Page 114 of What Doesn't Kill You…

"I suppose we have you to blame for this," Violet said to Lian.

Her family relaxed, put down their weapons and rushed at her. Engulfing her and Max in their embrace. Fantastic. She survived Damien only to be smothered to death by the Lees.

"Back off," Violet snapped. "Max is hurt."

They moved away instantly, although her mother and sister went straight into parent mode and started making concerned noises at Max. Any second now, they'd start talking about chicken soup and cold compresses.

Violet decided it was time to bring in the professional. "Harvey, could you take him into the bedroom and check him out?"

"Of course." He angled himself under Max's other side and took his weight from her. "You can call me Dr. Harv," he told Max. "All my patients do."

"All your patients are six years old, Dad," Poppy said, putting her make-shift firebomb down on the floor.

"I'm still a doctor," Harvey said with a good-natured smile. "And a bloody good one, if I say so myself." He looked down at Max. "As I tell my patients, there are the Harvs and the Harvs Not and they're lucky they have a Harv."

His daughters groaned.

Violet turned her attention to Katrina who, she was relieved to see, was carrying a proper weapon. "Harris still at the dock?" she asked.

Katrina put her gun away. "No. I sent him to your bungalow to pack up your belongings. I didn't think you'd want to stay there tonight. I thought you could stay here instead. Nobody's using this room."

Her father stepped forward. "Is it safe now?" he asked, sounding more worried than she'd ever heard him.

"Yes." She carefully removed the steak knife from his hand. "It's safe."

His shoulders slumped with relief. "I was worried about you," he said. "The phones were down and nobody could tell us if you were…"

This was exactly why she never wanted her family to be involved in her work. The thought of them being in danger was enough to drive her insane, but even just seeing them afraid was almost too much to bear.

"I'm okay, Dad," she said. "Not a scratch on me." Unless she counted the ones she got escaping from the bungalow toilet.

"Katrina told us everything," her mother said in an anxious rush.

"Everything?" Violet asked Katrina.

She cleared her throat. "I told them you'd been hired to act as Max's bodyguard while he got enough evidence to bring the owner of the resort to justice. I explained that Damien was responsible for the death of Max's college friend and many others, and he that was a very dangerous man."

Violet's dad took up the story. "She also told us that Max locked you up so you wouldn't get hurt, then he went off in the storm to confront this Damien guy all on his own." He huffed. "That man doesn't know you at all if he thought he was better able to deal with the threat than you were."

It was the nicest thing he'd ever said to her.

Her mother pressed herself into Samuel's side and he wrapped an arm around her, tugging her close. "Very foolish of him. Why would you leave your bodyguard behind?"

"Exactly," Violet said, inordinately pleased with both her parents.

"Then," her father said. "Katrina told us there was danger and that this Damien fellow might try to hurt our family. That's how we ended up here." He gestured around the room.

Violet took in the mess they'd made of the place. Someone had used the dining table and a mattress to barricade the wall between the suite and the hallway. The rest of the furniture had been arranged in a kind of a fort, in the middle of the room. A safe zone within a safe room. It was a tactic she knew her grandmother had used in the past.

She sighed. "Did you expect an army to attack?" she asked Lian.

Her grandmother lifted her chin in defiance. "One can never be too careful," she started.

"Or too prepared," Violet finished for her. "How about you guys set the room to rights and then we'll turn in for the night. We can pick this up in the morning. By then we should have more information."

"Yes," Katrina said, sounding relieved that there was a plan for dealing with the Lees. "The police should be arriving on the island any minute. They'll round up everyone who worked for Damien's criminal business, and the storm is easing so we should have a better idea of the situation by morning. We can have breakfast here.” She smiled. "Along with a debriefing."

"No more secrets or lies." Her mother pointed at Violet.