This is better. Saltwater at dawn. No one talking. A man ought to know how to enjoy peace when he gets it. I’m not always good at that.
The line tightens sharply, and instinct moves through me faster than thought. I set the hook, lift the rod, and feel the quick, bright fight on the other end. Not huge, but alive and stubborn. I smile despite myself as the fish runs parallel to the shore, silver flashing once in the low sun.
“Come on,” I mutter. “Don’t embarrass both of us.”
The fish gives me another few seconds of fight before I bring it close, wet sand pulling at my feet. I crouch, ease the hook free, and hold the small snook in the shallows until it kicks hard from my palm and disappears back into the green water.
“Not today,” I tell it. Too small to keep.
Fine by me. I’m not in a hurry. If I catch dinner, I’ll grill it later with lime, pepper, and whatever vegetables I picked up yesterday from the market. If I don’t, I’ll eat eggs and pretend that counts as a meal because, despite what half the island seems to believe, grilling is not cooking.
Cooking involves recipes, timing, fussing, and people telling you there are seven ways to ruin a sauce. Grilling is fire and protein. That’s honest, simple, and hard to complicate.
I straighten and shake water from my hand, already reaching for the line again, when movement along the beach catches my attention. A woman steps out from the private dune path near The Sandpiper.
At first, I notice only color. Red hair catching the sunrise. Red swimsuit and white-framed sunglasses.
Then details sharpen because that’s how my brain works whether or not I want it to. She’s alone. Early thirties, maybe. Curvy in a way that makes the red suit look like a deliberate act of confidence, though her shoulders carry something that doesn’t match the outfit. She walks slowly near the tide line in flip-flops, head angled down, searching the wet sand for shells. Vacation posture and not local.
She stops every few yards, bends to pick something up, studies it, then either keeps it or tosses it gently back toward the water. The red polish on her fingernails matches the suit, a minor detail I have no business noticing and immediately notice anyway.
She wanders closer, still pretending to care about shells more than anything else around her. When she’s within ten yards, she glances up and sees me watching her instead of the water.
“Are you catching breakfast or just making the ocean nervous?”
I glance at the water. “The ocean can handle me.”
“Bold thing to say while standing ankle-deep in it.”
“Fair point.”
She smiles then, and I feel like I’ve seen her before, but I’m sure I don’t actually know her. There’s something about her voice and her smile that is super familiar. Combined with the red hair and her smile, I know I have.
She’s someone well known … or looks like that person. The thought comes without a name attached. Somewhere I’ve seen her … on a screen, maybe. Magazine? Airport? One of those cooking shows my sister used to leave running on mute while she talked over the whole thing? I don’t know. She doesn’t have the polished look of someone ready for cameras right now. Her hair is loose, her face mostly hidden, and she moves like a woman trying to convince herself the morning is beautiful enough to make her feel safe. That word surfaces in my mind before I can stop it.
She’s not flirting exactly. She’s testing the air. Deciding whether a man with a fly rod at sunrise is a threat, a local oddity, or something harmless enough to speak to.
I reel in the slack and step back from the wash, giving her more space than most men would think to give. She notices that too. I see it in the way one shoulder loosens.
“You staying at The Sandpiper?” I ask, nodding toward the dune path she came from.
Her smile fades by a fraction.
“Yes,” she says after a couple of seconds. “Is that obvious?”
“Only house down this stretch with a guest right now.”
She looks past me toward the row of rentals, then back again. “You keep inventory?”
“I notice things.”
“That sounds like either a useful skill or a concerning hobby.”
“Depends on who you ask.”
The breeze lifts a strand of red hair across her cheek. She brushes it away with the back of her hand, still holding two shells in her palm. Up close, I can see she’s tired. Not hungover-tourist tired. Not stayed-up-too-late-by-a-bonfire tired. Bone tired. The kind people carry after adrenaline drains and leaves nothing good behind.
“You’re local?” she asks.
