Chapter 18
Cami
Crystal Cove’s Stars and Stripes Festival is an annual explosion of color and noise.
Bunting drapes from lampposts, the air thick with sweet kettle corn, charred barbecue smoke, and music spilling down Main Street in competing waves of country twang and beachy cover bands.
Kids dart between legs, clutching dripping snow cones, and couples sway lazily near the gazebo, the whole town humming with that too-much-sun, too-much-sugar buzz.
I should be weaving through the crowd with nothing on my mind but fried Oreos and the fireworks later tonight, but instead, I’m dodging the smell of carnival nacho cheese and wondering if anyone here can tell I’m still walking around in a Knox-induced daze.
Funny, considering there’s a chance I’ve already lost him.
Somewhere between the barbecue stand and the lemonade truck, he vanished—one second beside me, the next making a beeline for the shortest beer line in sight, tossing a “don’t wander off” over his shoulder.
Fifteen minutes later…I’m still wandering.
My bubble phone vibrates in my hand, and I flip it open without hesitation.
New Message:
Knox: Stay where you are, bubble girl.
Knox: Headed to you now.
Biting back a grin, I thumb my reply.
Cami: Stalker…
Turning in a slow circle, I scan the crowd, almost expecting him to materialize out of thin air.
And, there he is, cutting through the throng like a heat-seeking missile, two bottles of beer swinging from one hand, a paper tray of fried Oreos in the other, that signature curve of his mouth pulling me apart one heartbeat at a time.
It’s been a little over a week since Millie Palmer came home early, and since Knox and I stopped pretending we could keep our hands off each other.
Seven days of lazy mornings, warm coffee, and kittens curled between us.
Evenings spent tangled in sheets, his mouth on mine until I forget my own name.
Knox closes the last few steps, handing me a beer before claiming my mouth in a kiss that shorts all my circuits.
“I lost you,” I murmur against him.
His gaze catches mine, heat curling low in my stomach.
“Never,” he says, a vow and a dare in one word, before kissing me again, quicker this time, like he can’t help himself.
He nips at my lower lip, then lets the corner of his mouth hitch into a grin. “Let’s move before I forget we’re supposed to be social. Millie’s with Elena and Margo at the pie-eating contest. I promised we’d say hi before the fireworks.”
As we weave through festival-goers, music breaks against the sharp crack of a balloon pop from a nearby dart booth, the smell of cinnamon sugar and summer heat filling the air.
Millie spots us first, lifting her lemonade in greeting.
“Well, if it isn’t our favorite couple,” she calls.
“Looking like they stepped straight out of a summer romance movie,” Elena adds, her straw hat tipped at a jaunty angle, a festival button pinned to the brim.
Margo adjusts the red-white-and-blue scarf at her neck and smirks. “Except in my version, the broody neighbor doesn’t share his Oreos.”
Knox sets the tray in the middle of the table. “Then this must be the director’s cut.”
“Smart man,” Millie says, brushing sugar off her skirt after breaking one in half. “You two should sit before someone drafts you into the cornhole tournament.”
We slide onto the bench, the heat of Knox’s thigh brushing mine.
Elena glances around, phone in hand as if she’s one click away from documenting this for the town scrapbook. “Where are the kittens tonight? Thought they’d be your plus-ones for every public appearance.”
Knox smiles. “At the pet hospital for the night. Vet said the fireworks are one of the hardest things for pets, so they recommended boarding them. Plus, they’re trying a little meet-and-greet with Wanda to see if they’ll bond.”
“Smart,” Millie says. “Less stress for everyone.”
“Where’d you both vanish to last week?” Elena asks, leaning in like it’s classified. “We stopped by one night to invite you over for cards and tequila shots, and you were nowhere to be found.”
“Probably lost track of time with the kittens.” I slide my gaze lower.
Margo licks a streak of pie filling from her thumb. “Is that what they’re calling it now?”
Knox chuckles, and I shove an Oreo in my mouth before my cheeks give me away.
“Starting to think you three might be trouble,” Knox says, grinning.
“Darling, we don’t might about anything,” Elena replies.
Millie tilts her head, smiling. “It’s good to see you both out here. This is what Crystal Cove summers are all about: fun, laughter, and mosquitoes.”
