Chapter 43
Pressure Drop
“So I guess we’re walking,” Nick drawled, his tone dry enough to start fires.
David quirked an eyebrow, letting the moment stretch. A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, smug from knowing something Nick didn’t, from having planned ahead while his brother assumed the worst. “Would I do that to you?”
Nick slanted him a look that needed no words. Years of brotherhood compressed into a single skeptical glance that said, clearer than speech: Yes. Absolutely yes. You’ve done worse.
“Ah,” David smirked, acknowledgment coloring his voice, “right. I definitely would.”
He’d done worse. There was the time in Boston when he convinced Nick the client meeting was casual dress—then arrived in a full suit while Nick wore jeans. Or the rental car debacle in Dubai. The list went on.
Brothers who’d survived what they had earned certain privileges. Light psychological warfare ranked high among them.
He let the moment stretch, savoring the faint twitch at the corner of Nick’s mouth despite his best effort at annoyance.
The expression softened him—made him look younger.
More like the brother David remembered from before corporate responsibility, before sabotage, before Kate had been targeted and everything turned deadly serious.
With a mock-dramatic flourish worthy of a stage magician, David swung open the storage shed’s door. The hinges creaked, protesting the movement, and the odor of oil and rubber and trapped heat rolled out in a wave.
Inside, nestled in toolboxes and battery packs, sat an ATV tricked-out beyond regulation, matte green with knobby terrain tires and a padded roll cage. David’s pride and joy, lovingly maintained and upgraded over the past six months until it could handle anything the island threw at it.
Zach had his motorcycle—sleek and fast and vaguely menacing. David had an ATV—practical, powerful, and completely unnecessary for a resort that had perfectly decent golf carts and well-tended trails.
But where was the fun in perfectly good golf carts?
“However,” David waved a hand at their chariot like a game show host revealing a prize, voice gleeful. “I would not do that to me.”
Nick snorted, something between laughter and exasperation. He caught the keys David tossed with reflexive ease, the metal jingling in his hand. “You’re ridiculous.”
“I’m prepared,” David corrected, moving toward the passenger seat. “There’s a difference.”
“Is there, though?” Nick slid into the driver’s seat, adjusting it to accommodate his frame. The vehicle dipped under his weight, the suspension compressing with a hydraulic sigh.
“Absolutely. Ridiculous would be installing a sound system.” David sank into the seat, appreciating the way the fabric was still warm from the day’s heat, puffs of dust and synthetic leather rising at once.
The memory foam molded to his body, supporting his back in a way that helped his shoulders release some of their strain.
“I merely ensured we had reliable transportation in all conditions.”
“You installed a sound system last month.”
“That’s different. That’s quality of life.”
The ATV hummed to life under Nick’s hands, the electric engine soundless—David had insisted on the hybrid model, something that could run silent when necessary. The dashboard lit up with soft blue displays, throwing their faces into gentle relief as the vehicle rolled forward over the damp trail.
David leaned back, relishing the night air washing over his face as they picked up speed, cooler now that they were in motion.
The breeze cut through the humidity, carrying the fragrance of night-blooming flowers and rich earth.
Above them, through gaps in the canopy, stars scattered across the sky like chips of diamond, the Milky Way visible in ways it never is in cities, with light pollution and endless human sprawl.
His tablet rested on his lap, the screen dimmed but active, still humming with that familiar awareness beneath his palm.
The resort’s systems continued their tasks—climate control adjusting for the evening hours, security cameras sweeping their programmed arcs, the water management system running smoothly now that the threat had been removed.
Well, one threat. One hired hand. One piece of a much larger puzzle.
The satisfaction that had surged so sharply minutes ago now dulled, complicated by the questions multiplying in his mind. Who did the saboteur work for? How much did betrayal cost? What had they promised him—or threatened him with—to make him desperate enough to take this risk?
More importantly, how many more were there?
The ATV bounced over a root, jarring David’s thoughts back to the present.
Nick navigated with easy competence, avoiding the worst of the ruts and rocks, following the path that wound through the jungle like a serpent.
They’d walked this route in daylight enough times that Nick knew where the treacherous spots lurked, where erosion often undercut the trail, where low-hanging branches reached for unwary drivers.
“You think he’ll talk?” Nick asked without looking away from the path ahead. The ambient glow of the dashboard highlighted his profile, all sharp angles and focused concentration.
David considered the question, turning it over in his mind like a puzzle piece, examining it from all sides. “Depends on who he’s more afraid of—Zach or whoever hired him.”
“Zach can be pretty terrifying.”
“True.” David smirked. “Zach’s also right in front of him, which gives his fear something concrete to focus on. If he’s more afraid of some vague, distant threat, someone who might retaliate against his family or destroy his life in ways Zach won’t, that’s tougher to leverage.”
Nick grunted in agreement, downshifting as the trail steepened. The ATV’s motor whined, compensating, finding traction on the loose soil. “You got anything off his device?”
