E L A R A

Morning breaks silver and too quiet. The sea looks innocent again like it never howled through our windows last night, like the whole island didn’t hear us choose each other in front of the cameras. Adrian is somewhere behind closed doors with statements and shareholders; I’m at the clinic, sleeves rolled, pretending the world hasn’t tilted.

Work helps. Paper, not emotion. Inventory reports, delivery logs, purchase orders lined in neat blue rows. Numbers behave when people don’t.

Until they don’t.

The weekly supply manifest lands on my desk at noon, couriered from the mainland depot. I flip through the pages, listing gauze, saline, antivenom, and AED batteries, then stop.  The totals are wrong. The entire Lantern Tide shipment were two crates of emergency stock, half our oxygen cylinders, and every dose of epinephrine, is marked delivered three days ago. But the storage room is still half-empty.

My pulse jumps. I call Asha. “Check the cold-storage log.”

She scans her tablet, frowning. “No entries since Monday.”

“That can’t be right. I signed the request myself.”

“Truck manifest shows arrival stamp, Doctor. Signed by… T. Arden?”

I know every driver on our route. There’s no Arden.

I pull the radio from the counter. “Security dispatch, this is Dr. Quinn. I need confirmation on yesterday’s supply run.”

Static. Then Ethan’s calm baritone: “Copy. What’s missing?”

“Everything we need to keep people breathing next weekend.”

A pause long enough to mean he’s already moving. “Stay put. I’ll check the docks.”

“I’m not staying put,” I snapped. “If those crates are somewhere between here and the mainland, I’m finding them.”

“Then I’m driving.”

Fifteen minutes later the clinic doors hiss open and he’s there, sun-browned and steady, eyes scanning even as he tosses me a security vest. The smell of diesel and salt clings to him.

“Route map,” he says. “Main road splits after the cliffs. If someone wanted a truck to disappear, that’s where.”

I grab my med bag and climb into the passenger seat. The engine growls awake, dust spiraling behind us. The island blurs past the orchid groves, glittering sea, perfect for postcards and crimes.

As the tires bite into the dirt track, I glance at Ethan. “You think this is a mistake?”

He shakes his head once. “Nothing this clean is a mistake.”

The horizon tightens into storm gray. Somewhere out there, our lifeline has been cut.

The farther we drive, the rougher the road gets. Asphalt turns to packed sand, then to gravel that rattles the chassis until my teeth ache. The canopy thickens overhead, palm fronds slapping the windshield like warning hands. Heat builds fast inside the cab, mingling with the scent of diesel and salt, sweat and adrenaline.

Ethan drives with the same control he brings to everything, calm and precise, his gaze flicking between the road ahead and the mirrors.

I’ve seen him take down drunk guests and defuse panicked crowds, but he’s quieter now, every muscle tuned to the road.

“You’ve done this route before?” I ask.

“Too many times,” he says. “Shipments come through the north pass. Easy run unless someone wants to make it hard.”

“Hard, how?”

He flicks a glance at me. “Flat tires. Wrong turn. Papers that don’t match the cargo. Usually it’s incompetence.” His jaw tightens. “Sometimes it’s sabotage.”

The word lands like a stone between us. I watch the GPS flicker uselessly; the signal dies under the canopy. My phone follows a minute later. The island eats communication like it eats secrets.

“Could be a clerical error,” I offer, but even to my own ears it sounds weak.

“Clerical errors don’t reroute oxygen cylinders,” he says.

Wind howls through a cracked vent, whipping a loose strand of my hair across my face. I push it back, fingers trembling more than I want to admit. “If we don’t find those supplies before the festival..”

“We will,” he cuts in, voice firm. “You focus on what happens when we do.”

I turn toward him. “You mean if we find a crash. Or a body.”

His eyes meet mine briefly, dark and steady. “Then you do what you do best, Doctor. You keep people alive.”

The word Doctor shouldn’t sound like comfort, but from him it does. His calm steadies me when everything else feels like it’s shaking apart. We hit a rut, and the truck jolts hard. I grab the dash, but his hand is already there, firm around my forearm, stopping me from hitting the door. The contact sparks through me with pure adrenaline, nothing more. He releases me the instant the wheels grip again.

“Are you all right?” he asks.

“Fine,” I answer, though my pulse is still racing.

“Sorry,” he mutters.

“Don’t be.” My voice comes out lower than I intended.

We fall into a silence so dense it seems to press against the windows. The jungle hums beyond the glass, filled with cicadas, hidden birds, and the rustle of something larger. Every turn feels narrower, every shadow suspect. I open the glove compartment and pull out the manifest copy. “Whoever signed for the shipment used a pen from Seraphine’s front desk.”

He arches a brow. “You’re sure?”

“There’s a chip in the barrel and only one pen in the lobby has it.” I glance up. “Meaning whoever faked the delivery was already on the island.”

