I tried to hide it, though. Didn’t want to ruin the moment.
“This beats any splash pad,” I said, deadpan, because I remembered Sabrina’s horror story about Shane dragging her to one last summer.
Sydney grinned. “Only thing missing are those tiny shrimp that bite your ankles.”
“Better than bears,” Sabrina countered, glancing at me with that sideways concern she always tried to hide. As if she knew where my head went on days like this.
Maybe she did.
The wind picked up, tangling my hair into my mouth. I yanked it back, tasting salt and something like rust.
Everything should have been perfect. Everything almost was.
But the horizon clawed at my insides. I could feel the old panic, just under my skin. The jittery, broken pulse, the certainty that the world would crumble if I didn’t brace myself for impact.
I wished I could tell them. I wished I could feel what they did. Instead, I played my part.
Sabrina sucked in a deep breath, eyes shining. “I’d stay out here forever if I could.”
Sydney nudged her. “You’d miss your morning lattes in like two hours.”
“Please,” Sabrina shot back. “I could quit coffee for this.”
I let their voices blur together, the laughter loud and bright, a shield against what waited inside. I pretended it was enough. That I could stay in this moment, not get dragged under by everything that came before.
Eventually, Sabrina checked her phone and frowned. “We should head back up. If I don’t claim the best bedroom now, I’ll lose it to Shane.”
Sydney groaned. “Right, before Mr. Sleeps With a White Noise Machine takes over.”
We trudged back, sand clinging to my legs. The house looked closer now, its roofline jagged against the sky. I tried not to think of cages, of basements, of walls that never let in enough light.
Inside, it was chaos. Shane and Caiden had dumped the bags all over the main room. Duffels, pillows, and a box of cheap beer. Caiden stood with his back to the door, hands braced on the kitchen counter, muscles tense under a faded gray shirt.
Shane spotted us first, waving a beer in the air. “Ladies! Come help us pick rooms?”
There was a blur of shuffling, Sydney racing Sabrina up the stairs, the sounds of doors opening and closing, footsteps pounding on wood. But I just stood there, half in shadow, watching the three men fill the space.
Alex turned toward me. Smiled, easy and warm. “Hey, you survive the girl talk?”
I nodded, smiling. “We talked about you the whole time.”
He laughed, stepping closer.
But it didn’t matter. Not really. Because I felt Caiden’s gaze before I saw it. Like claws scraping down my spine, and impossible to ignore.
He didn’t speak. Didn’t move. But his eyes found me and held me, relentless.
Alex kept chatting, some story about a college beach trip gone wrong, his voice filling the room, light and smooth. The opposite of everything that lived inside me.
But all I could feel was Caiden, dark and silent, that gravity. Pulling, pulling, like the tide. I hated how easily I could sense him, how even trying to look away was a losing battle.
Shane came over and put an arm around my shoulders. “You good, Amelia? Need a tour?”
I blinked the world back into focus and forced the tension out of my shoulders. “I’m fine. Just…taking it all in.”
Caiden’s brows pinched. His knuckles whitened on the counter.
For a second, I thought he’d say something. Something cruel, or worse. But he didn’t.
