17 Cora #2
didn’t need Cora’s help anymore. Maybe it was that Cora hadn’t been around to see that Savannah needed it.
“You think I’m about to walk away from this beauty? Not a chance.” Bianca pointed at her phone. “This is for later. I can’t
exactly set up a romantic anniversary dinner before lunch.”
Cora nodded. “Yeah, the Prestly girls pull through together, remember?” It was the line their mom had said after their dad
had moved out, one they had echoed frequently through the years. Just maybe not in recent years. “I mean, technically you’re
a Prestly-Glasner girl now, but you know. Still applies.”
“Always,” Bianca reiterated.
“Okay.” Savannah nodded, and Cora could see some of the tension that had been building up in her sister start to release.
“Good.”
“I’m not a Prestly girl, but can I help?” Sylvie asked. “I’m pretty good at sandcastles.” She held up her plastic shovel.
Savannah turned to her, some of her kind and caring personality returning. “Of course.” She even offered a smile, though it
looked somewhat weak.
“From the looks of it, Bianca needs all the help she can get on that tail,” Cora offered, trying to lighten the mood.
“Hey! I take offense to that very true statement.” Bianca made an exaggerated expression of mock offense. She looked over at Luke. “Do you have some time to stay?”
“I’ve got all kinds of time. At the moment there isn’t one problem at any of my properties, and I have the best event planner
handling the other part of my job.”
“First of all, I agreed to help. Not do it all,” Bianca said. “And secondly, I wouldn’t say that ‘no problems’ thing out loud.
It’s like you’re asking for trouble.”
Cora gritted her teeth together, looking remarkably like the nervous emoji, and shook her head.
He laughed and joined Bianca at the tail. “We’ll see how long the good luck holds up. Okay, tell me how to do this.”
The next hour was full of carefree, beachy fun. They told jokes. They teased one another. But they also worked together and
supported one another. The only thing Cora regretted was that Chris and the girls weren’t there to do it with them, because
this was the closest thing they’d had to a Prestly summer tradition so far.
Did the sculpture still look like a broken boomerang resting on a smooshed sand dune? Yes. Yes, it did. But it was their broken boomerang. And their smooshed sand dune. And their memory.
For the first time since they’d gotten there, Cora started to think that maybe coming to the beach house wasn’t an awful idea
after all.
They were in the final efforts of finishing their sculpture in the allotted time when Jax suggested they get one more bucket
of water for a last-ditch effort at making the wave look like, well, a wave.
“I’ll come with you,” Cora offered. “More hands, more water.” She popped up next to him and grabbed one of the plastic sand
buckets. “We’ll be right back,” she said to her sisters.
As they started off through the maze of other sandcastle construction sites, Jax gave her a suspicious look. “Your coming
has nothing to do with me and everything to do with wanting to cool off in the water, doesn’t it?”
She glanced around to see if anyone was listening, as if anyone even cared.
When the coast was clear, she looked over at him and let go of her attempt to hold it all together.
“Oh my gosh. It’s so hot. It’s like this beach is on the surface of the sun, and Savannah and Bianca keep hogging the umbrellas. ”
Jax chuckled. “Why do you think I’m going?”
She eyed him. “So it has nothing to do with wanting our wave to look more like a wave?”
He shrugged. “Of course it does. The sand sculpture thing is why we’re here, isn’t it?”
She raised an eyebrow to show she didn’t believe him.
“Fine. I think I’m about to melt.”
She chuckled. “Which leads to the real question. Are you just going in deep enough to fill your bucket, or are you going all
the way in?”
“That’s a trick question.” He stopped just above the wave line and kicked off his flip-flops. “Because everyone knows the
best water for sand sculpting comes from the bottom of at least a three-foot depth. In the nature of doing what’s best for
the team, I gotta go all the way in.” He grinned at her before pulling his T-shirt over his head.
“I like the way you think.”
Cora quickly slipped out of the shorts and shirt she’d recently bought to replace the neon palm tree monstrosity—on her last
check, her luggage was currently in Houston waiting to be retagged—and followed him into the water.
After baking under the July sun, the cool, transparent waters of the Gulf felt so refreshing, and she let out an audible sigh
when the water washed up around her waist. She closed her eyes and tipped her head up toward the brilliant blue sky.
