by eight. No exceptions.
Then I type one more line before I can stop myself.
If she argues, remind her it’s not optional.

It doesn’t even take her an hour.

I’m halfway through a call with the legal team when the clinic door slams so hard the glass rattles. She storms in, barefoot, tank top, scrub pants, hair still damp from a rushed shower and every cell in my body recognizes the incoming fire before she speaks.

“What the hell did you do?”

The men on the video call go silent. I end it mid-sentence. “Out,” I tell them, and the screen goes black.

Elara stands in the middle of my office, arms crossed, jaw tight enough to cut steel. “There are two men outside the clinic pretending to fix a camera that isn’t broken. One followed me from the dock to the infirmary. They have earpieces, Adrian. You think I don’t notice?”

“Good,” I say evenly. “That means they’re doing their job.”

Her eyes narrow. “Their job? You mean spying? Guarding? Which word makes you feel more powerful?”

“It’s protection.”

“It’s control,” she fires back, stepping closer. “You didn’t even ask.”

“Because you’d have said no.” I keep my tone calm, measured, the tone that always works in boardrooms. It doesn’t work on her. It never does. “You received a threat.”

“I saw it.” She waves a hand. “Two vague sentences typed by some coward with a Wi-Fi signal. You really think I’m going to hide behind guards because of that?”

“Yes,” I snapped before I could stop myself. “Because that coward might have teeth.”

She flinches at the bite in my voice, then steadies herself, chin lifting. “You don’t get to decide how I live my life because you’re scared.”

I stand, closing the space between us. The sunlight through the windows hits her skin, gold and furious. “This isn’t about living your life. It’s about keeping you breathing.”

“Do you hear yourself?” she demands, voice rising. “You sound like every man who’s ever tried to make my choices for me, like Nathan, the hospital board, every smug donor who thought a doctor should smile and nod.”

Her words hit harder than she knows. “Don’t compare me to him,” I say quietly.

“Then stop acting like him.”

For a long moment, neither of us breathes. The air between us feels alive, humming with leftover heat and new fury. Her pulse jumps at her throat; mine mirrors it.

“I didn’t put guards on you because I don’t trust you,” I say finally. “I did it because I don’t trust the world around you.”

Her lips part, but no sound comes. I can see the argument forming, dying, forming again. She wants to stay angry, but the fear under it, the same one in me makes her shake.

“I’ve worked in trauma centers,” she whispers. “I’ve had knives thrown at me, patients die in my arms. You think I can’t handle this?”

“I think I can’t,” I admit.

That stops her. Completely. Her breath catches, eyes widening. The silence between us shifts, less battle, more confession. For a heartbeat, I almost tell her everything: the nights I wake choking on what-ifs, the names I couldn’t save.

But I don’t. Not yet.

She takes one step back, voice low. “You don’t get to protect me from ghosts, Adrian.”

“I can damn well try.”

Her stare could flay skin.
“Try?” she echoes. “You think locking me down counts as trying? You think I’m a patient or an employee you can order around until I behave?”

“I think I’m the one who gets the call when you don’t answer your radio.”

She laughs once, sharp and broken. “And what then? You show up with your guards and your money and fix it? You can’t run a rescue like you run a boardroom.”

“Except I can.” I move around the desk, every step deliberate. “Because when something breaks here, I do fix it. That’s the difference between us. You treat emergencies and I prevent them.”

Her shoulders stiffen. “By suffocating them.”

“By making sure you’re not the next body I have to bury.” The words rip out harsher than I mean, scraping my throat raw.

She blinks. “So that’s it. You get to decide who lives and who hides?”

“I get to decide when it’s worth the risk.”

“That’s not protection,” she says softly. “That’s fear wearing a suit.”

The truth lands like a punch. I can feel it in the tremor that runs through my hands, in the static in my ears. Fear is a suit that is tailored, pressed, expensive and she’s the first to see through it.

“Elara…” My voice roughens. “When I saw that message—”

“…you panicked.”

“I planned,” I correct, though we both know it’s a lie.

Her chin tilts. “You think you’re invincible because you control everything. But this?” She presses a palm to my chest, right over the heartbeat hammering out of rhythm. “You can’t spreadsheet this.”

The contact detonates something. I catch her wrist before she can pull back, holding her hand there, against me. “You think I don’t know that?” I whisper. “I’ve been pretending I can since I was seventeen.”

Her breath stutters. “Then stop pretending.”

I don’t. I can’t. The silence thickens until it’s almost touching. Close enough that I can smell the sharp bite of antiseptic and orchids clinging to her from the clinic, the scent I now associate with her.

“Every time you walk into that clinic,” I say, lower now, “every time you run toward danger instead of away from it, I feel like I’m watching the tide drag you under again. And I can’t do that. Not after the cave. Not after…”

Her throat works. “You think guarding me will make that go away?”

“No. But maybe it lets me breathe while you keep tempting fate.”

She shakes her head, but the anger’s gone, replaced by something fragile. “You don’t get to decide who I am just because you’re scared of losing me.”

“I’m already losing you,” I admit, and the room goes still.

She exhales, shaky, the fight draining out. “Adrian…”

“I know it’s wrong,” I cut in. “I know it’s not what you need from me. But I can’t turn it off. Not this. Not you.”

Her eyes shine, gray-green bright as seawater. “You could have just said that instead of sending an army.”

I huff a sound that isn’t quite a laugh. “I’m better at logistics than feelings.”

“Clearly.”

She looks at me for a long moment, then steps back. “Call them off after the Lantern Tide,” she says quietly. “Until then… I’ll try not to bite their heads off.”

That small concession feels like mercy. I nod once, unable to trust my voice.

She turns to leave, pauses at the door. “Adrian?”

“Yes?”

Her mouth curves, not a smile, exactly, but close. “Next time you’re scared, just tell me. It’s easier to fight a threat when I know which one it is.”

The door clicks behind her, leaving me alone with the echo of her footsteps and the hollow ache of truth.

I sink into the chair she just vacated, run a hand over my face, and whisper the thing I should’ve said out loud.

“I’m scared too.”