Worst case.

Oh, fuck. Oh, shit.

I don’t bother with a chair. I just drop down and sit on the floor.

“All right,” he says. “Thanks for calling.” He laughs. “No, I won’t. It’s tempting. But no.”

Then he ends the call and bends toward me, his hand held out to help me up.

I shake my head. “Until I know what that was about, I’d rather stay down here.”

His small smile doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Apparently the police know that I was at Reed’s house.”

“Oh.” I suddenly wish I’d gone for the small couch. At least it has a blanket that could ward off my sudden chill. “How?”

“A witness. Halloween night, remember? Reed’s porch light was off because he wasn’t doing candy, but a mother saw me under a streetlamp. She noticed a man walking alone.”

“You? She identified you?”

“They showed her a photo line-up. She picked me out.”

I close my eyes, and when I open them again, Jackson is crouched in front of me. “Syl, there’s more. She heard Reed and me arguing.”

“Oh, god.” I tremble, then grab hold of his hand. “You said worst case. You were talking about an arrest?”

He nods.

“So?” I demand. “When?”

“She doesn’t know. This may be the pivotal piece of information and they arrest tomorrow. Or they may try for more.”

“You didn’t do it.” My throat is thick. “They can’t take you away from me if you didn’t do it.”

“Hey.” He takes my hands in his. “This isn’t the problem we need to deal with right now. That’s not why we’re on this boat. It’s not why we’re at the island. We work now, okay? We work now, and we worry later.”

I nod. Because he’s right. And because worrying won’t solve anything, and neither will fear.

And because I meant what I said earlier—work is my solace, just as it is his. And right now, we both need it.

“Okay,” I say, forcing myself to think again. “Okay. We need—” My breath hitches as I say the words. “We need to prepare for the worst. The resort, I mean. We need a plan.” I push myself up to my feet. “If you do . . .” I trail off, hating even having to say it out loud.

“If I end up in cell block A?”

“Don’t,” I snap. “I can function, okay? But I can’t joke about it.”

“I know,” he says. “I’m sorry.” He pulls me into his arms and kisses my forehead. “Finish what you were saying.”

“I was just thinking that maybe we should hire someone who can step in and make sure your plans get executed the way you envisioned them.”

Jackson nods. “You’re right. I should have already thought of that.” He drags his fingers through his hair. “I would suggest Chester,” he continues, referring to one of his interns who has joined him in Los Angeles from the New York office. “But he’s not licensed yet, and I don’t think that would go over well with the investors.”

“And to be honest, I’d like someone I’ve worked with before.”

Jackson nods. “Are you thinking Nathan Dean?”

“Actually, yeah.” Dean was the architect for Damien’s Malibu house, and I’d worked closely with him during design and construction. Jackson met him briefly at a cocktail party not long ago at that very house, and they’d bonded over arches and trusses.

He’s a nice guy and a solid architect, though he’s not anywhere close to Jackson’s level. I know that Aiden thought Damien would veto Dean as the primary architect for the resort—apparently he’d committed to designing a bungalow for Damien and then backed out about the time we were getting started with Cortez—but this isn’t about Dean being the main guy. It’s about having someone on the team who’s capable of bringing Jackson’s vision to life if the worst happens.

“He seemed like a decent guy,” Jackson says. “If he’s got the time and Damien gives the okay, I think bringing him on board is a great idea.”

I nod. “I’ll feel him out about his schedule first, and if it sounds like he’d be free, I’ll run the idea past Damien and then we’ll go from there.”

I turn my attention back to the tentative list I’m making for cleaning up the island, and Jackson goes back to his drafting table.

By the time we hear the speedboat approaching, my list has gotten long, and I know it will get even longer once I see the damage up close and walk the island’s perimeter.

“How did you know?” I ask Ryan as he and Damien board Jackson’s yacht.

“Our saboteur is a bit of a show-off,” Damien says wryly. He passes me his phone, on which he’s saved a photograph of the destruction. It was taken at night, so only the parts illuminated by the flash are clear, and those bits are overly bright. It gives the image a haunting quality, as if we’re looking at some sort of futuristic mechanical graveyard. “That arrived by email this morning.”

“You’ve traced the email?” Jackson asks.

“Of course,” Ryan answers. “One of my guys just got back to me, actually. Sent from a burner smart phone. A dummy email account to a fake ID. All we know is that it was sent from the LA area, but that doesn’t do us much good. I’ve been assuming all along that the son of a bitch we’re chasing is local. And most likely in-house.”

“At least you’re no longer looking at me,” Jackson says, a wry edge to his voice.

“You said it yourself,” Damien says. “You have too much pride in your work. You wouldn’t fuck it over for a vendetta. Especially not one against me. I don’t mean that much to you.”

Damien glances at me. “There was a time you might have thrown your work under the bus if it meant getting back at Ms. Brooks. But I think that time has passed.”

“It has.” Jackson’s voice is as stiff as his posture. “And you’re right—you didn’t mean that much to me. Or if you did, I wouldn’t have wanted you to realize it.”

Damien chuckles. “And now I can?”

Jackson looks as confused as I feel.

“You said I ‘didn’t’ mean that much to you. Do I detect your growing respect and admiration?”

His voice is light, almost teasing, but Jackson answers seriously. “Yeah. I guess you do.” He locks eyes with Damien, then smiles thinly. “But don’t let it go to your head.”

The corner of Damien’s mouth twitches. “I’ll do my best.”

“Any leads?” I ask Ryan. So far, the investigation has hit dead ends and rabbit trails. “Surely the security team caught something today? They can’t possibly have done all this damage and stayed out of range. That area’s the whole reason we have the security cam.”

Ryan glances at Damien and frowns. “They looped the feed.”

“What?” I heard his words. I even know what he means. But somehow I just can’t process what he’s saying.

“How long?” Jackson asks.

Ryan shakes his head. “It’s a thirty-minute loop. Looks like it was recorded about two A.M., and they started the repeat at two-thirty. There was no moon last night, so it’s only the infrared, and nobody at the monitoring station noticed.”

“So how did you find out?”

“Once Damien got the email, we knew what to look for.”

I glance at Jackson, who is doing a valiant job of holding in his temper. I can see it though, pushing at the edges, building toward release.

He turns to me, the tension in his body palpable. “I may end up in prison after all, because I swear I will kill whoever is fucking with us.”

“You’ll have to fight me for the privilege,” Damien says.

I look between them. “Don’t even joke about that, you two.”

They look at each other, and despite everything, I see a hint of amusement in their eyes.

I can’t help it—I have to smile. They’re brothers, all right.

sixteen

I spent most of Tuesday and all of Wednesday on the island with Jackson organizing cleanup and wading through the vile remnants of that horrible, massive act of vandalism. My stomach started hurting the moment I stepped onto the island and saw the destruction—machinery destroyed, storage sheds toppled. And that was only the tip of the iceberg.