"I thought the guest room was for visiting family and friends."
"It was." He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, his touch gentle. "But plans change. People change. Maybe the guest room becomes something else."
"Maybe it does," she agreed.
They spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach, walking and talking and swimming in the warm shallows. They built a lopsided sandcastle that made them both laugh. They found shells and driftwood and a perfect piece of sea glass, green as her eyes.
For a few precious hours, there was no Marcus Webb. No restraining order, no motion lights, no fear. There were only the two of them and the sea and the promise of something more.
As they drove back toward Copper Moon, the sun sinking toward the horizon, Tessa felt something she hadn't felt in a very long time.
Hope.
Real, solid hope. Not the desperate kind that clung to unlikely outcomes, but the quiet kind that grew from certainty. She was going to stay in Copper Moon. She was going to build a life here with Brian, and his chosen family who had somehow become hers, too.
She just had to survive Marcus Webb first.
But as Brian's hand found hers across the center console, steady and warm, she let herself believe that she would. That they would.
Chapter Fourteen
The cabin belonged to a retired fire captain Brian had trained under fifteen years ago. Set back from the road on eight acres of coastal pine, with a locked gate and no visible neighbors. The kind of place you could disappear into.
Brian hadn't asked permission. He'd called Walt from the truck, explained the situation in short, clipped sentences, and Walt had given him the gate code without hesitation. That was the thing about people who'd spent their lives running into burning buildings. They understood when someone needed a safe place to land.
Tessa hadn't spoken since they'd left the beach. She sat in the passenger seat with her hands folded in her lap, staring out the window at the dark trees sliding past. Her face was pale in the dashboard light, and he could see the tension in her shoulders, the way she held herself like she was bracing for impact.
He reached over and covered her hands with his.
"We're almost there."
She turned her hand under his, lacing their fingers together. "I hate this. I hate that he's making me run."
"It's not running. It's being smart." He squeezed her hand. "Diaz is putting out a bulletin. Hank's got eyes on the cottage. Webb shows his face anywhere in Copper Moon, someone will see him."
"And if he doesn't show his face? If he just keeps watching, waiting?"
Brian pulled up to the gate and punched in the code. The metal arm swung open, and he drove through, watching it close behind them in the rearview mirror.
"Then we wait him out. We don't give him what he wants."
"What does he want?"
"You, scared. You, alone. You, doubting yourself." He glanced at her. "None of which is going to happen."
The cabin came into view, a low structure of weathered cedar with a wide porch facing the trees. Motion lights clicked on as they approached, flooding the clearing with yellow light. Brian parked next to a woodpile and cut the engine.
Neither of them moved.
"Brian." Her voice was quiet. "Thank you. For all of this. For not making me feel like I'm overreacting."
He turned to face her fully. "You're not overreacting. A man followed you across state lines. He's been watching you for weeks. He showed up at a public concert and made sure you saw him." He reached out, tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "That's not nothing. That's a pattern."
She leaned into his touch, just slightly. "I spent so long convincing myself I was imagining things. That I was being paranoid. My colleagues in Chicago thought I was losing it."
"Your colleagues weren't paying attention."
"And you are."
