Chapter 3
Wild emotions pinwheeled inside my chest, and I hated that Seb could make me feel like this within minutes of seeing him again.
I couldn’t think straight. The dog’s barking continued to echo around the beach as I struggled with my keys, and just when
I was about to scream at the dog, Seb circled the screen door, ducking his head to get in my face.
“Paige. Please listen—”
“Stop it! Don’t touch me!”
He held up both hands in surrender. “Not touching, just trying to talk.”
“I said everything I wanted to say. Just go!” My trembling fingers finally got the door unlocked. I pushed it open and stepped
inside, about to slam it in his face when he finally gave me a real answer.
“I didn’t come to Nana Malone’s funeral because I wasn’t in town, okay? I was in another state. I couldn’t.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Fine, I was also too fucking scared to come,” he said gruffly from the other side of the screen door.
That I believed.
“I was scared,” he repeated, “and I didn’t know how to reconnect with you after everything.
It was spineless and selfish, and I’ve regretted it.
Paige, listen to me. I’m sorry I was a such a fuckup.
I know how this looks right now, with the state of the cottage and that bonfire fight back there—I get it, okay?
I’ve been a coward, and I’m just really sorry. ”
I stood in the cottage, staring back out at him. Part of me wanted to tell him that his absence made Nana’s death so much
worse for me. That I was so alone last summer, and even until the moment the funeral ended, I kept looking to see if he’d
come.
But I didn’t say any of that.
“Goddammit, Punkin!” he shouted at the black dog, who had nudged her snout between the wooden screen door and the doorframe
and was pushing her way inside the cottage. Seb tried to grab her, but she wriggled away. “You can’t go inside right now!
Son of a . . .”
Apparently, she could, and she was familiar enough with the cottage to make a beeline for the sofa.
“Punkin, you’re in big trouble.” Seb stepped into the house to coax her back outside, but she wasn’t budging.
“I vacuumed up a metric shit ton of sand from the cushions today,” I complained, grateful to have a distraction from old wounds.
“No wonder it smelled so bad.”
“I’m trying to train her not to jump on furniture, but . . .”
“Next thing you’ll be telling me is that she broke the rocking chair and paintings.”
His head sagged, and he sighed dramatically. “Paige, will you please just listen? I caught a couple of guys here last night. They were trashing your place, looking for something. I chased them
away. I was planning on getting back here before you came home to clean up, but, you know. Shit happens.”
“What? You chased off a couple of guys . . . ?”
“Well,” he admitted. “Punkin chased them off. No one survives her barking attack.”
“Did the police catch them?”
“Police?”
I frowned. “You didn’t call the police.”
One brow arched as if he were incredulous that I’d even ask. “You’re joking, right?”
I supposed squatters weren’t exactly eager to call cops. “Fine, then who was it that broke in? Was it the Vanderburgs?”
He shook his head and shoved loose tendrils of hair out away from his face. “Nah, it wasn’t Paul, but I couldn’t get a good
look at ’em. It was dark, and they were wearing ski masks. One was pretty big, all muscle. The other guy was small. When Punkin
and I showed up, they scattered and took off on a pair of motorcycles.”
I blinked at him and looked around. Ski masks? Was this a Seb-sized lie? By the look on his face, he was telling the truth—I
always knew. Well, almost always.
Who would try to rob me? If any of the so-called dock bros decided to break in, the ones who worship Pretty Paul, they’d just
stumble over here in a drunken haze. Criminal masterminds they were not. Silly to even try to break in because there wasn’t
much of anything of value in the cottage. And there wasn’t anything stolen, except . . .
“My paddleboard! Wait. They rode off with it?” I tried to picture it being carted away on a motorcycle. God knew it wasn’t
worth that much. “Who breaks in a house just to steal a paddleboard?”
Seb squinted one eye shut. “Actually, no, that wasn’t them. Jaz borrowed it last week for work. I let her take it because
she said you wouldn’t mind.”
I didn’t. But why wouldn’t she tell me that?
And how did he know that she was at the cottage last week?
“Seb Jansen,” I said, pointing an accusatory finger at his chest. “You haven’t been ‘occasionally’ crashing at my cottage.
You’ve been living in it!”
Now he looked embarrassed. “Not living, exactly. Just . . .” He sighed heavily. “It’s just that Dad and I don’t have much to do with each other. It’s not like it
was between us before, but . . .” He scrubbed the top of his head. “It’s just been a little shitty around here lately, okay?
So I’ve been crashing wherever.”
