Ping. He answered immediately.
Eli: Message received. Bring your grumpy face. Scientists will love it.
I snorted and set the phone down. Wednesday was three days away. Three days to pretend my stomach didn’t swoop when I thought about the way Tessa’s voice had softened on the dock when she said my name. Or that the moment of levity between us hadn’t happened.
I didn’t have a plan beyond one day on the water and the promise I’d made in my mother’s kitchen—to stop making decisions for people who weren’t me. Wasn’t much, but it was a start.
“Great,” I told the empty room. “This’ll go totally fine.”
The silence didn’t argue. The ocean out there in the dark didn’t care. And Wednesday would come, no matter how neatly I stacked my excuses.
Chapter Four
TESSA
I was not cyberstalkingmy ex.
I sat at the kitchen table of my rental as morning birds twittered outside, laptop balanced on a stack of tide charts like a makeshift lectern. The glow from the screen cut across the maps in thin blue light. I told myself I was doing due diligence. Strictly professional.
Tidal Hops’s website was clean—good branding, bright photos that made the brewery’s stainless-steel tanks look like cathedral arches. At the top of the page, a headline from a lifestyle magazine declared BradenThe Unlikely Craft King of the Keys. Braden’s face dominated the frame, sleeves rolled, holding a glass up to the light like he was investigating a new species. He wore a small, sideways smile that was heavy on confidence.
I clicked further. Instagram showed a stream of images—brass taps glinting, Braden speaking on a makeshift stage at a fundraising event at the pub, a flyer boasting a benefit for the ocean. I kept scrolling because an internetsearch was a small, controllable risk. Not the same as walking into his taproom and watching him move through his life in real time. Words scrolled past—vision, founder, built it from the ground up.There were candid shots of him and his staff, tourists standing around a table under string lights, reviews filled with grateful, ecstatic emojis. Threads of comments from locals praising him and tourists recommending him.
The internet search rewired something inside me into a string of new facts. The seventeen-year-old I’d left in the rearview mirror clashed with this adult who ran a business with PR polish and trivia nights.
Pride surged through me, quickly followed by something colder—the old, sensible story of why I’d left town. Seeing Braden Coleridge on the other side of my decision made me question both my choices and the narrative I had been clinging to.
I closed the laptop on his handsomely smiling face. Enough. I needed to get out of this townhouse and back to the tangible world of my work. But as I mentally ran through my prep list, a problem snagged. The plastic sample vials I’d been supplied were flimsy. One good knock and they’d crack, ruining a whole data set. For the delicate work I had planned, I needed reinforced ones that could withstand pressure changes. It was a small detail, but one that could affect the integrity of the project. I needed to find them before morning. Rising to my feet, I left my tan abode and headed out. A walk down Main Street would do me good anyway.
The air inside Camden Marine Supply was a familiar, comforting blend of rubber and the clean scent of new rope. It was a place where every problem had a practical solution, neatly organized in bins. A woman with sun-bleached blonde hair stood behind the counter with herback to me, talking on the phone while effortlessly untangling a snarl of fishing line.
“No, Dad, the order for the Yamaha fuel filters came in yesterday. I logged it myself. Check your email.” Her voice held a mix of exasperation and deep affection. She hung up the phone with a sigh and turned, a wry smile already on her face. Her smile froze when we made eye contact. Her hazel eyes widened in recognition.
“No way. Tessa Donovan in the flesh?”
A laugh escaped me, a sound of pure surprise. “Lila Camden. Good to see you again. Guess I shouldn’t be too surprised to see you here.”
She came around the counter in a flash and wrapped me in a hug that smelled faintly of WD-40. It was the kind of hug that assumed no time had passed at all. “What are you doing here? I thought you were off saving the world’s most glamorous coral reefs.”
“Right now I’m just trying to save my data from cheap plastic.” I held up one of the flimsy vials I’d brought with me. “I’m leading a Scripps project here for a few months, and I need a rush order of reinforced sample vials. The five-milliliter ones, if you have them. I was hoping you could help.”
“Oooh! You’re part of the Scripps team? That’s amazing, Tessa.” Lila’s eyebrows shot up. When she took the vial, her expression shifted instantly into professional competence. “Yeah, we’ve got these. Back here.” She led me toward the back of the store, pushing through a hanging curtain of bright orange life jackets. “So, a big-shot scientist at last, huh? This seems like a pretty major project. And here I am, still telling my dad to check his email.”
We fell into the easy rhythm that used to make our lunches last all afternoon in high school. Her family hadowned Camden Marine Supply for generations. We’d kept in touch over the years, texts and Facebook Messages, but nothing beat catching up face to face. Lila finished ringing up the vials and leaned on the counter, her smile softening. “Seriously, though. How are you? Coming back here... it can’t be easy.”
“It’s motivating,” I corrected. “I’m seeing some patchy bleaching on the north ridge. It’s the kind of early warning sign we might be able to act on if we move quickly.”
Her gaze was steady, full of an understanding that went beyond words. “You always saw things on the reef nobody else did. Even in high school, you were the one pointing out the specific corals that were thriving while the rest of us just saw pretty colors.”
A small, determined smile touched my lips. “A lot of good it did. I left.”
“You went and got the tools to protect it. That’s why you came back, right? To use them.” She slid a pack of waterproof note cards across the counter. “For the data, and it’s on the house. Don’t let the ocean eat your homework.”
We laughed, then she leaned in, conspiratorial. “So. The inevitable question. Have you seen Braden? Been to Tidal Hops?”
I tried for an even expression. “I saw some social media posts about the brewpub. It looks successful.”
“It’s fabulous. Braden’s got a real thing going. It’s a fun place, modern without being pretentious or hipster. Plus, he does charity nights for island causes. Full disclosure—he gifted us a keg last month for a cleanup crew, and I’m still accepting his generosity.” She made a small bow with mocking reverence.
