Not Another Beach Read (Clearwater Dreams #3)

Prologue

Clearwater, Florida

He's at Frenchy's Rockaway Grill, sitting in the booth kitty-corner to mine, peering into the eyes of a woman who's at least ten years his junior.

He's dressed to impress in an impeccably tailored loser blue pinstripe suit—at the beach—and is, of course, completely oblivious to his surroundings.

The air is thick with deep-fried humidity and the cacophony of a hundred souls with a hundred stories to tell.

There's a tired, cranky, sunscreen-smeared toddler a few feet away having a meltdown for the ages.

But he doesn't notice. A rogue volleyball from one of six games in progress just outside the front door slams into the window behind him.

But he doesn't notice. He only has eyes for her.

Ahhhh... "young" love.

I'm wearing a navy Tampa Bay Rays baseball cap with the bill pulled low, a plain white t-shirt, a pair of golf shorts, and Converse.

Not quite beachwear, but good enough to blend in.

A wax-paper-lined basket of food sits in front of me.

I pick up a french fry and dip it into a puddle of watery ketchup, pretending to play with my phone as I take pictures to commemorate the day.

His bushy, porn-star mustache twitches. He throws his head back and laughs at something she says, his throat exposed as his Adam's apple bounces up and down. I text his wife (of twenty-six years) the pictures I've been taking for the last thirty minutes.

He who laughs first and all that.

It doesn't seem as if they'll be leaving anytime soon, but it doesn't really matter at this point.

I have everything I need. I slide my phone into my trusty orange backpack, put my napkin on my tray, and stand to leave.

He glances up and looks at me, but no recognition crosses his face.

It wouldn't. He doesn't know what I look like.

He doesn't know me at all, which is what makes me so useful.