14. Chapter 14
Kara
The closer we get to The Sandpiper, the quieter Cole becomes.
Not that he was chatty before. Cole is not a man who fills silence because it exists.
He seems perfectly comfortable letting air sit between words until a person either speaks the truth or gives up trying to decorate it.
But this is different. This silence has weight.
The boat ride had given me something I did not realize I had lost. Space inside my head that signals a true release from the anxious gremlins that gnaw on me. Sun on my skin. Wind in my hair. A little piece of myself that was not checking shadows, screens, windows, locks.
Now the shoreline slides past us, cottages bright against the dunes, and I feel that space narrowing again.
Cole guides the boat into Bluefin Marina with easy control, one hand steady on the wheel, eyes moving everywhere. Docks. Parking lot. Charter boat. Woman in a wide-brimmed hat. Teenager with a fishing pole. Man carrying a cooler toward a truck.
He sees all of it. I see him seeing it. By the time he ties off at the slip, my stomach has started that slow, ugly twist again.
He helps me onto the dock, his hand firm around mine. He releases me as soon as I’m steady, but this time the quickness doesn’t feel like distance. It feels like discipline.
We walk to his SUV without talking. The marina sounds too cheerful around us. Engines rumble. Ice rattles into coolers. Someone laughs loudly from a nearby boat, and I want to turn toward the sound because laughter feels impossible and almost rude right now.
Cole opens my door, waits until I’m inside, then looks across the lot again before closing me in. The drive back takes less than ten minutes. It feels longer.
By the time The Sandpiper comes into view, there is no unfamiliar rental car parked along the road.
No idling vehicle. No mysterious figure waiting under the house.
Just the pale blue cottage lifted on pilings, the private dune path beyond it, and sun beating down on crushed shell and wood like nothing terrible has ever happened here.
Cole does not relax. He glances over, and for one brief second, I see the man from the boat. The man who smiled at one of my jokes. Also, the man that used his strong fingers to spread sunscreen on my back.
He parks beneath the cottage but doesn’t reach for his door right away. His phone is already in his hand.
“Sloane?” I ask.
“Eli. He made a pass ten minutes ago. They noticed a vehicle, but it’s gone now.”
“So someone could have been lost.”
“Yes.”
“Or someone could have been watching.”
His jaw tightens. “Yes.”
I close my eyes. For a second, the salt air from the boat is still on me. Sunscreen. Wind. The faint rocking sensation in my knees from being on water. I want to crawl backward into that moment and stay there. Instead, I open my eyes and look at the cottage.
“Do we go inside?”
“Yes. Stay with me, but I enter first.”
The underside of The Sandpiper feels different now. Earlier, it was just shade and storage doors and practical beach-house clutter. Now every post and corner looks capable of hiding a person. The outdoor shower curtain moves in the breeze, and my pulse jumps so hard I hate myself for it.
Cole notices.
“It’s wind,” he says.
“I know.”
But knowing does not calm my body.
He goes up the stairs ahead of me and unlocks the door. I wait on the landing with my tote pressed against my side.
Once we are inside, Cole keeps me near the kitchen while he moves through the cottage. Not a full dramatic sweep. Not the way people do it in movies with guns and shouted warnings. Just a fast, controlled confirmation of what should be empty.
Bedroom.
Bath.
Porch.
Closets.
When he returns, he says, “Clear.”
I believe him.
“I need to rinse off,” I say.
He looks like he wants to argue with the concept of a shower, which is ridiculous and somehow sweet.
“Five minutes,” I add. “Door unlocked. I’ll talk the whole time if that keeps you from kicking it down.”
“I wasn’t going to kick it down.”
“Cole.”
“I would knock first.”
A laugh slips out of me, although it’s a nervous one.
The shower helps a little. Hot water takes off salt, sunscreen, and some of the sticky edge of fear. I change into loose shorts and a soft tank top, then pull my damp hair into a messy knot. My swimsuit and cover-up go over the bathroom rod.
When I step out, Cole is on the screened porch, phone to his ear, his back to me. He turns at the sound of the door, eyes moving over me in a way that is quick and controlled and somehow more intimate than if he had stared.
“I’m fine,” I mouth.
He nods, then looks back toward the dunes. I pour a glass of water in the kitchen and carry it to the porch. The screen door creaks softly when I open it. Cole’s head turns.
I lift the glass. “Just air.”
He says something low into the phone, then covers the receiver. “Stay inside the porch with me.”
“I am.”
I almost make a joke. Then I see his face and don’t.
I sit in the chair farthest from the screen door, the one angled toward the ocean.
From here, the dunes roll in pale gold waves toward the water.
Sea oats shiver in the breeze. Beyond them, a strip of blue flashes between grasses.
Beautiful. It is so beautiful I want to remember it forever.
Cole keeps talking to Sloane or Eli, the Sheriff, or maybe both. I do not try to listen. Instead, I take a long drink of water and let myself exist in the porch shade.
