Lunch on the waterfront tasted like laughter and something dangerously close to hope. He stole fries from my plate. I pretended to glare. He pretended not to like the way I looked at him when I did it.
Record shops. Random Street markets with hand-pressed flowers in tiny frames.
My fingers brushed his. His brushed back. A slow, deliberate choreography of almosts.
Then, in a quiet moment while I was comparing vinyl sleeves, he pulled Peter aside.
His voice low.
Serious.
Planning.
When I re-joined them, Dane looked…different.
Determined.
Resolute.
Soft in the way dangerous men can be soft only once.
“You ready for the next surprise?” he asked.
“I don’t even know what the last one was.”
He grinned. “Good.”
By late afternoon, Peter turned down the road that curved toward the marina, the car rolling slowly as if even it understood the day was shifting into something sacred.
The world outside the tinted windows was gold.
Not yellow. Not bright. Gold, the kind that softens everything it touches. The kind that looks like a blessing laid over the sea.
Sunlight poured across the water in broad strokes, shimmering like liquid metal. The breeze lifted strands of my hair from my cheeks. Even through the closed windows, I could smell it salt, seaweed, damp ropes baking in the last heat of the day. The scent triggered something in me, a memory I couldn’t place, a childhood feeling of standing barefoot on wet sand with my mother’s hand in mine, the waves kissing over my toes.
It made my throat tight.
And then I saw the yacht.
Long, sleek, white the kind of white that doesn’t exist in nature, only in dreams or expensive catalogues. It rocked gently against the pier, the hull glinting like polished bone. Lanterns hadbeen strung along the railings, their soft amber glow already flickering in the thickening dusk. Blankets, heavy, warm ones, were folded neatly in a basket. Cushions waited on the deck lounge. Someone had arranged wine glasses and a small stack of plates wrapped in linen napkins.
It wasn’t just beautiful. It felt intentional. Like someone crafted this moment one heartbeat at a time.
The smell hit me before my feet even touched the wooden planks of the pier, salt, teak, warm metal cooling in the evening air, the faint sweetness of whatever dinner Peter had arranged. My tongue tasted the wind: cold, sharp, alive.
Something inside me went quiet.
Not empty. Just…still. Like the ocean had reached inside my chest, pressed a cool palm against my ribs, and whispered,breathe.
It smoothed the jagged edges Blake had carved into me. Softened the panic that lived beneath my skin. All of it. For one terrifying, peaceful second, I felt okay.
The skipper spotted us and nodded toward Dane with a grin he tried to hide. They knew each other. The kind of knowing that comes from more than business. Shared years, maybe. Shared secrets. That should’ve meant something to me, should’ve made me connect dots I’d never dared trace.
Maybe it did. Maybe I just wasn’t ready to see the picture.
Peter opened my door, and I stepped out onto the pier. The wood was warm from the day, the grooves worn, the air filled with the distant clang of metal rings tapping against dock posts. Somewhere a gull called, the sound echoing out over the waves.
Dane came around to my side, his hand hovering near my waist, not touching, not assuming, but ready. Always ready. Thegesture made my heart twist in a way that felt both too much and exactly what I’d been starving for.