On the table between them, paper plates sit stacked with generous slices of pie, each in its own waxy paper cradle.
“Contest leftovers,” Margo explains when she catches me eyeing them. “They sell them off for the food bank once the judging’s done.”
My heart smiles. Crystal Cove could easily fit the backdrop of any small-town movie.
“Are you two watching the fireworks from the bluff?” Margo asks.
“We were thinking about it,” Knox replies, then takes a last swig of his beer.
“Do it,” Elena urges. “Best view in town. Fewer people, more privacy. Although we wouldn’t mind a public display. Keeps the town gossip mill alive.”
Margo winks. “We love a happy ending.”
Millie shifts sideways on the bench to face us. “If you head up before the finale, you’ll miss the crowd. But stay long enough to try the peach bourbon. It’s worth the walk back.”
“Oh, please.” Elena snorts, lifting her lemonade cup in our direction. “You two don’t need bourbon.” Her gaze flicks between Knox and me. “You’re already drunk on each other.”
Heat crawls up my neck. I chance a glance at Knox, expecting him to deflect. But he’s all smiles as if Elena just stated the obvious out loud and he doesn’t mind it one bit.
Conversation stretches on a little longer, trading festival gossip: which vendor accidentally set their tablecloth on fire, who spiked the lemonade stand at the quilting tent, and which band has been promising “one last song” for twenty minutes.
Finally, Knox stands, offering me his hand. “We should go claim that bluff.”
Elena nudges two plates with cherry pie slices in my direction. “Fuel for whatever you two get up to after the fireworks.”
As we walk away, pie plates in hand, I glance back to see the three of them still watching us, their laughter chasing us into the night.
Knox leans toward me. “Yep. They are definitely trouble…”
I grin. “…And they might also be our unofficial chaperones. The type who’d throw us a going-away party and spike the punch. Pretty sure Margo just bet Elena ten bucks we’d make out before the first set of fireworks.”
Knox smirks. “A bet she won’t lose.”
“Confident, are you?”
“Extremely.”
We drift through the crush of bodies toward the waterfront, Knox’s hand steady at the small of my back.
The festival noise fades to a low hum—the echoing clang of a ring-toss bell, the call of a roasted-almond vendor.
With every step, the midway’s heat and sugar give way to the cool, briny breath of the harbor.
Lantern lights dim behind us, replaced by the shimmer of moonlight on black water and the hush of waves against rock.
“Millie’s right,” Knox says, steering me around a stroller. “That bluff will give us the best view.”
“My mom used to say the same thing.”
The words land before I can stop them, unraveling a part of me I’ve kept sealed shut.
His brow lifts. “About the bluff?”
“About fireworks.” My lips curve slightly.
“When I was little, my parents would take me to the East River every Fourth of July. We’d sit on this big, tartan picnic blanket my dad insisted on hauling out—the one my mom swore was too nice for grass stains—and watch fireworks blossom over the Manhattan skyline.
She’d pack strawberries and lemonade; he’d buy pretzels from a cart ‘to support local business.’ Mom always said there’s nothing better than fireworks over water. ”
“Sounds like a gem.”
“She was.” My voice thins to something fragile, and so does his tone as he asks, “What happened?”
I take a breath. “An undetected heart condition. HCM. One morning, she just…didn’t wake up.”
His footsteps slow to a stop, gravel crunching under his shoes. When I turn, his gaze has beaten me to it, the pier lights catching a caramel ring in his eyes, a flicker of concern mingled with something softer, like he already knows this isn’t small talk.
“Cami…”
“Every six months, I get checked to make sure I don’t have the same thing.
So far, so good. But that’s why my dad’s the way he is.
” I tuck my hair behind my ear, the motion more habit than need.
“Overprotective to the point of overkill. He didn’t even want me to leave for Oxford.
Told me he couldn’t stand the idea of me being an ocean away. ”
Heat drifts down my arm in the path of Knox’s fingertips, each inch unhurried, deliberate, until they reach my palm, threading through.
“I get that,” he says quietly, his thumb brushing once against my skin. “I wouldn’t want you to be an ocean away either.”
I squeeze his hand, the steadiness in it settling me in a way that’s rare.
Funny how one sentence from Knox has single-handedly shifted my perspective and made me realize I might’ve misread Dad all along.
