Page 7

“That sounds masochistic, honestly,” she said, with that laugh that he’d spent entirely too long last night pretending he wasn’t replaying again and again and again in his head.

He braced himself to contend with whatever new horror she intended to visit upon him, but to his surprise, she just...took off.

Making him realize, as he stood there feeling foolish on his own doorstep, that she really was out on a walk in the dark foggy morning. She was not sleeping in her car—which he knew because he recognized all the cars parked out here, on the road that led to the lighthouse. She was not hanging around, trying to get in his face or talk to him more.

Or grab onto his hand and hold on, which he couldn’t actually feel like a brand into his skin. That was dramatic. And Noah was many things, none of them good, but he had never been dramatic.

Raemy was just out on a walk like a great many other people either were already or would be soon, because going on walks was a thing people did everywhere. And particularly did here, because everyone loved a beach walk no matter the tide or the weather.

But it was so early, so that meant she was staying here, as threatened. Right here in Wild Rose Point, and Noah was going to have to... get used to that? To unexpected encounters with one of his deepest regrets, all dressed up in too-bright colors—yellow and magenta today—and that damned smile of hers?

He couldn’t take that in.

So he got moving and ran hard about it instead. He ran up and down the beach, much faster than usual, which meant he got to do an extra couple laps. And that meant he was really feeling it when he finally got back home and threw some weight around in the makeshift weight room he kept in what had once been his grandmother’s screened-in porch.

He was in a shit mood all day, according to literally everyone.

Noah didn’t think he was in any particular mood, but all the men had to comment on it. There were snide comments about his hormone levels at his advanced age, since mid-thirties was ancient to some of the newer little punks. There was commentary on bears trapped in snares, and the like.

All the usual ribbing, which, today, Noah found significantly less funny than he might have at another time. Not that he’d show it, but it seemed the way he was not showing it today was too much for them.

“Not that you’d be able to tell if our Staff Sergeant was in a bad mood or not,” Tank said with a laugh while doing something dramatic to his cake batter. “Not if we’re being honest here. What’s the actual difference between grumpy and taciturn?”

“High school English class,” Noah retorted. “Which, far as I can tell, you didn’t take.”

But he immediately regretted engaging, because that only made it worse.

Usually, he liked early mornings at the diner. He had his usual opening customers, usually a selection of his grandfather’s rickety old cronies and a whole lot of other gray- and white-haired folks who liked that Noah opened at 6:30 a.m. on the dot.

Every single morning, without fail.

He liked the routine of the breakfast shift. He liked making sure that there was strong, good coffee at every table. That meals came out fast and filling. He liked the buzz of conversation, a little quieter because of the early hour, but there. And he particularly liked that there was something about the morning that lent itself to leaving him alone about what his face might or might not be doing at any given moment.

He also liked the lull when the rush was done.

The current crop of veterans who were living and working here was a particularly good one. Meaning, they read each other pretty well, gelled when they had to work together, and didn’t drive each other crazy with the living accommodations.

That wasn’t always the case, as he’d discovered over the years, so he’d learned to be grateful when it was.

He sat behind the counter with his laptop, catching up on his email, which was where a lot of vets reached out to him. And a lot of veteran charities and organizations he always liked to reply to, because the way he figured it, there was never enough attention paid to veterans. They could always use more services, more places to land, and more care from the communities they put their lives on the line for.

Noah took it very seriously that he got to be a mouthpiece for the men and women he’d served with.

When the door opened, he caught a flash of unbearable brightness out of the corner of his eye, and he knew before he looked up who would be standing there.

Sure enough, it was Raemy once again.

This morning’s brightly colored ensemble had apparently been her early-morning walking clothes, because now she was wearing jeans. The jeans had ridiculous patches on them, in shapes that his brain told him were citrus fruits, or possibly small mammals, but the rest of him refused to accept that possibility. She was wearing a striped sweater, every single stripe in a different, outrageously bright color.

And her hat was a handknit scream of fire engine red.

Really, he thought, this was all going too far.

“Did you know that there’s this amazing metaphysical shop just up the road?” asked Raemy in that bright voice of hers, even brighter than her clothes, which was possibly the most offensive thing yet.

Like they were the only two people in the diner.

The way she was looking at him, it was possible she thought so, but he couldn’t actually let that kind of thought land. That was asking for way too much trouble.