12. Caro

"Take it back. Take it all back. We didn't order any of this."

The reporters had tried coming by boat, and they'd tried sneaking in on foot, and when neither of those approaches worked, they figured they'd try the old Trojan Horse trick? Did they think we were dumb? The truck outside the sagging gates of the turtle sanctuary bore the logo of a furniture company from Ilha Grande, and it was stacked high with goods. The pictures on the boxes showed beds, couches, a dining table, and a hammock, but no doubt there was at least one asshole with a camera hiding in there too.

Probably because the photographers couldn't get to the sanctuary by water anymore. When I went to the store yesterday evening, I'd mentioned to Marica Perrin that the spirits were restless, and Marica—along with a large percentage of the indigenous population—took the moods of the spirits very seriously. Between that and the boat currently resting among the corals, rumours of bad juju were spreading like wildfire.

"I can't take it back," the driver of the truck said. "The purchaser paid in advance and insisted on express delivery."

I bet they did.

"Well, call the purchaser and rearrange delivery to somewhere else." Would the reporter have been dumb enough to use his own name? "Who is the purchaser?"

He thumbed through the paperwork. "A Ms. J Puckett. There's no number on here."

J Puckett? Jubilee Puckett? I ground my teeth together so hard my jaw hurt, then realised what I was doing and forced myself to stop. It was a bad habit, and I couldn't afford expensive dental work. Not anymore.

"Okay, so I might actually know who that is." And so did the reporters. Had they borrowed her name for an elaborate ploy, or had she genuinely ordered a truck full of stuff? It had to be the former—why would Jubilee need a freaking bed? We already had beds. "Sorry for snapping. It's been a difficult week."

"So where should I put the boxes?"

"Could you just wait here for a moment?"

"I don't got all day, ma'am."

I was already marching back up the driveway, getting more annoyed by the second. For three and a half years, I'd managed to stay out of Aiden's clutches, and now two stupid women were threatening to unravel everything. It wasn't Franklin's fault—I'd never told him the whole story—but that didn't make things any easier. If we hadn't been so short-handed, if we weren't coming into nesting season, I'd have come up with an excuse and hidden on one of the other islands for a month.

Jubilee was in the third of the five pool rooms, helping Franklin to toss pieces of tuna to last year's hatchlings. They'd grown so quickly, and I knew he was worried about the food bills. Costs kept going up. For years, he'd funded the sanctuary himself, and although he hadn't said as much, I'd long suspected that the money was running out. Meanwhile Luna, who had plenty of money, was sitting on her ass watching other people work.

"There's a truck full of furniture at the end of the drive," I announced, and Jubilee's face lit up. "You ordered it?"

"Yes, from a store on Ilha Grande. The guy said it wouldn't be here for another day at least."

"Why?"

"I guess because they have to take two ferries and it's super slow? There's a place on Malavilla, but they didn't have memory foam."

"No, I meant why did you order furniture in the first place? We already have beds."

"Luna isn't sleeping well. She doesn't find sprung mattresses comfortable."

"The rest of us manage just fine. And you're here to work, not kick back on the couch."

"I-I thought it would be a nice surprise for everyone."

"Well, it isn't. We're having security issues here, or did you miss that part? The truck turned up unannounced, no warning whatsoever."

"I didn't think?—"

"Exactly. You didn't think, which is how the two of you ended up here in the first place."

"Hey, don't be mean to her!" Luna steamed over, followed by one of her personal pit bulls. Knox. The hot one. Okay, hotter one. He looked at me, looked at her, opened his mouth, and then closed it again.

"I'm not being mean; I'm being truthful. How much money did she waste on stuff nobody needs?"

"Who are you to know what other people need, Miss High-and-Mighty?"

"I know what the turtles need, and in case you haven't noticed, they're the most important thing around here. If the two of you want to do something useful, then you could contribute toward the new pool room."

"In case you haven't noticed, we're here under duress. If you want new pools, go ask people who actually care about turtles."

"Oh, sure, because it's that damn easy. We don't all have ten million Instagram followers."

"It's twenty million, actually. Plus twelve million on TikTok and another eight million on BuzzHub."

"And you only got them by acting like a dumbass and cavorting half-naked in public."