“Like my cottage? You’ve been sleeping in my bed, Seb. What else have you been doing?”
“In your bed? Quite a lot, I’m afraid. Don’t worry, I thought of you every time.”
My cheeks warmed. “You’re vile. You know that, right?”
“But honest.”
“Ha! Now that truly is funny.” I shook my head, looking anywhere but his face. “I can’t believe you’ve been living here. Jesus, Seb. No
wonder the utility bill has gone up!”
“Hey, you should be thanking me. A house needs to be maintained. If you don’t maintain it, nature claims it. Or robbers. So,
you know, you’re welcome. For all the maintaining.”
“Maintaining?” I threw up my arms in frustration. “I can’t even . . . What’s wrong with you? Did you get hit on the head when
we were in high school? Because I cannot for the life of me understand how my sweet, loyal friend turned into prince of the
fucking delinquents.”
“Look, I’m not here every night. I stay at Benny’s, too. Sometimes I crash in houseboats in the marina.”
“Are you serious? Jazmine’s parents are going to murder you.”
“They don’t know, okay? I’ve been working for Mr. Neely since last fall, and he’s been really cool. So please don’t blow this for me.”
I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to understand it all. “Hold on. You’re working at the marina? The boy who said his future career plans were to retire at eighteen? What in the world do you do for
Mr. Neely?” I couldn’t picture him working . . . ever.
“Pump gas, mostly. Engine repair, oil changes. Sometimes I help with valet boat launching.”
“Wow.”
His brow lowered. “Fine, judge me. I guess when you get a free ride to Harvard, you’ve earned the right. I may be a lowly
gas attendant, but at least I’m bringing in cash.”
“Well, for your information, my financial aid is being stripped because some jackass told my resident dean that my estranged
ex-father was worth millions.”
“Why would that matter? You haven’t seen him since you were a kid, and he doesn’t support you. You don’t even have his surname.”
I made the same arguments in the financial aid department. “It matters because the only way I can afford to attend school
in Cambridge is thanks to need-based financial aid. People whose families make under a certain amount don’t have to pay tuition.
“But if my father can afford to pay tuition, then the school says I’m not below that need-based threshold anymore. I asked
the family attorney to send me old legal documents that show Nana had guardianship of me, but that wasn’t good enough. So
now I’ve got to resubmit all my financial paperwork with his salary included—or get him to sign a form stating that he’s not
legally responsible for me. And that is why I’m here this summer instead of studying in Europe.”
A long silence stretched between us.
“Yikes,” Seb finally whispered, squinching up his face. “I don’t know what to say, Paige. Have you seen your dad yet? He’s
a big shot commercial real estate agent in Grand Rapids. Wins awards and shit.”
I scrubbed my face. “Yeah, I heard. I just got in town today.” Reintroducing myself to the man who ruined my family and begging
him to sign paperwork to help me was not something I looked forward to doing. “I can’t . . . handle him yet.”
“Too busy getting robbed,” Seb agreed blithely.
I glared at him. “These so-called robbers had time to drink a thousand bottles of Haven Beach Ale? Because I spent most of
my time cleaning up those, along with all your weed.”
“You threw my weed away? Dang, Paige. That preroll sale only happens a couple times a year. Please tell me you’re joking.”
“You care more about that than this cottage—so typical! Nothing has changed. What’s wrong with you?”
“Haven’t you heard? I’m a waste of space who’ll amount to nothing.”
“If you’re angling for sympathy, it might do you good to remember that I gave you plenty of that when you started pulling away from the Wags, and what did it get me? You left your friends high and dry so that you
could run around the beach like you were in some stupid gang.”
His brow lowered. “At least I was living. All you wanted to do was polish your golden transcript so that you could fit in
with an Ivy League crowd and pretend like your family was still rich!”
In that moment, it felt like I’d traveled back in time to when we were both fifteen and having this exact same argument. I remembered fighting with him in the cottage’s front yard and Nana racing out to get between us and stop us from killing each other.
She wasn’t here now.
Anger rose, hot and fast. I shoved him with both my hands.
Hard.
Caught off guard, he stumbled sideways into the wall, straight into one of my grandmother’s landscape paintings—one that hadn’t
been damaged by the robbery. I winced internally when it fell off its nail and hit the floor with a terrible bang. A corner of the wooden frame chipped off.
“Shit! Paige, I didn’t mean to do . . .” He cocked his head as he stared at the fallen painting, and my eyes followed his
as he bent down.
A piece of paper had fallen on the floor. He picked it up while setting the painting against the wall. “I think this fell