“This is much better.” She stood there for a second, feeling the gentle waves crash into her body as her feet stayed rooted
in the sand and the sea breeze blew across her face. Her worries and cares seemed to melt away, and she felt herself relax.
This was what paradise felt like.
When she opened her eyes, Jax was looking at her with an expression she couldn’t quite decipher.
“What? Do I have seaweed on me or something?” She did a quick scan of her torso just to make sure.
“Nope. It’s nothing.”
But it wasn’t nothing. The way he looked at her with a gentle sweetness, almost like she was adored, caused something to stir
inside her.
The magnetic pull between them was getting stronger. These kinds of looks, the shared laughter, all the tiny, sweet moments
that made up the time they spent together were starting to overpower all the barriers she’d tried to build between them.
But they weren’t supposed to have moments. There was no future here, and the entire community backed her on that. Jax Verona
was a playboy who didn’t stick around. Everyone knew this. And frankly, it was a good thing because she actually wanted Jax
to not stick around. She just had to figure out a way to not get sucked in to all these tiny, sweet moments.
She splashed him. “Then eyes on yourself, buddy. Aren’t you supposed to be on the very important mission of fetching the best
sand-sculpting water?”
“One I’m not taking lightly. But we might have to go a little farther out than anticipated. You know, to get the really good
water.”
“Agreed.”
They bounced through the waves, pulling their buckets behind them.
Honestly, the problem with falling for Jax wasn’t that it was Jax. And it didn’t have anything to do with winning her bet
or proving her point to Bianca. The real problem, the one she didn’t even want to admit to herself, wasn’t that she was worried
all men would leave. Her bigger fear was that it was her, specifically. Everyone would leave her .
Yes, she was aware there were good men out there. Men who committed and who stayed and who were always faithful. No one was
perfect, but she was willing to admit there were enough great guys that proved the whole Prince Charming thing existed. For
some people, at least.
But that kind of thing didn’t exist for her.
She was opinionated and determined and sassy, and truth be told, she could be a little outspoken about some things. Fine,
a lot of things.
Yes, she still stuck to the belief that a lot of men, maybe even most men, took off when things got tough. But the real fear was that they always took off when she was involved.
Because maybe, at the end of the day, the real problem was her.
And for that reason, she was out. She didn’t have a problem with who she was, and she wasn’t willing to change just to be
the kind of person some guy was looking for. But she also wasn’t willing to risk heartbreak over something she knew had no
chance at working out. She wasn’t going to hang her hopes on a dream, only to realize there was never any chance of it being
a reality.
Would falling in love be nice? Yeah, but she didn’t need it. She was fine on her own. She thrived on her own.
Was Jax the kind of guy she’d be looking for if she were in the market for that kind of relationship? While she hadn’t thought
so in the beginning, she was starting to change her opinion.
But it didn’t matter, because that was all in some fantasy world. She lived in the real world, and in the real world, it would
never work. She was only in this relationship for the breakup. And the sooner, the better.
No more little moments or sweet looks. Playtime was over.
She jumped over a wave to keep her head above water. It felt nice to be fully immersed. She let her body relax in the cool
water, enjoying the playfulness of being in the ocean.
Okay, so maybe playtime wasn’t over just yet. She wanted to enjoy the water just a bit longer.
She turned back to the beach and searched through the crowds to check on her sisters.
“Do you think there’s something going on between Luke and Bianca?” She hadn’t meant to ask that question out loud, but watching
them had caught her attention.
Jax squinted at the beach, too. “I don’t know if anything’s going on, but I can say with a hundred percent certainty that
he’s into her.” He turned in the direction of where her family was on the beach. “She’s engaged, right?”
Cora shrugged. “I mean, I guess. As engaged as you can be to someone you only know online.”
“That bothers you.” It was more of an observation than anything else, but she considered the truth behind it for a second,
anyway.
“You have a sister. Would it bother you?”
“Fair point. Have you met him?”
“Kind of, I guess.” She thought of the first time she’d met him, early in their stay. Bianca gave Zander a tour of the house,
and Cora was part of that tour. “I was introduced while they were on a video call.”
“And?”
“No one looks good on a video call. And he’s always wearing these logoed trucker hats for his favorite fitness brands. It’s
like he’s trying to get a sponsor.”
