“When it affects your safety, yes.”
I should bristle. Instead, I look down at my pancakes and feel something inside me loosen that has been clenched for too long.
After breakfast, we step outside into hard sunlight and salt air. The island moves around us, bright and busy, indifferent to private terror. A gull screams from a rooftop. Someone laughs near a golf cart.
For the first time since Orlando, I do not feel safe because nothing can happen. I feel safe because if something does, Cole will already be moving on my behalf. And that realization may be the most dangerous thing that has happened to me all day.
Chapter 10
Kara
Cole opens the vehicle door for me again, but this time I catch the mechanics of it. He is not being old-fashioned. He is stepping out first, looking left, then right, checking the sidewalk, the parked cars, the tourists drifting past with iced coffees and shopping bags. Only after that does he angle his body slightly and give me room to pass.
I should feel ridiculous needing that. Instead, I feel watched over. There’s a difference, and I am starting to understand it.
“We don’t have to go straight back,” he says.
I look up at him, surprised. “Is that you saying my therapist was right?”
“No.”
“Because it sounded suspiciously like my therapist was right.”
“It’s me saying isolated people are easier to pressure.”
“Ah. Tactical fresh air.”
His mouth moves, almost a smile. “If that helps.”
“It weirdly does.”
We walk toward the boardwalk because everyone else seems to be walking toward the boardwalk, and for once, joining the current feels easier than fighting it. Sunbreak Harbor is louder here than on the quiet stretch near The Sandpiper. A man with a guitar sits beneath a striped umbrella playing something beachy and soft while a toddler drops coins into his open case one by one with great solemnity.
The whole town looks like summer decided to build itself a body. I want to enjoy it. For a few minutes, I do.
Cole stays close without making a production of it. Not touching or crowding me with his body, although I feel a twinge inside me that almost wishes he would. He’s a constant presence at my side. We pass surf shops, a bookstore with a display of vacation reads, and a kiosk selling sun hats I immediately know would make my head look like a decorative mushroom.
Ahead, the boardwalk opens into a small public green where a stage sits beneath a curved roof. Workers are stringing lights and checking speakers while a banner flutters in the breeze.
SUMMER NIGHTS CONCERT SERIES — HIGH TIDE PAVILION
“Concerts?” I ask.
“Every Friday night.”
“Big crowds?”
“In summer? Yes.”
“Do you hate crowds?”
“I respect crowds.”
“That sounds like bodyguard language for hate.”
“It’s bodyguard language for crowds hide a lot.”
My stomach gives a small, unpleasant tug, but Cole’s tone stays even. He isn’t trying to scare me. He is simply telling the truth as he sees it.