“Inside job,” he says flatly.

The truck bucks over a rise, revealing a sliver of coastline far below. Waves flash like broken glass. In the distance, a white box truck glints at the edge of the cliffs, half-hidden by palms.

“There,” I say, pointing. “Brake.”

Ethan downshifts hard, tires spitting sand. The truck fishtails before catching grip, engine growling as we veer onto the narrow trail leading down. Dust clouds our view. The closer we get, the worse it looks, the driver door ajar, crates stacked unevenly in the back, no movement.

Ethan kills the engine. “Stay behind me.”

“I’m not helpless.”

“Didn’t say you were.” He draws his sidearm, checks the chamber, and steps out.

I follow, heartbeat pounding against my ribs. The air smells wrong with oil and something metallic underneath, faint but sharp. Blood or fuel. The cliff wind tears at my hair as we approach the truck.

Ethan’s hand rises in signal. Wait.

I freeze. He edges forward, peers into the cab, then motions me closer.

The driver’s seat is empty. Keys still in the ignition.

“Someone left in a hurry,” I whisper.

“Or they were made to,” he says.

A gull screams overhead, and the echo rolls down the cliffs like a warning bell.

The truck lists to one side, one tire buried in soft sand. The rear doors gape open, chains swinging lazily in the wind. Inside, crates are stacked in uneven columns with some pried apart, packing foam scattered like snow. My breath catches when I see the stamped labels. Valcrosse Medical Supplies – Seraphine Clinic. Every box slit, half the contents gone.

Ethan climbs onto the bumper, flashlight slicing through dust. “This wasn’t theft for profit,” he mutters. “They took specific things.”

I pull myself up beside him. “Oxygen tanks. Epi. Anything traceable.” I crouch, fingertips brushing a broken seal. The plastic is still warm from the sun, but the cut is clean, it’s an industrial blade. “They knew exactly what mattered.”

“Look here.” He points to the manifest envelope taped to the inner door. It’s been ripped open, but the corner of a carbon sheet sticks out. I ease it free. The signature at the bottom blurs under sweat and dirt, but one thing is clear: the name printed beneath it. T. Arden that is typed neatly, as if meant to be believed.

My pulse kicks. “Fake ID, fake name. Whoever signed knew the system.”

Ethan scans the ground. “Footprints of two sets. One smaller. Female maybe.” He kneels, presses a hand into the sand. “Tread depth’s fresh. Ten, fifteen minutes tops.”

“Then they’re close,” I whisper.

A twig snaps in the brush.

He turns, gun raised. “Step out. Slowly.”

Leaves rustle. A man stumbles from the treeline in his mid-thirties, sweat darkening his shirt, hands up. His eyes darted between us, wild. “Don’t shoot. I just drive the thing.”

“Name,” Ethan orders.

“T-Tomas Arden.”

My heart slams once. “That’s not your name.”

He flinches, eyes flicking to me. “I was told to use it. Said it was for confidentiality.”

“Who told you?” Ethan’s tone drops to lethal calm.

The man swallows. “She said it came from the family. That I’d be paid extra to reroute, hold the crates till they called.”

“Which she?”

He hesitates. “Said she worked for one of the Valcrosses. The cousin.”

I step closer. “Selene?”

He shakes his head violently. “No. The other aide. The one that handles deliveries and calls herself ‘logistics support.’ Blonde hair, sharp accent..”

Ethan’s gaze snaps to mine. We both know who that sounds like. Marina’s assistant.

“Where are the missing crates?” I demand.

“Inland,” he blurts. “Old sugar warehouse past the ridge. They said to wait till tonight.”

Ethan grabs his radio. Static. Dead zone.

“Truck keys,” I say. “Give them.” When he hesitates, Ethan steps forward and the man tosses them quickly.

“Stay here,” Ethan orders. “If you move, I’ll find you.”

We climb back into our jeep, dust swirling behind us. My hands shake as I strap in. “This isn’t random,” I whisper. “Someone inside wants the clinic crippled for Lantern Tide.”

Ethan’s jaw flexes. “And now we know where to start digging.”

The radio crackles weakly with Adrian’s voice, distorted but urgent. “All teams stand down. Supplies accounted for. False alarm.”

Ethan and I trade looks. My stomach turns to ice.

“He thinks it’s handled,” I say. “Because someone made him believe it.”

He floors the accelerator. “Then we show him proof.”

The cliffs blur past, waves smashing below like thunder. The truck shrinks in the mirror, the driver shrinking with it, a single figure framed against the sea.

Wind whips through the window, carrying the smell of salt and betrayal.

“Ethan,” I whisper, gripping the dash. “She said it came from the family.”

He nods grimly. “Then the family’s the leak.”

And as the horizon swallows the sun, I know this isn’t over. It’s just begun.