Chapter 32 #2
“Was it?”
Summer’s mouth flattened. “That’s the part I want your read on. I recommend a ninety-day probation period and no peak-season placements until they prove their inventory controls are real.”
The report sat in front of me, clean and complete. Not a crisis. A choice.
“Do it,” I said. “And add financial penalties to the next contract renewal.”
Summer’s pen moved. “Already drafted.”
Of course it was.
Summer’s eyes flicked to mine, then back to the agenda. “Emme.”
Emme tucked a strand of hair behind one ear on the screen. “The Galápagos expedition partner accepted the emergency-transfer language and the insurance addendum. Communications standards are clean now. Evacuation obligations are clearer.”
Annie’s mouth flattened. “Cancellation windows are still garbage.”
“Unfriendly,” Emme said.
“Predatory.”
“Firmly unfriendly.”
Brynn lifted her coffee. “I love when Finance and Vendor Relations flirt.”
Annie did not blink. “We are not flirting. We are identifying unacceptable exposure.”
Emme smiled. “With warmth.”
“With math.”
I looked at the revised clause. “Push for weather-delay flexibility and a client medical exception. If they refuse both, we pause premium placement.”
Emme nodded. “That was my recommendation.”
Annie added, “And mine, but with less mercy.”
“Excellent work,” I said.
Emme’s smile softened. She did not look surprised. That was somehow worse.
Summer moved to the next tab. Actual tabs. Criminal behavior in office supplies.
“Annie and I have started preliminary interviews for the CFO transition.”
My pen tapped on the table. “You started interviews?”
“Preliminary ones,” Annie said.
“For your replacement.”
“For the CFO role, Jules. I am not being replaced as a person.”
Brynn leaned forward. “That is exactly what a person being replaced by a spreadsheet ghost would say.”
Annie ignored her. “Final round will be early November if the current shortlist holds. I’ll stay through transition and remain available in an advisory capacity during the first semester.”
The first semester.
University of Florida. Marine Sciences. A doctoral program Annie had earned and almost not taken because Wilder Horizons had needed her, because we had needed one another, because sometimes love looked suspiciously like a locked door with family branding.
I turned the page. “Candidates?”
“There is one Summer and I both like,” Annie said. “Remington Montague. Strong finance background. Excellent under pressure. Not easily rattled.”
“She survived an interview with you?” Brynn asked.
“Yes.”
“Potential.”
“Schedule her final,” I said.
Annie nodded once, already making the note.
No one asked if I was sure.
Daisy typed quietly from the corner.
Brynn tapped the side of her coffee mug. “Speaking of people we should hire before someone smarter steals them, Daisy needs to be full-time.”
Daisy’s typing stopped.
Summer looked at Brynn. “We discussed support expansion in general terms.”
“Yes, and now I am using my outside voice. Daisy can run a calendar, make a panicking client breathe in complete sentences, find a ghosted passport, and somehow keep the printer from having a psychosomatic breakdown in the middle of a deadline. That’s not intern work.
That’s a woman with a fully developed frontal lobe and a future.
Hire her before I steal her for my own chaotic bullshit. ”
Daisy looked up, her face a mask of terrifying competence. “I prefer ‘The Person Who Knows Where the Bodies and the Backup Toner are Buried,’ but I’m flexible for the right salary.”
Brynn pointed at her. “See? Diplomatic. Useful.”
Rayann leaned closer to her camera. “Brynn is right, and I need everyone to appreciate the personal growth it takes for me to say that out loud. Daisy is terrifyingly useful. Rome needs one of her. Possibly two. Someone who can track vendors, client upgrades, and whatever fresh nonsense the villa owners are calling ‘traditional local charm’ this week.”
Brynn sat back. “I want everyone to pause and appreciate this historic moment.”
“Do not make me regret it,” Rayann said.
“Put together a proposal,” Summer said.
Brynn lifted her pen. “And not just emergency help. A real intern pipeline. Hospitality programs. Logistics students. Weird little spreadsheet goblins Annie can identify in the wild.”
Annie didn’t look up. “I can.”
“Of course you can,” I said.
