Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
TESSA
The morning sun hit the water at just the right angle, turning the marina into a sheet of hammered copper.
I stood on the dock next to Seahorse, mentally reviewing the dive plan, but my focus kept fracturing.
A week ago, this had been the best part of my day—the quiet moments before heading out, the easy rhythm of prepping gear alongside Braden, sharing the anticipation of what we’d find beneath the waves.
Now, the air was thick with a different kind of anticipation.
The quiet, humming tension of something left unsaid.
Kaia and Zane were already aboard, their easy banter a sharp contrast to the polite, professional bubble Braden had created around himself. A focused, impersonal efficiency had replaced the easy camaraderie we’d built.
“Morning,” he said, looking up from checking a fuel line. He offered a smile, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Dive plan’s the same?”
“Same plan,” I confirmed, my voice a little too bright. “Conditions look good.”
“Should be a nice morning.” He turned back to his task, the conversation neatly concluded.
On the boat, I tried to bridge the gap, leaning against the cabin doorway as he piloted us out of the channel. “Harper was telling me Finn is dead-set on a sandcastle competition at the event. We might need to rent a bulldozer.”
“She’ll find a way to make it happen. She always does.” He glanced at me, his expression softening for a brief second before he looked back at the water. “How’s the rest of the planning coming?”
“It’s good. Pretty much done.” The conversation stalled, his question answered, no follow-up offered. It wasn’t that he was being cold. It was almost worse. He was being polite. He was treating me like a colleague he was friendly with, neatly excising the intimacy we’d shared just days before.
The dive itself was a brief respite. Underwater, in the silent, blue world where communication was reduced to hand signals and shared glances, we were still a team.
We moved in sync, our years of shared history and weeks of intense work creating a seamless partnership.
He pointed out a juvenile hawksbill turtle hiding under a ledge, and I signaled back with an okay sign.
But all I could think about was how much more at ease we’d been in the grotto.
The moment we surfaced, the polite wall was back.
On the boat ride back, he stood at the helm, his focus locked on the horizon.
My mind, trained to analyze data, couldn’t shut off.
The shift hadn’t started after a fight. It had begun after the bonfire.
After we’d stood in front of his family and made it real, an event that had initially filled me with happiness.
The conclusion was sharp and unavoidable.
This wasn’t anger. It was preemptive grief.
He was bracing for an impact that hadn’t even happened yet, letting the past pilot our future right into the ground.
And maybe he was thinking about the email notification that had landed in my inbox yesterday.
The one I’d shown him right away. After all, I believed in full disclosure.
Candidate Shortlist Confirmed. I was officially in the final selection pool for the Gbr fellowship.
The clock wasn't just ticking. It was counting down to zero.
By the time the familiar sight of the Sunset Siesta pier came into view, my frustration had solidified into resolve. A direct confrontation would only make him retreat further. I’d seen it in his careful deflections all day.
I was a scientist. I didn’t just observe a problem—I formed a hypothesis and designed an experiment. If the future was what he feared, then I had to find a way to make him engage with it. Not with feelings, but with facts. With something tangible he couldn’t deflect.
The routine of securing the boats was a familiar dance. When Zane and Kaia headed away, they left a pocket of charged silence in their wake. I watched Braden coil a mooring line, his movements precise and contained. This was my chance.
I took a breath and closed the distance between us. “Braden.”
He turned, and the guarded look was back in his eyes. “Yeah?”
“Are we okay?”
He gave a small, reassuring smile that felt like a lie. “Yeah, of course. Lots on my mind.”
I nodded, pretending to accept it. Then I shifted my stance, changing my angle of approach. “I could use a hand. I’m hitting a wall with something, and I was hoping I could borrow your brain for an hour or two tonight.”
His curiosity was piqued, just as I’d hoped. “My brain? For what?”
“The conservation center.” Interest flickered in his eyes, and I pressed my advantage. “I’m trying to map out potential locations, but I’m not in the loop. I need someone who knows the island—the history, the politics, the forgotten corners. You.”
