Page 33 of Christmas Harbor Secrets
Rone slid the laptop a fraction closer and set both hands on either side of it as if bracing a body for bad news.
“Shade,” he whispered to a man who wasn’t there, “what did you do?”
CHAPTER SEVEN
The boat went too still.Even the hum of the generator faded as if the air itself had taken a breath and refused to let it out.
Isobel stood there, frozen, as if an arctic, dystopian blast had hit Florida and mummified her in ice. The words he’d spoken hung between them.
He was working for them.
Her father.
Her father, who’d taught her how to tie a cleat hitch before she could spell it. Who’d carried her on his shoulders through the lake marina, who’d told her to “find the truth, kiddo—it’s the only compass that doesn’t break.” The man who’d laughed loud and easy, who’d fixed things instead of breaking them.
That man wasn’t the kind who worked for somethingrotten.
She moved before she knew she was moving—past Rone, to the narrow stairway down to the salon where the sun was painting the water gold and broken. Her reflection caught in the glass, split by a hairline crack from the earlier blast. Two halves of herself: one believing, one not.
“That’s impossible,” she said, her voice small but sure. “He wasn’t—he couldn’t be.”
Rone’s footsteps echoed down the stairs. He set the laptop on the dining table, leaving the screen to glow mercilessly in the corner of her vision. His eyes were on it, that quiet, tactical stare that stripped a thing down to its bones.
“He could,” he said finally. “Shade knew what he was doing.”
Her throat went tight. “No. You’re wrong.”
The denial slipped out sharp, like a reflex she didn’t get to control. She spun back toward him. “You don’t know him. You think you do, because of a logo, a name. But people make mistakes on screens all the time. It could’ve been planted. It could’ve been a cover—deep enough he couldn’t risk leaving a trail.”
Rone leaned back in his chair, elbows braced on his knees, jaw tight. “I’ve seen deep cover. It leaves shadows. Breadcrumbs. This—” he gestured at the screen “—this is a brand. They mark their own. You’ve spent your life looking for a hero, but they don’t exist in real life. This changes everything. You have your answer, so now you can go.”
“Go? Don’t even start that again. This changes nothing,” she said, the words coming too fast, too sharp, too desperate. “He has information on a drive, that doesn’t mean he belonged to them.”
Her pulse thundered in her ears, drowning out everything else—the hum of the generator, the whisper of water against the hull, even the sound of her own voice shaking. She pressed a hand to her chest, as if she could steady her heartbeat through sheer force of will. “He could’ve seen something. Or someone forced him—used him. You said yourself that group cleans things until they look holy. And you pass judgment—convict him—without even seeing what’s in that file.”
Rone didn’t move right away. The silence between them filled with the weight of things unsaid—his breathing, her trembling. When he finally did move, it was slow, deliberate. He stepped closer and reached out, his hand finding her shoulder, rough palm warm through her thin shirt.
The contact broke something in her—some small, rigid part she’d been holding tight. The warmth of him, solid and quiet, pulled the sting out of her words. She let her forehead tip forward, just enough for a breath, a heartbeat, to steady herself against him. For that fleeting moment, she let herself believe it was okay to lean on someone else.
Then her mind caught up. The memory of every man who had smiled before he twisted the knife came rushing back. Pity dressed as compassion. Promises dressed as control.
She jerked back, the air between them snapping cold. “Don’t,” she said, voice low and shaking. “Don’t use comfort like a weapon. You don’t get to soften me up so I’ll do what you want.”
His brows knitted, confusion flashed before he exhaled, slow and measured, like he was handling live wire. “That’s not what this is.”
She folded her arms tight across her chest, armor against the warmth that still lingered where his hand had been. “It always is. That’s how it works, right? Get the woman to feel something so she’ll fall in line.”
Rone’s gaze softened, not wounded but resolute. “You think that’s who I am?”
“I think you’re a man who wants me to run. To hide.”
“I’m a man who’s seen what happens when people stay.” His tone was quiet, even, stripped bare of any defense. He took another step, close enough that she could see the tired lines at the corners of his eyes, the small scar just beneath his jaw. “I’ve done wrong in my life, Isobel. More than you’ll ever know. But Idon’t play games. I don’t lie to get what I want. You’ll only ever get truth from me. No tactics.”
Her chest tightened again—but for a different reason this time. The words landed heavier than she expected, grounding her instead of swaying her. She wanted to believe him. She almost did.
She looked away first, staring at the computer screen’s dull glow instead of the honesty in his eyes. “Then tell me the truth,” she whispered. “Tell me he wasn’t one of them.”
Rone’s silence stretched long enough for her to feel it settle in her bones. When he finally spoke, it was a whisper that sounded almost like regret.