“Some.” David let his awareness sink into the data pulled during those crucial seconds while the saboteur had been pinned. “Let’s see… basic corruption protocols, timed deployment, nothing sophisticated. The interesting part is what’s not there.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning no fingerprints. Not digital ones, anyway.” David’s fingers moved across the screen, highlighting sections of code, following the architecture of the malware.
“Surface level crude, but effective. This was written to be disposable. One-time use, no callbacks, no command-and-control infrastructure. Whoever created it didn’t want any connection back to themselves. ”
“Professional?”
“Very. Not an amateur.” The word tasted sour on his tongue.
David preferred an amateur, someone sloppy, someone who left trails.
Professionals were harder to track, harder to predict, harder to stop.
“The device itself is probably a burner, purchased with cash, untraceable. We might get lucky with forensics, but I’m not holding my breath. ”
They emerged from the thickest part of the jungle, the trail widening as they approached the resort’s outer perimeter.
In the distance, lights glowed like earthbound stars—the main building, the guest cottages, the landscaped paths that made everything look effortless and natural courtesy of the small army of groundskeepers who maintained the illusion.
Home.
“Lena’s probably wondering where you are,” Nick said, and there was something in his voice—amusement, or meaning, or both.
Heat, which had nothing to do with the tropical climate, crept up David’s neck. “She worked second shift today, so she’ll be sound asleep now. She won’t even notice I’m gone.”
“Right. Because she definitely didn’t watch you leave. Definitely didn’t worry when you didn’t come back at the normal time. Definitely isn’t checking her phone every five minutes.”
“How would you even know that?”
Nick tapped his temple, grinning. “Telepath, remember? Also, I have eyes. You two aren’t as subtle as you think you are.”
David wanted to argue, to insist that his relationship with Lena was normal, appropriate, completely professional.
But the words wouldn’t come, mostly because they’d be lies.
Nick would know they were lies, and there seemed little point in lying to a telepath who had probably caught him thinking about Lena seven hundred times today.
“It’s complicated,” he said in what was perhaps the greatest understatement of his life.
“It’s not.” Nick guided the ATV around the final curve, the main building coming into full view now, all elegant architecture and warm lighting that promised comfort and luxury. “You like her. She likes you. The complication is you making it complicated.”
“She works for us. She’s in danger because of us. Someone is trying to hurt her because she’s connected to the resort, to me, to—” David cut himself off, recognizing the spiral before it fully formed. “It’s not that simple.”
“No,” Nick agreed, his voice gentling. “No, it’s not simple, but it’s also not impossible. You’re allowed to want things for yourself, David. You’re allowed to have things that aren’t about work or the company or protecting everyone else.”
The ATV rolled to a stop in the staff parking area, tucked discreetly beside the building and surrounded by foliage, where guests wouldn’t see the utilitarian vehicles and equipment.
Nick killed the engine, and silence descended—not complete, never complete on a tropical island, but the absence of even the wheels’ hum made the ambient sounds of the night now audible. Wind whispering through palms. The buzz of insects. The eternal murmur of waves against the shore.
David sat there for a moment, not quite ready to move, to face what came next. They had a prisoner to interrogate. Questions to ask. Answers to extract. Beyond that, the larger mystery still loomed—who wanted to destroy them, and why?
Underneath all of that, woven through everything else, was Lena.
The way she’d looked at him this afternoon while he explained his plan.
The worry in her eyes that she’d tried to hide.
The trust she’d placed in him despite barely knowing him, despite having every reason to keep her distance from wealthy men with power and secrets.
“I don’t want her hurt,” David mumbled. “Not because of me. Not because of this.”
“I know.” Nick’s hand landed on his shoulder, supportive. “So we make sure she isn’t. We stop whoever’s behind this, and we keep her safe. That’s what we do—we protect our people.”
Our people.
The phrase settled on David like a key finding its lock.
That’s what Lena had become, wasn’t it? Somewhere between her first day at the resort and tonight, she’d graduated from employee to something more.
Something that mattered in ways that had nothing to do with organizational charts or professional hierarchies.
She’d become theirs to protect.
His to protect.
And David Jones had never failed in protecting something he cared about. He wasn’t about to start now.
“Come on.” His legs protested when he stood, stiff from crouching and then riding, but he ignored the discomfort. “Let’s go see what our new friend has to say.”
They walked towards the security entrance, comfortable knowing that not every moment needed words. The path was level under David’s feet, routine after years of traversing it at all hours.
Tonight, something felt different.
Maybe it was the adrenaline still trickling through his body, the aftermath of successful action.
Maybe it was the weight of what they’d learned and what they still needed to discover.
Maybe it was Nick’s words about being allowed to want things, to have things, echoing in his mind like a permission he’d never quite given himself before.
Maybe it was simply that for the first time in weeks, they weren’t reacting. They were planning. They had leverage. They had momentum.
They had hope.
David’s tablet hummed against his palm, the resort’s systems singing their electronic song, everything functioning as it should. Secure. Protected.
For now.
Tonight, ‘for now’ was enough. In his experience, safety developed one moment at a time, one decision at a time, one protective measure at a time.
Tonight had been one more step toward ensuring that safety would last.
The rest would come.
It had to.