Never once had I braced myself for the kind of status and acclaim that would put his face on magazines. It wasn't a matter of our worlds being different anymore.
"There's a difference between knowing you're wealthy and important, and this." I shook the magazine at him. It didn't matter that I'd asked him to spare me the details of his life on the West Coast. That I asked for the lies. "I know my world is nothing like yours. I've always known that. I had no idea you're the master of the online universe. You're fuckin' internet royalty."
"That's an exaggeration." Frowning, he folded his arms over his chest. "I'm not internet royalty."
"The fuck you aren't," I cried.
"Royalty suggests power by bloodline." He shrugged. "I wasn't born into this. I'm more of an alchemist."
"Oh, my God, Cole," I shouted. "Shut the hell up."
He was decent enough to stop talking and hold up his hands in surrender.
"The article said you were in search of a 'creative lightning rod' and a 'spiritual, strategic reawakening,' whatever the fuck that means. What was this to you?" I asked. "Some kind of experiment? Head up to Maine, fuck a lobsterman, and find your next great idea?"
"Of course not," he said. "I was wrong. I should've told you, and I wanted to tell you so many times."
"But you decided to keep right on hiding instead," I roared. "You're good at that, aren't you? You ran away from Silicon Valley after some app that didn't work. That's why you're here, right?"
"None of that matters, Owen," he argued. "You're the only one who knows me, the real me. You have to believe me."
I turned away from him, shifting my gaze to the ocean. "I thought I knew you, but that article makes it clear that I don't."
"I can tell you right now that article is bullshit. There are news stories and blog posts written about me every day. Entire books about me, my company, my approach to business. I know this is all new to you, but—"
"I'm not stupid, Cole," I interrupted.
He brought his fingertips to his forehead and rubbed his temples. "That's not what I was saying. I was wrong, Owen. I should've told you. Held you down and forced you to listen. But I loved that you knew me, the guy who drifted into the Cove, not the internet royalty." His lips quirked up in a rueful smile. "You found me and you took me in when I was lost and lonely. You accepted the guy who fell overboard. The one who required a lesson on dishwashing and pestered you with a thousand questions. I wanted you to love that guy, and not the one with an industry on his shoulders."
"I did love that guy, but I can't love this guy," I said, gesturing to the magazine.
"Goddamn it, Owen," he yelled. "Don't say that. Don't fucking say that."
Summer love was never meant for me. It wasn't mine to keep. I built sandcastle dreams and the tides washed them away every time.
"I think you should go."
Cole's eyes drifted shut, his head fell forward, and his shoulders slumped. For an instant, my heart ached to comfort him. And goddamn him for that. Even at my most gutted, I still wanted to care for him.
These four walls were soaked with memories of these past eight weeks—of us—and I couldn't drown in them, not now. I dropped the magazine and marched to the porch. The sea would soothe me tonight.
"Don't be here when I get back."
24
Cut and Run
v. The fast but expensive practice of sailing away quickly, either by cutting free an anchor or by cutting ropeyarns to unfurl sails from the yards.
Cole
Cole: Did you know about TechToday's cover story?
Neera: I did not. They didn't reach out to me or the communications shop for comment.
Cole: But you knew it was released? And didn't think I needed to know that?
Neera: Yes, I knew it was released.
Neera: No, I didn't think it was worth notifying you. It was unremarkable. Dozens of similar stories have been printed in recent weeks.
Neera: Is there an issue?
Cole: Issues, plural.
Neera: Understood. How can I help?
Cole: I'm going to need your assistance.
Cole: Get my replacement on the phone.
Neera: I'll take care of it.
Cole: Get a pilot and a jet ready. If the next day doesn't shake out the way I'm hoping it will, I'm going to need a ride home.
Neera: May I ask what's happening in the next day?
Cole: I'm begging the love of my life to take me back despite my extremely long list of flaws, inadequacies, and missteps.
Neera: Very well. Where might this jet be picking you up?
Cole: I'm in Talbott's Cove, Maine.
Neera: Forgive me for asking but if things do go as you're hoping, do you anticipate staying there?
Cole: I'd like to. If he lets me.
Neera: Then I'll do whatever I can to make that happen.
Cole: Thank you. I appreciate it, N.
Neera: That's what I'm here for.
Neera: I figured you'd find one spot and stay there for the summer. I'm happy you found that spot, and someone to share it with.
Cole: What?
Neera: The bookstore you asked me to feature is in Talbott's Cove. And the oceanic nonprofits you asked me to signal boost are also in Maine.
Neera: I also received an invoice from the sailboat fabricators last week. It referenced delivering parts to Talbott's Cove Marina.
Cole: You knew? All this time, you knew where I was and you didn't come find me?
Neera: You didn't want me to find you.
Neera: I believe you were busy finding yourself.
There were benefits to being a billionaire. I didn't worry about having a roof over my head or food on the table. The health and well-being of my parents, sisters, and nieces and nephews was secure.
And whenever I needed to make a call without the benefit of mobile service, I had a satellite at the ready.
With a secure connection in place, I explained my issues with that TechToday click-bait bullshit to my acting CEO and PR team. There was none of my usual Scream, Fire, or Throw. Not when I was fighting to keep the tears out of my voice.