“Maybe he just likes the brands.”
“Maybe.” She bounced over another wave. “But I think he’s bald.”
Jax laughed. “Is that a deal-breaker?”
“No. Just an observation. The deal-breaker is that I don’t think he knows he’s bald. And if challenged on it, he would tell you you’re wrong before insisting the lack of hair is because he
told it to stop growing, and he wears hats because they’re cool. And then he’d fight you.”
“I take it you’re not heading up his fan club?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Want me to run a background check on him? Mine are a little more thorough than SoulMatch.”
“No way. That would be an invasion of privacy.” But even as she said it, she vigorously nodded in an affirmative.
“Then I would never dream of doing it.” He winked.
Was it an invasion of privacy? Maybe. But she didn’t trust this guy. Who proposed over a video call? Knowing if there were
any official red flags in his past made her feel the tiniest bit better.
And then another thought occurred to her. “Wait. Did you do one of your fancy background checks on me?”
He looked guilty. “No?”
She gasped and glared at him. But before she could let her righteous indignation soar out of control, his guilty expression faded into one of playfulness.
“I’m just kidding. Of course I didn’t. I reserve background checks for clients and creepers only.
” Then he cocked his head to the side and studied her.
“Although I wouldn’t mind finding out what part of your past makes you so good on the pickleball court. ”
“Still salty that I smoked you?”
“Salty? No. I’ll redeem myself at the rematch.”
“Keep dreaming big, little buddy.” She patted his arm.
“Name the time and place, and I’ll be there.”
She raised an eyebrow. “This afternoon? After we finish up here, of course.”
“Actually, I can’t today.”
She pressed her lips together and gave an I-get-it nod. “That’s okay. I’d be afraid of the rematch if I were you, too.”
“Not afraid of the rematch, I just have a commitment I can’t back out of today.”
“Another supersecret spy mission?”
“Something like that.” He paused for a second. “Actually, would you like to come?”
“Learn how to steal priceless works of art from museums?”
“Technically speaking, I think most art is stolen from private homes or churches.”
“Good to know.”
“But today’s mission is a lot more local and a lot less illegal.” He shot her a taunting look. “Unless you have a problem
with losing, in which case, you should probably sit this one out.”
“Well, I can’t back down from that challenge.”
He grinned. “I didn’t think so.”
“In fact, should we go right now?” She started quietly singing the lyrics, “ All I do is win, win, win, no matter what. ”
He chuckled. “I have a few other things I have to take care of first. But two o’clock? I’ll text you the address.” His eyes
twinkled with that good humor that she loved—
Liked . The good humor she liked .
“I’ll be there.”
“And on that note, I should probably get going.”
She nodded, and they made their way back to shore.
When they got back to their designated station, he delivered the water and said his goodbyes.
“It was nice to hang out with you, but I have to take off.” He pointed at Sylvie. “Best dorsal fin I’ve ever seen.” Then he
turned to Savannah. “I’m sorry I couldn’t stay the whole time. I hope you won’t hold it against me.”
Bianca held up her hand. “Wait. Before you go, we should get a picture with everyone.” She grabbed her phone and waved down
a lady from the spot next to theirs to be their photographer, and everyone gathered behind the dolphin.
“Say ‘world’s favorite marine mammal,’” Bianca said, throwing her hands up in the air in a pose. Everyone repeated the phrase
in voices that sounded like smiles.
Well, almost everyone. Cora said, “I prefer a sea lion,” with the same photo-ready voice.
Savannah gave her a reprimanding look. “Really?”
Cora shrugged. “They’re like the dogs of the ocean, and their facial expressions are ridiculously cute.”
Savannah let out a tired exhale. Sylvie giggled. Bianca thanked the stranger and reclaimed the phone.
Cora ignored them all and focused her attention on Jax. “Anyway, thanks for, you know...” She motioned to the commotion
behind her. “Putting up with this.”
“I loved it. I’ll see you at two.” He tossed her one more lingering look before he turned and walked off.
She let the excitement tingle through her before she turned back to her family. Yes, she’d caught a case of the feels for
Jax. She blamed it on the smoldering smile. Or maybe his ridiculously good looks.
Regardless, like any virus, this one had run its course. It was time to get back to business.