He hesitated, the war playing out on his face. The part of him that wanted to retreat was battling the part that was a builder, a problem-solver already deeply invested in this project.
“Please?” I pressed.
The builder won. A real, small smile touched his lips. “Sure. I was actually thinking about that the other day. Wondering if you’d considered the old McGregor place.”
Relief washed through me. “That’s exactly the kind of thing I’m talking about. I wouldn’t even have thought about that place.”
“It’s a wreck, but it’s got potential,” he said, now fully engaged. The wall wasn’t gone, but he’d just opened a gate. “Yeah, Tess. I can help you with that.”
“My office? Say, seven o’clock?”
“See you at seven.” He finished with the rope, and this time, when he looked at me, the smile reached his eyes. It wasn’t the enthusiastic agreement I’d hoped for, but it was a start. It was a foothold on the wall he’d been building, and I would take it.
I spent the next two hours turning my small, functional marina office into a war room after giving my assistants the rest of the day off.
This space, unlike my townhouse, felt like me.
It was a controlled expression of scientific passion.
I cleared the central worktable, unrolling a massive, laminated map of Dove Key and the surrounding waters until it covered nearly the entire surface.
Then, I went to the corkboard on the wall.
I took down the tide charts and shipping lane diagrams before pinning up my best research photos—a stunning close-up of a brain coral’s intricate patterns, the wise, ancient face of a loggerhead turtle, a school of parrotfish flashing like a living rainbow.
This wasn’t just data. It was the soul of the project. This was what we were fighting for.
It was not a romantic setting. It was a command center for a dream, and I was deliberately inviting him into the heart of it.
A sharp knock sounded at the door at seven o’clock.
I took a steadying breath, my reflection a faint ghost in the dark office window, and opened the door.
Braden stood on the threshold dressed in a button-down shirt and gray cargo shorts.
Hair damp and clean, shoulders broad and strong. He made my knees wobble.
“Hey,” he said, his voice a low rumble.
“Hey yourself.” I stepped back, gesturing him in.
He stepped inside, his gaze immediately drawn to the massive map dominating the room, then to the vibrant photos of the reef life I’d pinned to the wall. A flicker of interest crossed his face before he shuttered it away.
“You weren’t kidding.” He studied the mess on my desk. “That’s a big map.”
“And I have no idea where to start.” I held out a green dry-erase marker. “So—if money, politics, and zoning laws were no object, where would we put it? The main center. The place that has the research lab, the public-facing education wing, and the boat dock.”
For a moment, he just stood there, thinking. Then, with a slow exhale, he took the marker. The tension in his shoulders eased as he leaned over the table, his brewer’s mind, so good at seeing systems and processes, immediately engaged.
He walked the perimeter of the map, his finger tracing the coastline.
“You need deep-water access for the research vessels, but you want the education center to be easily accessible for tourists and school groups.” His focus was so complete, so intense, it was like watching him create a new recipe.
He moved to the northern edge of the main island.
“What about here?” He drew a rough circle on a patch of coastline just north of Driftwood Beach.
“It’s undeveloped, right on the water. Belongs to the town, but they’ve never figured out what to do with it.
The channel is deep enough, and it’s enough land. ”
A jolt of excitement shot through me. “A blank slate.”
His expression turned pragmatic. “But a blank slate is expensive. You’re talking new construction from the ground up. Utilities, infrastructure… it’s a five-year project, maybe ten.”
“Okay, that’s not ideal. So what’s the alternative?”
He scanned the map again, and I watched his gaze settle on the spot he’d mentioned earlier and that we’d seen early on in the project. “I think the McGregor place could work.”
“Right. You mentioned it earlier. The old compound south of Sunset Siesta?”
“Yeah,” he confirmed. “It’s got history. People know it. And it has that huge, old deep-water dock that could be restored. The structure is probably a teardown, but the location is perfect. It’s iconic.”