Maybe he wasn’t being overprotective or controlling.
Maybe he just couldn’t risk losing someone else he loves.
So when my life fell apart last year, he started nudging me to come home because he hated seeing me broken and too far away from home to help fix it.
That’s why he’s so thrilled I’m finally coming back.
The apartment. The job. They’re his way of bringing me home.
But how do I tell him home doesn’t feel safe anymore?
It feels like grief with a fresh coat of paint.
Like everywhere I turn, there’s another piece of Mom.
The bookstore where she used to read to me in the kids’ section.
The bench in Central Park where we ate melting ice cream cones, hands sticky, bellies sore from laughter.
The corner flower shop that always smelled like her favorite tulips.
And the brownstone Dad never left.
Home is where I can’t escape the ache of missing her…still.
Where every memory whispers loudly that love can vanish in a heartbeat.
We walk the last stretch to the bluff in comfortable silence, the sky fading from lilac to deep indigo.
When we reach the top, the crowd has thinned to a scattering of couples and families on blankets.
Knox drops the pie plates onto the grass and pulls me between his knees as he sits, arms looping easily around my waist.
Boats bob in Crystal Cove harbor, lights mirrored on the water, swaying gently like they’re breathing with the tide.
From up here, pier lights shimmer in pale amber, a buoy’s distant toll drifting on the breeze, threaded with bursts of laughter from the boardwalk.
Knox’s arms tighten around my waist, warmth wrapping around me like a blanket, chasing back the cool night air.
I lean into him, letting his steady hold eclipse the world around us.
“I’ve heard a ton about your grandparents, but you don’t talk much about your mom and dad,” I say, tilting my head just enough to catch his profile. “And if you don’t want to, I get it. No real life. Scout’s honor.”
A slow breath leaves him, heat brushing my shoulder.
“Lost my dad in a car accident when I was in my twenties. My mom, she’s the best. Sharp as a tack, funny without even trying, and she’s got this way of making everyone feel like they belong.
About three years ago, she sold my childhood home and moved in with my grandparents, the same ones who gave me the house here.
Mom says she’s just helping them out, but I think she likes having two people to boss around. And they let her.”
“Sorry about your dad,” I say, tracing a slow circle on his forearm with my thumb. “And I think I’d like your mom. Your grandparents, too.”
“You would, and they’d be crazy about you,” he says with a quiet certainty that sinks into me. “Losing my dad was hard. We were close. I think that’s why I’ve taken a liking to Mont, my business partner. Older, wiser. He’s filled in that gap without even knowing it.”
“Wait.” The memory clicks into place, ardent and wicked all at once. “Is this the same business partner who told you to hook up with a woman in her twenties, like I did?”
Knox’s mouth curves, slow and guilty. “Yep.”
I can’t help the grin tugging at mine. “Then I like him already.”
And I do. Which sucks. Because temporary doesn’t come with introductions, or family dinners, or meeting the people who made this incredible man who he is.
Up above, fireworks burst over Crystal Cove harbor, painting the sky in shimmering variations of red and gold.
Knox’s fingers tighten around mine, his thumb sweeping across my skin, a delicate touch that manages to light me up more than the explosions overhead.
Another firework blooms, and I turn to kiss him. The sound of the crowd, the crack of fireworks, the rush of my own heartbeat all blur until it’s just him, thumb still brushing over my hand, steady and warm.
“So,” I say, a smirk playing on my lips, “think we’ll need that pie later?”
“Absolutely,” he says, eyes glinting. “Though I can think of something sweeter I’d rather eat.”
His lips brush mine again, and the moment hangs suspended, weightless, unwilling to let us go.
We part slowly, like our mouths still have something left to say. His breath lingers on my lips, the soft graze of his stubble still hot against my skin, while sounds of the crowd and fireworks seep back in.
For a moment, I let the light play over him, sharp lines softened in the glow, eyes catching fire for a heartbeat before the dark swallows it again.
Knox is the type of man you read about in romance novels—dreamy, hot, thoughtful, smart, amazing in bed—the once-in-a-lifetime kind.
And of course, I’m the brilliant mastermind behind these stupid fling rules: no real life, no strings, no falling in love.
So I either buckle up and ride this summer bubble to the end.
Or wager my heart, betting the memory of him will be worth the ache.