E L  A R A

I know something’s wrong the second I step into the clinic. Not wrong like blood-on-the-floor wrong. Wrong like air-too-still, eyes-too-quiet wrong. Asha won’t look at me when she hands over morning vitals, and she’s never like that. She’s usually all soft sarcastic comments before coffee. Today she’s… folded in on herself.

“There’s, um… something you should see,” she says, fingers worrying the cuff of her scrubs like she’s trying to rub a bruise away. She pushes an envelope across the counter. Not sealed, just… left there for her. For us. No name.

The printout inside hits like a slap: missing overtime hours. A dozen names. Entire shifts shaved down to nothing. Hazard pay “adjusted for budget compliance.” Adjusted meaning erased. My gut goes cold. Someone’s been stealing from them. From her. From the staff who already work themselves into the ground so Seraphine can sparkle. Asha finally speaks, voice barely there.

“Dr. Quinn… I didn’t want to bother you but, someone’s messing with payroll again. People are scared to complain. Last time someone did, their schedule got cut for a month.” Again.  That word burns.

I press the heel of my hand between my eyes. “You did the right thing bringing this to me.” But inside, something twists.  This isn’t a mistake. Someone is doing this on purpose. And the island feels like it’s holding its breath.

I’m still staring at the numbers when I feel her presence before she even speaks.

“Walk with me, Elara.” Isabella’s voice is always this calm, like she was born already knowing the ending of every argument. Today it’s even softer. Like she already knows what’s inside the envelope. She waits until we’re inside the back corridor, away from guests and cameras. The clinic hum fades behind us. Her heels click lightly on the tile, steady, purposeful.

“Who gave it to you?” she asks.

“Asha found it on the counter this morning.”

“And the staff?” she says, eyes sharp as a surgeon’s scalpel.

“They’re scared,” I answer, throat tight. “This isn’t the first time payroll has been tampered with. Hazard pay disappearing. Overtime cut. ‘Budget compliance’ as an excuse.” She exhales slowly. Not surprise. Recognition. That… stuns me. She already knows.

“Come,” she says again, gentler this time. “There’s something I need to show you.” I follow her through a maintenance hallway I’ve never noticed, past a locked staff-only door. She punches a code so fast I don’t catch the numbers. The air changes instantly, cooler, dimmer, smelling faintly of dust and old paper.

“Isabella… what is this?” She closes the door behind us.  A small room. Shelves of folders, ledgers, binders labeled by year in her handwriting I’ve seen on birthday cards and corporate memos. Stacks of financials no one in PR even knows exist. Her eyes meet mine, unflinching.  “This is where the truth lives.”

My stomach drops. She’s been keeping records. In secret.

I drag the binder toward me and flip through the next set of pages. It’s worse. Not just missing hours. Entire departments quietly drained.

I pull a 2019 ledger closer and lay it beside a 2020 one, flipping back and forth. The same names show up again and again. Groundskeeping. Housekeeping. Night shift security. The people who never get thanked, never get invited to lantern releases.

“These are the ones with the least protection,” Isabella says quietly.
“And the least power,” I add.

She nods. “Every year, right before Lantern Tide, the audits spike. Then the corrections ‘disappear’ after the festival closes.” It’s a sick rhythm, predictable, deliberate. Someone using the chaos of festival season to erase theft.

My stomach twists. “But this isn’t just sloppy accounting. This is..”

“Intentional,” she finishes.

I meet her eyes. There’s no fear in them. Just exhaustion and something I didn’t expect: resolve. The kind that comes from fighting the same silent war too long and deciding to keep fighting anyway.

“I thought the festival chaos was the worst of it,” I whisper.

“Oh, Elara.” Isabella reaches out, lays a hand on mine. Her touch is warm, steady. “The chaos isn’t the danger. The people who hide inside it are.”

We move deeper into the shelves, past binders so worn the labels are frayed. Isabella pauses at one and traces the spine with her index finger, like she’s remembering every argument she lost, every moment she bit her tongue for the sake of peace.

“You’ve been carrying this alone,” I say, not a question. She stiffens for a second, then exhales.

“Damian thinks the staff love working here,” she says softly. “He sees the smiles. The gratitude. He doesn’t see the second jobs, the underpaid hours, the fear of speaking up.” Her face tightens. “He’s a good man. But he still believes people will tell him when they’re hurting.”

“And Adrian?” I ask before I can stop myself. Something fragile flickers through her expression. 

“Adrian carries too much,” she murmurs. “More than he lets anyone see. The island weighs on him. The family. The expectations.” A pause.

 “I didn’t want to add this to his shoulders until I had irrefutable proof.”

“So you protected him,” I say. “And the staff. At the same time.”

“I tried.”

The way she says it, quiet, almost ashamed, breaks something in me. Because I know that tone.  I’ve lived that tone.  The voice of someone who fought and fought and still worries she hasn’t done enough.

“Isabella,” I say, voice rough. “You shouldn’t have had to do this alone.” She gives a small, weary smile.
“I’m not alone anymore.” And for a second, it feels like something lands between us.
Heavy. True.

I pulled a newer binder, this year’s. Fresh ink. Crisp paper. And then a line jumps out at me like a knife.

“Wait,” I say. “This… this isn’t old. This was updated last week.” Isabella moves beside me, reading over my shoulder. Her breath catches. 

 “Whoever is doing this is getting faster.”

“No,” I say, because something is crawling across my skin. “They’re getting bolder.” I flip through the pages, my heart thudding unevenly. Adjusted hours from two days ago. Hazard pay is overwritten. A staff complaint filed and then… deleted. The printed version is the only proof it existed.

“This isn’t months-old sabotage,” I whisper. “This is now.” The room feels smaller.
Closer.  Like the walls are leaning in.

“Elara,” Isabella says carefully. “Speak.”

“This is coordination,” I say. “Someone with system access. Someone who knows when oversight is weakest.” My hand shakes turning the page. “Isabella… this isn’t just theft. This is someone trying to destabilize the entire resort.”

I think of the near-drowning. The cut skiff rope. The failed drills. The smear campaign. A pattern I didn’t see until now. And Adrian’s face flashes in my mind, all that tension and the quiet dread he thinks he hides. He doesn’t know.  He can’t know. But this touches him. Touches everything he’s built. Everything he’s terrified of losing.

“What if this is the same person sabotaging the safety systems?” I whisper. Isabella’s eyes sharpen, hard as tempered glass.

“Then we are far more exposed than I feared.”

I reach for another binder, but Isabella stops me.

“Not that one,” she says softly. “Start with this.” She hands me a single folder. Thin. Too thin.

“Year-to-date executive expenditures,” she says. “Top-level allocations.” My stomach knots. “Executive?”

“Yes. Only a handful of people have access.” I open it—and everything tilts. There. Right in the spreadsheet’s center. A transfer logged five nights ago. Large. Irregular. Routed through a dummy account flagged in red pen.

“What is this?” I ask.

“Follow it.” I drag my finger down the column, pulse climbing higher with every line. The transfer didn’t go to maintenance.  Or staff compensation. Or festival prep.

It went to: Seraphine Operations — Tier 1 Authorization. Only three people on the island hold Tier 1 clearance.

Damian.
Isabella.
And Adrian.

A sharp exhale punches out of me.

“No,” I whisper. “No, he wouldn’t.. he didn’t..” Isabella places a steady hand on my wrist.

“This is why I brought you here,” she says softly.
“Because someone wants it to look like my son.” The room feels ice-cold. Someone is framing Adrian. And they’re getting closer.