Chapter Ten #2
He gave a brief smile. “You look like you already have.”
The air between them thickened. The faint scent of sawdust mixed with rain clung to his skin. His shirt stuck to his shoulders, muscles shifting beneath it in precise, economical movements. The kind of control that could be comforting—or dangerous, depending on where his hands went next.
Harmony leaned in a fraction. “You think you’ve got me figured out?”
“I think you’re collecting us,” he said. “Every secret. Every scar. Like you’re afraid you’ll vanish if you stop.”
His words hit too close. She kept her gaze steady, heartbeat even while something sharp passed between them. “Maybe I just like to know what I’m dealing with.”
He stepped closer, closing the distance, letting her know he was the one in control. “Then stop looking. I’m not something you can write your way out of.”
Lightning flashed, catching his face in stark relief—beautiful, dangerous, unknowable. For a suspended breath, Harmony imagined leaning forward, closing the gap, and discovering whether the danger was imagined or real. She didn’t move. Not yet. Anticipation was half the pleasure.
Instead, she whispered. “Maybe I don’t want to.”
Zach’s smile was slow—a warning wrapped in invitation. “Be careful, Harmony. The island doesn’t like people who play both sides.”
“Neither do I,” she said.
Rain hammered harder, matching something unspoken between them.
Harmony exhaled. Maybe the island didn’t like games—but she was starting to think she’d met someone who played them better than she did.
She tipped her face up and let the rain wash her sins away.
The island smelled different in the storm—colder, cleaner, more alive.
She turned to leave. She took three steps before he called after her.
“Running away?”
“Nope. I don’t run. Just taking a breath,” she said. “Some of us need oxygen.”
He moved closer, rain streaking down his cheeks. “You always come looking for trouble once it’s dark enough for you to hide.”
“Maybe, it’s just that I recognize the trouble and point it out.”
They stood close enough to feel each other’s breath, far enough to pretend they weren’t feeling the same things. The air between them sparked.
Zach reached out, his thumb brushing a drop of rain from her cheek. “You should go home, Harmony.”
“I’m not afraid of storms.”
“You should be. They wash things clean.” His eyes didn’t leave hers. “Sometimes that’s not a mercy.”
Her pulse beat hard against her throat. “You talk like you’ve done things that need to be cleaned.”
He hesitated, gaze dark. “Haven’t you?”
The question lingered between them, intimate and dangerous.
Lightning fractured the sky above the harbor, silvering the world for an instant. When the light faded, he was inches from her. His breath was warm despite the chill.
“You keep writing about monsters,” he murmured. “Maybe you’re trying to understand your own reflection.”
She didn’t flinch. “Maybe I’m trying to understand yours.”
For a long moment, neither moved. His hand slid to her jaw, gentle but possessive. She thought he might kiss her. She wasn’t sure whether she wanted him to—or wanted to see if he’d dare.
Instead, he whispered. “Be careful what you look for here. Catalina always gives you what you ask for—just never how you think it should come.”
Then he turned and walked away into the rain until the dark swallowed him whole. Harmony stood there, heart pounding, tasting salt and thunder on her tongue. Somewhere deep inside the island, something stirred—approval, or warning. She wasn’t sure which thrilled her more.
A patrol car rolled slowly past at the end of the block. Harmony caught a glimpse of Ciscel behind the wheel, features blurred by rain-slick glass. For a split second, it looked like he was staring directly at her. Then the car slid out of sight.
She eventually moved on, her footsteps echoing on wet pavement.
Under a small awning, she pulled out her notebook and scribbled before the words could slip away.
Maybe the idea of someone watching her as closely as she watched everyone else sent a small thrill down her spine. Secrets never stayed hidden for long.
Later that night, Harmony saw Zach’s truck parked near the Marlin Club after closing, no lights on inside. Through fogged windows, she could make out shapes and hear raised voices. Tosh’s slur. A woman’s sharp bite.
“Don’t touch me again!”
“Do you think anyone believes you?” The second voice was low and dangerous.
“You’d burn this place down if someone paid attention to you long enough.”
A crash. Shattering glass. Then silence. Then footsteps.
Harmony stayed in the shadows, notebook pressed to her chest, then wrote one line.
Love sounds like violence when it’s told in whispers.
By the next morning, Mary had started carrying a knife. She showed it to Harmony without ceremony, pulling the blade from her bag in the middle of breakfast at The Pancake Cottage.
“For protection,” she said.
“From who?”
“Whoever the island decides to use next.”
Harmony watched her slice through a piece of toast with surgical calm. “You think it’s not over?”
Mary laughed softly, bitterly. “It’s never over. The island doesn’t bury its sins. It simply recycles them.”
Harmony took the chair across from her. “And the knife helps?”
“It helps me feel like I still get a say.”
Wind rattled the shutters. For a moment, the whole cottage seemed to hold its breath.
“Have you ever killed anyone, Harmony?” Mary asked suddenly.
Harmony met her gaze without flinching. “Not on purpose.”
Mary’s lips curved into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “When you do, you’ll understand why I carry it.”
Thunder broke the moment apart. Harmony stood, brushing rain from her sleeves. “You should lock your doors at night.”
Mary looked back at the knife. “Maybe I should leave them open and invite them in. When a person has nothing left to lose, they’re the one you should fear.”
Harmony glanced toward the café window. A figure passed by, blurred by rain, then turned their head just enough that she knew they’d been looking in. By the time she focused, the sidewalk was empty. Catalina loved an audience—it never announced when one arrived.
Over the next few days, paranoia spread like a fever. Torie stopped sleeping. Candy stopped singing. Tosh started drinking in the mornings. Zach stayed in the shadows. Janie was brittle. Even Cass’s smile stopped reaching her eyes.
Harmony kept writing.
Torie’s hidden marriage.
Candy’s bruises.
Mary’s blade.
Zach’s midnight visits to the cliffs.
Tosh’s secrets.
Cass’s innocence.
Were any of these things real, or were they all facades? Was every story written twice—once as a confession and once as fiction?
That night, as the storm thickened, Harmony walked the edge of the harbor. The lights along Crescent Avenue flickered in and out like unreliable memories. Footsteps echoed behind her, then stopped when she turned.
She shook it off.
She passed Tosh’s house and heard raised voices inside—one sharp and defensive, one slurred and desperate.
She passed Mary’s place and saw shadows dancing behind the curtains.
For a second, she thought she saw a splash of red on the glass.
She passed Torie’s house, which was dark.
She passed Zach’s and saw someone step back into deeper shadow.
She passed Janie’s and glimpsed more than one body moving inside.
Everyone had secrets. Some wanted their stories told. Some would kill to keep them buried.
Who were these people, really? Were they willing to kill? Or did they quietly hope someone would save them?
Somewhere behind her, boots scraped against wet stone, the steady rhythm too measured to be a drunk tourist. When she turned, all she saw was fog and the faint outline of a tan uniform at the top of the hill. By the time she blinked, even that had dissolved.
By the time the storm hit its peak, the whole island felt caged. The power flickered. Wind screamed through the palms. Harmony watched the lights in town sputter and die. In the dark, she whispered the last line she’d written aloud, just to hear it.
“When everyone’s guilty, who do you forgive?”
Thunder answered. Lightning lit her reflection in the window—pale, composed, watching herself watch. For a moment, she thought she saw another silhouette behind her in the glass. When she turned, the room was empty.
Only the whisper of the rain remained, steady and alive, like the island itself.