Apparently, the newer, calmer Cole was absolutely terrifying because they were snapping to attention and suggesting every countermeasure imaginable, short of putting a hit on the journalist. The acting CEO was even amenable to my proposals, and that right there was progress.
For all that I could solve with money, there were several things I couldn't. One of them—my grumpy, growly bear—was somewhere in Jericho Bay by now. Knowing Owen, he'd sooner tuck his big body into the Sweet Carolyne's cramped quarters and spend an uncomfortable night at sea than risk seeing me again.
He wasn't wrong. I hadn't shown myself worthy of his presence, not when I'd let months pass without telling him everything. There were opportunities to put it all on the table, and I should've ignored his request to the contrary. I pushed him to be honest and real with Annette, even when staying hidden was the easiest route. I should've taken some of my own advice. Instead, I usually seized those opportunities to suck his dick or get bent over the kitchen table. I always wanted him wrapped around me, and I knew talk of my other life wouldn't give me that. I knew it would come between us because it came between me and everything.
But that didn't mean I was accepting it, not this time. Not with Owen.
I sat on the dock for hours, long after the sun had slipped past the horizon. The lighthouse blinked out a golden beam, a silent reminder that I wasn't alone in watching over the water. My ass was sore and my heart was heavy, but I was staying right there until Owen returned.
When the boat's light cut through the darkness, an hour or two before dawn, I found him staring at me, his gaze hard and hurt.
"I told you to leave," he yelled from the deck. He turned away, busying himself with lines and buoys.
"That's tough shit, Owen," I called as he stepped onto the dock. "We need to talk."
He froze, his fists on his hips and his hea
d hanging low. "Please," he said, his voice strained. "I can't do this."
I wrapped my hand around his bicep and pulled him close. "I fucked up and I was wrong but I love you, and you can't just toss me back into the sea."
Sighing, Owen looked out at the dark waters of the cove. "Your life…it's not here."
One of his greatest powers was his stoicism. He could hear my most sacred, private words and respond with little more than an impatient exhale. A blink. But I knew him, and I knew there was more to him than that. He wanted to be loved as much as I did, and he wanted me to keep pushing. His walls might be tall, but I wasn't afraid of the climb.
"It can be," I said.
That caught his attention, but holy Jesus, I wanted to hold him tight when he gave me that sad, pouty bear face.
"I mean that. I can stay. My life can be anything I want it to be. Anything we want."
His eyebrow winged up, unconvinced. "It seems that you're needed back in Silicon Valley."
"I'm not going back to the Valley, at least not permanently. I kinda hate it there." I shrugged, and he continued watching me with what are you talking about? eyes. "They'll be fine without me, and I can build apps to make working remotely more seamless." I dropped my hands to my waist, my hip cocked. "There's also the issue of my boyfriend living in Maine, and long distance just won't work for us."
"Then…what are you going to do?" he asked.
I brought my palm to the back of his neck. "Being here helped me realize that I didn't like managing the business. I'd always known, but…it was the only thing I had, you know? Now I know I'd rather mess around with crazy ideas and fix wonky code issues, and none of that requires me to spend any time in the office. I can do it anywhere, as long as I'm with you."
Owen didn't say anything for a long, painful minute where I was more interested in drowning myself than having him turn me away again. But finally—fucking finally—he wrapped his arm around my waist and dropped his head to my shoulder. "This probably means you're going to want that Wi-Fi stuff in the house now, huh?"
I laughed and rubbed my hand down his back. "I installed it in July," I said.
He lifted a shoulder but didn't respond immediately. "I let myself think this would work out, you know, with us. That I could ignore your life before me, and we could live in this little bubble. Then I saw that magazine, and…" He sighed, and that warm puff set off a ripple of goose bumps over my neck. "And I felt like a fool. That's why I wanted you to leave. Not because I didn't want you."
His words were the sharpest arrows.
"I mean it, Owen. I'm so sorry. Tell me how I can make it up to you."
"No more secrets," he murmured. "And you could say yes when I ask you to marry me."
"Yes," I said. "Yes now, and yes always."
Epilogue
Reef Knot
n. Joining two ends of a single line to bind around an object.
Owen
Fifteen months later
"What is this unholy mess?" I asked from the doorway as I shook out of my sleet-soaked coat. A nor'easter was blowing in tonight.
Cole glanced up at me but quickly returned to the measuring cups and mixing bowls on the countertop. "I thought you'd be out for another two hours," he replied.
"You didn't answer my question," I said.
"You didn't stick to your schedule," he answered, pushing his glasses up his nose. His fingers were dusted with flour, leaving a white smudge on his dark frames.
Once I'd shucked off my cold, wet outerwear, I padded into the kitchen to get a look at the chaos brewing there. "It smells good," I remarked, glancing at the sheet trays cooling near the oven. "Whatever it is."
"I made gingerbread," Cole said as he poured sugar into a mixing bowl.
I took another look around the kitchen. "For the entire town?"
