I stood at the net and watched her go. The crowd was dispersing and Tanner was already halfway to the water. The sun was highlighting the gold in her dark hair as she walked away. I wanted to follow her, but something—not my shark instincts, just regular human ones, the kind that even idiots like me develop eventually—told me to stay exactly where I was.
She’d shut down so fast. One minute she’d been glowing, and the next the light was gone. One question, and the whole bright, ferocious, devastating version of her just…packed itself away behind the smile I knew she wore for difficult tourists at her stand. All that was left was a pleasant, deflecting, perfectly fine woman who wasn’t fine at all.
I knew that move. Hell, I’d invented that move. The cocky grin to cover the flinch. The joke to fill the silence where the truth should go. I recognized all of that.
Selena Torres was hurt, and she’d been covering it with a pleasant smile for years, building up walls. Why? I didn’t know, but I wanted to.
But she wouldn’t let me, I knew that. She would fight to keep me at a distance, keep the magic and the turtles and whatever else between us, and that was a fight I didn’t know how to win.
I wanted to see her glow again, with that joy I’d experienced on the court, but I knew that was outside of my pay grade. But even with a spreadsheet of debts a mile long, I wondered how many more I would be willing to add just to get her to smile.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Selena
My heart was still poundingagainst my chest when I got back to Shark Bites.
21–11, against two professional athletes. My shoulder ached, my toes were full of sand, and I’d hung Chase Perez out to dry in front of half the boardwalk. I’d finally beaten him.
Somebody had filmed it and the tournament form had already gained fifteen sign-ups as the video quickly racked up views. I wasn’t glowing like after our sex, but the hollow place inside me felt full. Not buzzing and overflowing, but a more natural feeling, like I had earned it.
You’ve still got it.
I smiled to myself as I cleaned out the blender for a new smoothie order. I watched a young family playing down by the shoreline, their daughter building an epic sandcastle. I glanced up at El Soldado and he nodded. He swooped down and nabbed a rare piece of blue sea glass I held out, then flew over the beach, dropping it right next to the girl. She squealed and immediately set it as the crown jewel atop her tallest tower. The rest of the day passed quickly.
Then I felt her.
The energy on the beach shifted when my mother arrived, like it curved around her, drawn into her immense gravitational orbit.I’d spent enough of my life watching it happen that I could feel the ripple from behind the counter without looking up.
I finished making the açaí bowl I was working on, smiling at the woman who took it before turning to her.
“Mi corazón! There you are.” She glanced around the shack like she was appraising it for a buyer.
“Mamá, I was just closing?—”
“This is cute. Is this new?” She touched the wind chime I’d hung by the register. “I saw a video today. Sandra sent it to me—you remember Sandra, from my circle—she said, Marina, isn’t this your daughter? Playing volleyball with El Tiburón?”
“Beating El Tiburón.”
“Mmm.” She was already looking past me, at the menu board. “Do you still make that thing with the mango? Don’t trouble yourself. Anyway, I watched it, and I thought, well. This little tournament of hers is finally getting interesting.”
Finally. After eight years of hard work and thousands of dollars I’d raised for this town.
“It’s the same tournament, Mamá. It’s always been?—”
“So I’ve decided to bring everyone.” She said it like she was blessing me with a favor I’d asked for. “The whole community. Sandra, the Vega sisters, some of the coastal families from up north. They were already here for my waves, anyway. We’ll need seating, obviously—somewhere shaded. I’ll send you the numbers.” She finally met my gaze. “You can manage that?”
“This isn’t really that kind of event—” I started, but she wasn’t listening.
“It’ll be wonderful exposure for you.” Past me again, at her own reflection in the window now, adjusting an earring. “Everyone always asks what you’re doing down here. Now I’ll finally have something to show them. Oh, this will be just perfect.”
Something to show them.
Eight years, and I became worthy the day a famous man stood on the other side of my net.
I breathed. In, out, in, out. “Okay. We’ll figure out covered seating.”
“And the Perez boy.” Her smile was hungry, and I did not likethat at all. “My god, mija. The photos don’t do him justice, do they? That jawline, and those tattoos. The shoulders on him. If I were twenty years younger.” She laughed, delighted with herself. “Honestly, even now?—”
