Beth spoke first.
“I couldn’t sleep. I’ve been calling my boyfriend, but he’s not answering. I just… He’s my first everything. I already pictured us—dating a year, getting engaged, moving to Wakefield, maybe a condo. I don’t know what happens now.”
For a moment, real sympathy filled Sage’s face.
She walked over and sat down—directly between us.
“I don’t like that shit,” she said calmly.
Before I could react, she took the cigarette from my hand and snubbed it out in the sand.
“Sorry, baby,” I muttered.
“Go brush your teeth,” she said lightly. “Rinse with mouthwash. I don’t want cigarette breath kissing me.”
“Yes, baby,” I said automatically. “Yeah. Baby.”
Beth shifted, standing. “I’m gonna call it a night too.”
She gave me a look—brief, unreadable—before disappearing inside.
I felt a flicker of embarrassment. Sage speaking to me like that in front of Beth… but no one said anything. No one ever did.
Back in bed, Sage made me shower. Said my skin smelled like smoke. She waited, then curled back into me once I was clean, fitting herself into my arms like she always did.
I held her.
She sighed contentedly.
The surf kept pounding outside.
And somewhere deep down, a thought surfaced—quiet, uncomfortable, impossible to ignore:
I didn’t remember agreeing to be managed.
The sex was hot—mind-blowing. Addictive like a bad drug and I started to wonder if I was falling in love or falling into an addiction.
CHAPTER 13
ETHAN
After the Fourth,everything snapped back into place.
At least on the surface.
Sage went back to beingnight Sage—cooking, doting, folding herself neatly into my routines like nothing had happened. She made dinners. Asked about my day. Left clothes in my dresser without comment, like it was the most natural thing in the world.
No yelling.
No accusations.
No explosions.
It was almost worse.
Because while she reset, I didn’t.
I didn’t tell her about the guy at the club. The one who’d said they were engaged. I told myself it was self-preservation. That the weekend had already been too much—our fight, Beth’s breakdown, Sean disappearing in a cloud of guilt and smoke.