The room shifted around that sentence. Not dramatically. No one gasped. The walls remained upright. But my voice had come out without resistance, without the familiar reflex to take the idea, examine it, own it, improve it, control it until it belonged safely to me.
Daisy’s tablet made a soft click.
Gabe cleared his throat. “Security update?”
Summer nodded. “Go ahead.”
He connected his tablet to the screen. A clean matrix appeared: destination, vendor category, transfer risk, local contact, escalation path.
Max’s bones were in it. The structure, the color coding, the unforgiving clarity. Before Rome, before embassy work, before Rayann became the center of his life, Max had been Wilder Horizons’ director of security and logistics. Now he was building a different life beside ours instead of inside it.
Gabe stood with his shoulders squared. Young, yes. Not unready. There was a difference.
“We have procedures,” he said. “They work for standard luxury travel. Vendor vetting, transfer confirmation, client movement logs, emergency contact chains. But they were not built for targeted digital access tied to physical movement.”
The room quieted.
My pen stopped moving.
Gabe continued. “Max’s system assumes most threats are logistical failure, vendor misrepresentation, medical emergency, or client behavior. It doesn’t fully cover credential compromise, manifest exposure, or coordinated attempts to connect data access with physical location.”
Sarah’s text returned in my mind.
They shouldn’t have authenticated.
My fingers tightened around the pen until the plastic edge pressed into my skin.
Summer looked at me. “What do we need?”
The answer arrived before I wanted it.
Nick.
I didn’t say his name.
“We need an external assessment,” I said. “Destination security architecture. Digital-to-physical vulnerability review. Manifest and transfer protocols. Vendor credential standards. Staff escalation training.”
Gabe nodded. “Yes.”
“Limited scope at first. Remote audit if possible. Site review if needed. Gabe remains internal lead.”
His shoulders lowered by a fraction. Good.
Summer watched me. “External. Anyone in mind, Jules?”
“Formal proposal. Conflict disclosed before contact. You review before anything goes out.”
Brynn’s eyebrows rose. “Are we talking about the African ranger with the post-orgasm punctuation?”
I looked down at the agenda. “I have someone in mind who fits the role perfectly, which is an administrative nightmare because I have seen him naked. Repeatedly. The ethics committee and I are currently not on speaking terms.”
Daisy’s pen froze.
Rayann smiled from Rome. “Extensively, I assume.”
I lowered my forehead to the agenda for one brief, professional second.
“This meeting has lost focus.”
“No, big sister. It has absolutely found focus,” Brynn said.
Emme covered her mouth with one hand. Annie glanced at Daisy’s notes.
“Do not write ‘naked candidate,’” Annie said, her pen hovering over her legal pad. “Label him ‘Asset with Significant Physical Exposure.’ It’s more accurate and less likely to trigger an HR audit.”
Daisy’s pen hovered. “Already abbreviated.”
“Still no.”
Summer’s expression remained responsible, which was unacceptable under the circumstances. “Is he qualified?”
“Annoyingly.”
Gabe looked between us. “Reserve security?”
“Head of security at Mara Khaya. Ex-military. Field-based crisis response. Route planning. Guest containment. Staff coordination. Active incident management.” I paused. “His current contract ends in about three months.”
Rayann’s gaze sharpened. “Conveniently convenient.”
“Professionally relevant,” I said.
Brynn made a sound into her coffee. “Sure.”
I closed the folder in front of me. “We are not laundering my personal life through procurement.”
“Repeatedly,” Rayann said.
“This meeting remains professional under protest.”
Brynn made a small sound.
I pointed my pen at her. “Do not.”
“I said nothing.”
“You breathed in italics.”
Summer folded her hands. “A consulting assessment makes sense.”
Gabe nodded. “It would help. I can run what we have. I need a better framework before we scale further.”
There it was.
Not failure. Growth.
Daisy waited at the edge of full-time. Annie was preparing to leave without abandoning us.
Emme handled vendor contracts with velvet gloves and sharp clauses, while Rayann built Rome from another continent.