"For a gingerbread house," he replied. "I'm constructing a scale replica of the house. And the lighthouse." He tapped the measuring cup against the bowl before turning on the mixer, the shine of his wedding band catching my eye. I couldn't fight the grin that surfaced every time I noticed it on his finger, or the obscenely sweet photo of our first dance that was framed and hung above the fireplace. "I'm making frosting now."
We were a few days away from our six month anniversary. We'd intended for our wedding to be a small affair, but I discovered my definition of "small" deviated from Cole's by fifty percent. In the end, it was a bit larger and more lavish than I would've selected for myself but getting married wasn't about me alone. If there was one thing I'd learned since Cole drifted into my life, it was that we mattered more than I.
"Um," I started, running my hands through my hair, "if you needed something to do, you could've helped me haul in traps. Were you bored or something?"
Cole still accompanied me on the boat most mornings, but not all the time. There were days and nights when he was too deep in his work to look up, and I respected the ebb and flow of his mind's machinations. When I left this morning, he appeared lost in his coding. No cakes in sight.
"I was working and now I'm baking," Cole answered over the whirring mixer. "It's the holidays, and I wanted to do something festive. Since we spent last year in Palm Springs with my mother—"
"Where we did not dehydrate into jerky," I said.
He glared at me over the mixer. "Since we spent last year in Palm Springs," he continued, "I wanted to start a tradition of our own this year."
"You were bored," I murmured.
Cole was between projects, and having that kind of time on his hands often led to him falling down curious rabbit holes. He tried his hand at gardening last summer. It yielded a handful of tomatoes and one amusingly girthy zucchini before he abandoned it to start building a new app. That product met with massive success.
The Talbott's Cove Effect. That's what Cole called it. Everything he created here was a hit.
As much as he loved being here, there were still moments when it was difficult for him to cede control to the people back in California. Those moments occurred only when he was locked in a power struggle over issues and details I didn't understand. Reliably, Neera talked him off those ledges.
She visited us in the Cove every month or so. She'd fly in for a weekend, and she and Cole would spend two hours working at the kitchen table. Then the three of us would hit the water. For reasons I still didn't understand, the lady enjoyed sorting lobsters. She was good at it, too. It only took a quick overview of the process and she sorted more quickly—and more accurately—than her boss.
Cole traveled to Silicon Valley from time to time, but he spent the majority of his time here in Maine. We'd flown out there—on a goddamn private jet, no less—a few months after everything hit the fan with his so-called disappearance last year. His company was introducing a new product, the one he'd developed while working as my deckhand, and he wanted me to join him for the launch party.
Before we'd arrived, I wanted to hate everything about California and his world there. It was fucked up, it was immature, it was irrational. The good news was that it didn't last.
Cole's house was big, modern, and boring, and I fucked him on just about every surface I could find. That seemed like the right way for him to say goodbye to that era of his life. Since he only visited California a few times each year now, he ditched the gigantic mansion and downsized into a penthouse apartment. If anyone could call a penthouse downsizing.
Palo Alto was different from Talbott's Cove for sure, but it was amazing. It was fast-paced and overflowing with people, and I loved it. I loved the vibe, the places, the weather, even the people who wore sneakers with business suits.
I'd worried I'd be intimidated by the people from his company, or they'd resent me for keeping him on the East Coast. None of that happened. They were fun and fascinating, and interested in hearing about our life in the Cove. One weird dude asked me about bringing a group out on the water for some lobster boat team building, and Cole damn near pissed himself laughing about that. Later, he to
ld me I could indulge the offer, yell at some executives all morning, and charge six figures for my time.
I wasn't ashamed to say I gave it serious consideration.
If Talbott's Cove hadn't been inundated with wealthy businesspeople—and their tourism money—I would've gone along with that ridiculousness. But ever since Cole announced he'd be staying in Maine, the tech types had been flocking here. My sleepy seaside town was becoming the next Sun Valley.
The local inn was always booked, and some of the locals had taken to fixing up their homes and listing them on short-term rental websites for obscene rates. The O'Keefes were able to pay their daughter's college tuition after renting out their house for the summer and pay off their mortgage. JJ sprung for a new can of paint and added some kale salads to The Galley's menu. No one ordered them but it was an amusing gesture. The town council was slammed with proposals for restaurants, shops, hotels. It was madness.
The Cole McClish Effect. That's what I called it. Everyone wanted to catch some of the magic he found here.
"Yes, I hit a wall with my work but I also wanted to surprise you with a new tradition," Cole started, pinning me with a sharp glance, "but it seems you chose this as the one and only day you'll deviate from your schedule."
"The fish weren't biting," I said, laughing. "That's often the case when winter storms move in."
He looked up, his lips parting, and stared out at the sleet and dark clouds. The visibility was low and the waves high. Based on the surprise washing over his face, he hadn't noticed until now. Absentmindedness was one of Cole's most adorable—but also infuriating—traits. I was certain the earth could open up and swallow everything around him, and he wouldn't notice until his ass caught on fire.
"You went out in that weather?" he asked, incredulous.
"Yes, sweetheart, I did." I pointed to my dripping hair. "That's why I'm soaked. Unlike some people, I don't make a habit of falling overboard."
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