My phone buzzes on the small table beside me, making me jump. Water sloshes over my fingers.
Unknown Number.
My whole body goes cold. The message is an image.
For several seconds, I do not open it. I stare at the little preview, my thumb hovering, my heart beating so hard I can feel it in my teeth. Cole turns. He knows before I say anything.
“Kara.”
“I got something.”
He is beside me in two strides.
“Don’t open it.”
“It already previewed.”
“Hand me the phone.”
I should. I know I should. But some terrible part of me needs to see what has found me this time. I tap the image. The world falls away. It is a photo of me. Not from breakfast. Not from a stranger’s social media post. Not from earlier in town.
Me here now — on this porch.
Sitting in this chair, wearing these shorts and this tank top, damp red hair twisted up, water glass in my hand.
The photo is slightly blurred by screen mesh and distance, but there is no mistaking it. It was taken from beyond the porch. From the dunes.
Below the image, a message appears.
He can’t watch everywhere.
The sound that leaves me does not feel human.
Cole takes the phone from my hand. One second he is beside me. The next, he has pulled me up and behind him, his body between me and the screen, between me and the dunes, between me and whoever stood out there close enough to see me breathe.
“Inside,” he says.
I can’t move.
“Kara. Now.”
This time I do. He gets me through the porch door and into the living room, then locks it behind us. His phone is already at his ear, my phone in his other hand.
“Sloane,” he says, and his voice is so calm it scares me more. “We have a live-proximity photo. Taken from the dune side. Message says he can’t watch everywhere.”
My legs stop working. I sit on the edge of the sofa because the room tilts slightly. And if I fall, I do not want Cole to have one more thing to manage.
He turns, sees me, and his expression changes.
“Breathe,” he says.
I try, but nothing happens.
He crosses to me and crouches in front of the sofa, still listening to Sloane, still watching the doors, still somehow with me. One of his hands closes around mine.
“Look at me,” he says.
I do. His eyes are blue and furious beneath the calm.
“In through your nose. Slow.”
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can.”
“I was just there.”
“I know.”
“Cole, I was just there.”
His hand tightens around mine. “I know.”
The words break something loose in me. Not a sob. Just a sharp, broken breath that hurts all the way down.
He speaks into the phone again. “We’re moving. Now. Send Eli to the dune path. Get Rafi on tower data for the new number. I want the road covered before I put her in the vehicle.”
A pause.
“I don’t care if it’s daylight.”
Another pause.
“No. The Sandpiper is done.”
The Sandpiper is done. The words hit strangely.
This cottage was supposed to be safety. Escape. A pretty blue pause between my real life and whatever waited for me back in Orlando.
Now it is only a place someone found me.
Cole ends the call and looks at me. “We’re leaving.”
“Where?”
“Dune Garden Inn. Sloane has a cottage he uses for relocation. Different name. Different booking. No public connection to you.”
“I need to pack.”
“Two minutes.”
“That’s not enough.”
“It’s enough for what matters.”
“What matters?”
“Medication. ID. Phone charger. Shoes. Something to sleep in.”
“My laptop?”
“If it’s in reach.”
“My knives are in Orlando, so at least I can’t make that stupid priority mistake.”
His face softens for half a second. “Kara.”
“I’m joking because if I don’t, I’m going to fall apart.”
“I know.”
Of course he knows. He stands and pulls me up with him. Not yanking. Just firm enough that my body believes his before my brain catches up. We move through the cottage fast.
I grab my tote. Laptop. Charger. Wallet. Toiletries. A change of clothes. My hands keep fumbling with zippers and straps, and twice Cole quietly takes something from me and fixes it without making me feel useless.
Outside, a siren chirps once. Not loud. It’s like a signal.
Cole looks through the front window. “Eli’s here.”
“Is the person still out there?”
“I don’t know.”
That answer should terrify me. Truly, it does. But the way he says it helps. No sugarcoating or false promises. Just truth with his body already positioned to do something about it.
My phone buzzes again from where Cole set it on the counter. We both look and it’s Vanessa. Her name lights up the screen, bright and familiar. I reach for it out of instinct. Cole’s hand closes gently around my wrist.
“Not now.”
“She’ll worry.”
“She can wait.”
I stare at her name until the call stops. A second later, a text appears.
Honey? You went quiet. Please answer me. You’re scaring me.
Guilt rises fast. Then I look toward the porch. Toward the dunes. Toward the place where someone watched me. For once, guilt does not win.
I leave the phone on the counter until Cole picks it up and puts it into his pocket.
“Ready?” he asks.
“Yes.”
He opens the door, and the bright afternoon rushes in like nothing has changed. But everything has.
I follow Cole down the stairs with Eli waiting below and Sloane’s voice crackling through Cole’s earpiece. The dune path is taped off in my mind now, even if no yellow tape exists there yet. The sea oats move in the wind, whispering over the place where someone stood with a camera and a message.
I do not look back at The Sandpiper. It was never safe. It was only pretty.