Luna launched herself at me, claws out. Jubilee grabbed her arm and began shrieking, and for the second time this week, I found myself trapped in Knox's vise-like grip. Today, I stamped on his instep, and he muttered a string of curses as Ryder ran in and wrestled Luna away. She sounded like a cat in pain when she was angry.

"Enough with the bruises," Knox muttered.

"Then let go of me."

"Can't do that. If you're trying to claw my client's eyes out, then I'm obliged to intervene."

"I didn't do anything."

"You called me a dumbass!" Luna snapped.

"Which was accurate."

Percy the loggerhead swam up to the edge of his pool and stared at her, no doubt perplexed by the noise. The sanctuary was usually such a peaceful place. Franklin kept a wind-up radio tuned to a classical station, although the charge had run out this morning and nobody had bothered to crank the handle again.

"Ladies…" Ryder tried, but Luna didn't let him finish.

"She's no lady. Jubilee buys new furniture, and is she grateful? No, of course not. She cares more about turtles than she does about people."

True, but they didn't bite as badly as humans did. "Maybe that's because they're better company."

Luna began struggling against Ryder. "You little?—"

"Hey, hey, hey. What's with all the fightin'?" Franklin asked from behind me.

"Our two ‘guests' have decided to redecorate the place. There's a truck from the furniture store outside the gates."

"That's mighty generous of them."

"They gave no warning whatsoever. The truck just showed up."

"Well, we'd better get to unloadin' then."

Luna folded her arms, and her smug expression made me want to slap her. Honestly, I wasn't a violent person, but something about her rubbed me the wrong way. The sheer sense of entitlement, even when she was meant to be doing community service. Franklin headed to the door with Jubilee trailing behind, and I tried to pry Knox's hands away. He held firm.

"If I let go, are you going to behave?"

"Define ‘behave.'"

"Are you going to do bodily harm to Luna?"

"No." I sagged a little in his arms and screwed my eyes shut so I didn't see her triumphant look. "No, I'm not."

I hated new, uptight Caro. She reminded me of old, uptight Caro, and that was a person I wanted to forget. I'd spent the past three years convincing myself to relax. Convincing myself that Aiden wasn't going to crawl out from under his rock and make me pay for what I'd done. Make me pay, the way he'd promised.

Knox's arms loosened, tentatively, as if he wasn't sure I'd manage to control myself. But I could. I had an iron will when I needed it. For almost a year after Aiden first raped me, I'd submitted to him, smiled at his side and carried on going to work, all while plotting my escape. Finally, the time had come. I'd brought both of our worlds crashing down.

And then I'd run.

I headed for the door, for the gates and the truck, blinking back tears as I jogged along the driveway. My emotions ran so close to the surface these days. Where was Caro-the-ice-queen when I needed her?

"You okay?" Knox asked when he caught up with me.

"If you need to ask that, then you're also a dumbass."

"I understand it's not easy having Luna here."

"Do you? Do you really? Do you know what it's like to be happy one minute and have your life turned upside down the next?"

"Yeah, I do."

I stopped mid-stride and whipped around to face him. "Is that so? A pain-in-the-ass singer just walked into your life?"

"More the reverse." Knox gave a heavy sigh, and for a fraction of a second, his tough-guy mask slipped and I saw a flash of pain in those brown eyes of his. At least, I thought I did. I wasn't exactly the greatest judge of character, especially when it came to men. "You need a break. Let's get out of here this afternoon—didn't you say you wanted to go diving?"

"Don't you have to build flat-pack furniture with Princess Primadonna?"

"Ryder can handle her for an afternoon." Knox nudged me with a shoulder. "C'mon—you know you want to. I haven't dived for weeks, and I hear the reefs off Malavilla are the best in the Caribbean."

"Not as good as the barrier reef around Emerald Shores, but they're easier to reach."

"Is that a yes?"

What I actually wanted to do was crawl into my bed, tuck the covers over my head, and stay there until the Puckett girls had gone back to Vegas or hell or wherever it was they came from. But when it came down to a choice between arguing over which screw went where and carrying out a much-needed marine survey, there was only one answer I could give.

"Fine, if we must."