He took the marker from me, his hand brushing mine, and the brief contact was an electric shock in the charged air. He drew a second, confident circle around the McGregor property.
We both stood there, shoulder to shoulder, staring at the map. Two green circles. Two possible futures. We weren’t just brainstorming anymore. We were building a legacy for Dove Key, and the sheer permanence of what those circles represented seemed to crash down on Braden all at once.
He took a physical step back from the table. The collaborative energy vanished, sucked out of the room as if a vacuum had been turned on. The wall was back, higher and colder than ever.
“You’re planning something that will take years to build.” His voice was flat. “Foundations, permits, fundraising, construction.”
I turned to face him, my excitement dissolving into a familiar ache. “Yes. That’s the point. To build something lasting.”
“Right.” He wouldn’t meet my eyes. He ran a hand through his hair—a gesture I recognized as caged frustration.
This was it. The precipice. “This is what it’s about, isn’t it? This is why you’ve been distant.”
He finally looked at me, and the raw fear in his eyes stole my breath. “Tessa, what are we doing?”
“We’re planning a conservation center.”
“No.” He stepped toward me, hands clenched at his sides.
“Us. What are we doing? We’re standing here, drawing lines on a map for a future.
And you haven’t even decided if you’re going to be here to see it happen.
I thought I could handle this, but I can’t.
I can’t stand here and map out the next five years with you, let myself believe in it, get used to it…
and then watch you pack your bags. I did that once. I won’t do it again.”
The agony in his voice shattered my defenses. I closed the distance between us in two strides and placed my hands flat on his chest, feeling the frantic beat of his heart under my palms. “I’m scared too.”
“Of what?” His words were almost a scoff. “You’ve got the world at your feet. The Great Barrier Reef waiting for you. Your dream.”
“That Gbr project isn’t a reality yet. And I’m scared I’ll make the wrong choice.
I’m scared of disappointing my parents, of throwing away a career I’ve worked for my entire adult life.
But most of all,” I said, my voice breaking, “I’m scared of this wall you’re building because you’re so sure I’m going to leave that you’ll cause it to happen. ”
I reached up and cupped his jaw, my thumb stroking the tense muscle there, forcing him to hold my gaze.
“I don’t have all the answers. I don’t know what my life looks like in six months, let alone ten years.
But I’m not running. Not from you and not from this.
” My eyes flickered to the map, then back to his.
“I am trying to figure it out. And I need you to trust me while I do. Please.”
He didn’t answer right away. His eyes searched mine, and war raged in him—the desperate desire to believe me warring with twelve years of ingrained self-protection. His jaw tightened under my thumb, and for a second, I thought he would pull away.
“I know what I’m asking.” My voice dropped lower, more intense.
“I have a contract with an end date. It feels like a pattern, doesn’t it?
Like graduation day all over again.” He flinched, and I knew I’d hit a nerve.
“But that was a choice a teenager made. This is different. I’m different.
I can’t promise you I’ll stay. Until recently, it never occurred to me.
But I promise to make this decision as a woman, not a girl. ”
I leaned in, demanding he see the truth in my eyes. “You have every right to be scared. I get it. But don’t let a memory of who we were dictate who we could be now. Don’t build a wall so high that I can’t find my way back to you.”
My honesty finally broke through his armor. He let out a long, shaky breath and gave a slow, deliberate nod, his eyes shining with a vulnerability that mirrored my own. “Okay. I’ll trust you.”
Relief washed through me. Before I could question myself, I rose on my toes and pressed my lips to his.
It wasn’t the desperate, frantic kiss from before.
This was slow and deep, a quiet confirmation.
It was a seal on a pact made in the faint light of a cluttered office, with the future of a town and the future of us laid out on a map between us.
When we broke apart, he slid his arms around me, and I rested my face against his chest. My gaze fell back to the map. Two green circles glowed under the fluorescent lights. They weren’t just potential sites anymore. They were a question. A challenge. A promise I had to keep.
And I had six weeks to find the answer.