People were harder. Futures were harder. Margot was harder. But worth it. The thought arrived quietly. No lightning strike, no fanfare, just true.
Just the simple certainty that tomorrow morning mattered for reasons that had nothing to do with stolen ornaments.
He filled the coffee pot. Set it on the camp stove. Checked the shelf. Two clean cups.
Good.
The harbor outside had gone still. A few boats rocked gently against their lines.
He switched off the overhead light and headed for the apartment above the marina.
Dawn wasn’t far away.
Chapter thirty-three
The Second Cup
Evanwasawakelongbefore dawn. Not because of the investigation.
The investigation had finally started making sense. The evidence wall in the dock shed looked the way an engine looked after you found the broken part. Not fixed yet. But understandable.
Caleb. Everything pointed to Caleb.
For the first time since the blackout, Evan believed they were close. That wasn’t what kept him awake.
Tomorrow. Dawn. Dock shed.
Four words.
He’d read them often enough to memorize the spacing.
The coffee pot was already on the camp stove when the first gray light appeared over the harbor. Mist floated above the water. The slips sat quiet. A gull landed on a piling and watched the world wake up.
Evan poured coffee into two cups. One for him. One for her. Then he told himself not to be ridiculous. The second cup remained on the shelf anyway.
A minute later he heard footsteps on the boardwalk. His pulse betrayed him.
Margot appeared in the doorway wearing jeans, sneakers, and a hoodie that was too large to be hers. No clipboard. No headset. No badge. No pen. Just Margot.
The knot he’d carried all night let go. “Good morning. Got your text.”
A smile touched her mouth. “And here I am.”
He handed her the coffee. Their fingers brushed. Neither seemed in a hurry to move. Eventually they remembered the coffee.
She wrapped both hands around the cup.
The dock shed fell quiet again.
Outside, the harbor drifted in and out of the mist.
Inside, the butcher paper wall covered half the room.
The evidence sat between them. The future sat between them too. Neither seemed eager to address either one first.
Finally, she looked toward the water. “What happens after?”
There it was. The question from the bookstore. The one they’d carried back to the resort and never answered.