Brynn saw pipeline through profanity. Summer carried operations without fanfare, and Gabe held a department together with Max’s old system and his own steady hands.
Wilder Horizons had not stopped needing me.
That was the part I had to get right.
They still looked to me when the room needed direction. They still waited for my judgment before the shape became final. My standards lived in the walls, the contracts, the way Summer challenged a timeline and Emme softened a no until a client thanked her for it.
The company did not need my fingerprints on every surface to prove I loved it.
It needed me clear enough to make the next right call.
I set the pen down with steady hands. “Daisy, include security architecture assessment under new business. Gabriel, send me the current protocol matrix and Max’s last full review. Summer, I’ll draft the consulting scope and send it to you before contact.”
Daisy typed. Gabe nodded. Summer made one note.
No one applauded.
Thank God.
After the meeting, I returned to my office with Ranger Wilder still judging the room from the corner of my desk.
Daisy appeared two minutes later with fresh coffee.
“Do you need anything else?” she asked.
“Yes.”
She straightened.
“Send Summer your availability for a longer conversation this week.”
Her face went carefully blank. “About?”
“Growth.”
“That is either exciting or how people get assigned new filing systems.”
“Both, if you’re lucky.”
Her smile broke through before she could hide it. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Daisy.”
She paused in the doorway.
“Thank you for the alligator.”
“He seemed resilient.”
“He is currently my most emotionally stable advisor.”
“I’ll update his title in the org chart.”
She left before I could regret being fond of her.
I opened my laptop.
The blank document waited, clean and white and professionally unforgiving.
I typed the title first.
Wilder Horizons Security Architecture Assessment
Professional. Clean. Useful.
No mention of the way Nick’s voice had gone flat when he told me my manifest had been accessed. No mention of his hand on the radio, his blood on a bandage, Sofia’s homecoming date sitting inside my calendar like a fixed point I had not removed.
Objective. Scope.
Phase One: Transfer and Manifest Protocol Audit
Phase Two: Vendor Credential and Access Review
Phase Three: Destination-Specific Risk Framework
Phase Four: Staff Escalation and Training Recommendations
Internal Lead: Gabriel Vaughn.
Executive Sponsor: Juliette Wilder.
Review: Summer Wilder.
The cursor blinked beside the next line.
Proposed Consultant:
I typed his name once.
Nicholas Mercer.
My pulse behaved badly.
I deleted it.
External consultant.
Safer. Colder. Less likely to make my composure act like Daisy near a promotion discussion.
The cursor blinked again.
I typed his name where it belonged: Nicholas Mercer. Then I spent forty-five seconds adjusting the kerning and the font weight, as if a serif could somehow camouflage the fact that I was inviting a man who knew my pulse into the center of my boardroom.
His contract at Mara Khaya ended in three months.
I knew that because he had told me once in the careful tone of a man offering a fact instead of a hope.
I also knew he wanted to be stateside more often, though he had phrased it like logistics and not longing, because apparently we were both insufferable.
I didn’t send it.
I saved the draft and let the decision exist without forcing it to become action.
For once, restraint didn’t feel like avoidance.
It felt like design.
My phone buzzed.
Nick’s name appeared on the screen.
NICK: Sofia wants to know if there are alligators where you live.
I looked at Ranger Wilder on my desk. The afternoon Florida sun slanted through my window, warm and gold across the polished wood. The alligator’s khaki hat sat crooked over one black bead eye, deeply unqualified for office leadership.
ME: Tell her we have one in the office. He’s currently head of HR.
A few seconds passed. My pulse stayed steady. Home moved around me in the low murmur of phones, footsteps, and Daisy laughing at something near the front desk.
NICK: Sarah confirmed the credential source. Former contractor access tied to the fence breach. Daniel has the handoff with police. All guest transfers are complete. Everyone is clear.
A second message followed before I could answer.
NICK: Reserve remains standing. Staff remain competent. Giraffes remain judgmental.
The breath left me slowly.
ME: Good. Don’t work too hard, Ranger.
NICK: Try.
I set the phone down and looked out at the palms of Maris Key. My life wasn’t smaller. It was finally the right shape.