Summer
Main Street is nearly empty at this hour. The shops have closed, the sidewalks are still warm, and the light turns pink above the rooftops without making the street any more welcoming. My heels click against the asphalt, and every step hurts.
You didn’t need to wear those.
Too late now. The black pumps, the light blue dress, the mascara, the blush—everything I need so no one can look down on me. Except my right foot isn’t happy about it.
I grit my teeth and straighten up.
The Salt Vine is wedged between a closed hair salon and a souvenir shop with its shutters drawn, right across from the little Main Street medical center. The sign is understated—gold letters on a black background, almost snobbish for Coral Bay. I push the door open.
Inside, it’s narrow and long, with an elegance that feels more New York than a small California surf town. Dark polished wood, chalkboards on the wall with grape varietals scrawled across them, low lighting, muted jazz. The tables at the back disappear into alcoves divided by low partitions.
I don’t know anyone. Couples, older people, the kind of crowd that would never set foot in the Lighthouse Diner. Ryan’s territory, not mine.
He’s already there, settled at a table in the back lit by a candle in a smoked-glass holder. White shirt, collar open, sleeves rolled in neat folds over his forearms. The watch gleams on his wrist. There’s a nearly empty glass in front of him and another, full, across from it.
When he spots me, he gives me a wide smile, warm on the surface. But his gray eyes stay cold.
He stands.
“Evening, New York girl.”
I can’t tell if it’s a compliment or a label.
“Sorry I’m late,” I say, sitting down.
My right foot throbs in my shoe. Under the table, I cross my ankles.
“Don’t worry. I got a bit of a head start.”
He gestures at his glass, almost drained, then at mine.
“Sauvignon blanc. Marlborough. You’ll like it.”
Maybe, but he chose for me.
I take the glass and have a sip. Of course it’s good.
“Thanks,” I say.
Ryan sits back down. His posture is perfect—back straight, shoulders relaxed, elbow resting on the armrest.
“So… third day in Coral Bay. What do you think?” he asks.
“Dusty.”
He laughs—a short, controlled laugh.
“The town’s changed, you know. You missed a lot.”
“In six years, I’d imagine.”
“More than you’d think. Especially since Diane Carter became mayor.”
I frown.
“Evan’s mom?”
“Yeah, for two years now. She’s got ideas. She wants to modernize the town, draw in investors, get things moving. I pitch her projects now and then.”
Ryan Caldwell, twenty-five, heir to the local real estate agency, pitching projects to the mayor. Already inside the machinery of power, and delighted that I know it.
“What kind of projects?”
“Development, waterfront renovation, new businesses. Coral Bay has potential, but it’s asleep.”
He swirls the wine in his glass. I notice a scar, small, a half-circle at the base of his thumb. White, old, sharp—like a bite.
His only imperfection. Everything else—the shirt, the watch, the hair slicked back, the one disciplined strand—is too clean, too smooth. The mark on his hand doesn’t fit. I wonder where it came from.
Ryan sets his glass down.
“Speaking of potential…”
Here it comes. The house.
“Think about my offer. Three hundred thousand dollars. It’d save you a lot of wasted time.”
“I’m thinking about it.”
“Good.”
He doesn’t push. He smiles and drinks. That’s his technique—he plants the seed, he waters it, he waits.
The jazz shifts to a new track. Upright bass, piano, slow music that matches the lighting. My foot is throbbing. I cross my legs so my right heel doesn’t touch the floor. The pain doesn’t ease.
Ryan starts talking again. He talks about the agency, a lot they bought near the boardwalk. His delivery is smooth: long sentences, numbers slipped in along the way, names dropped at the right moment. I nod. I lose the thread somewhere between two rental-yield percentages.
“…the Walkers have always been… how do I put it… enthusiastic. But enthusiasm doesn’t pay the bills.”
The name Walker pulls me back to reality. Ryan’s tone is polite, almost kind. He talks about them like slightly naive children who need money explained to them.
“The surf school’s doing fine, isn’t it?” I say.
“It gets by. But between us, since the father died, things have slipped quite a bit. The mother and Jace don’t know how to run the place. They’re surfers. They don’t speak business.”
“Since the father died.” A line on a balance sheet. Not a man, not colon cancer at forty, not three kids.
“The only thing keeping them afloat,” he goes on, “is the kid. Avery. Sixteen, sponsorship deals, brands paying her to wear their logos. She’s the one bringing in the money, not the school.”
My fingers tighten around the stem of my glass.
“You could almost accuse them of exploiting a minor,” he laughs.
I don’t laugh. I think of Jace in his trailer. Of a sixteen-year-old kid on an international circuit with too much weight on her shoulders already.
“Jace does what he can,” Ryan adds. “But this kind of business, in a town like Coral Bay…”
He lets the sentence hang. My fingers find the little gold wave at my throat.
“Nice necklace,” Ryan says.
I drop my hand.
“Thanks. It’s a family keepsake.”
“It suits you.”
His gaze lingers a second too long on my throat, then on my cleavage, then climbs back up. He takes his time—he figures he’s entitled to.
“You know, Summer…” he begins, lower now.
Summer. Not “New York girl” anymore.
“…some decisions get a lot simpler once you’re willing to be a little pragmatic.”
He slips into the tone of a seasoned advisor, like he’s got a twenty-year head start on life. Except he’s twenty-five and reciting his father’s playbook.
“I’m pretty pragmatic,” I say.
“I don’t doubt it.”
He leans forward, sets his elbows on the table. The distance between us shrinks.
“You’ve changed,” he says. “And not just a little.”
I don’t say anything.
“Last time I saw you here, you were what… sixteen?”
“Seventeen.”
“Always in sneakers, hair pulled back. Still had your braces, I think.”
He says it with a half-smile, like it’s fond. Like the memory belongs to him as much as to me.
“And… well, let’s say you left that figure skater’s body behind.”
His gaze drops again, climbs back. His smile widens. My stomach knots, the way it does when a stranger presses in too close on the subway.
“I don’t skate anymore,” I say.
“Maybe that’s not a bad thing.”
He laughs. I don’t.
The server comes by. Ryan orders a second glass for himself, red this time.
“We could eat here,” he suggests. “Their cheese board’s pretty decent.”
“No thanks. It’s been a long day, I’d rather head back.”
“Suit yourself,” he says, smiling.
He files the idea away in a drawer. He might pull it back out later.
The wine is good, but I don’t want to be here anymore. My foot burns inside my shoe. The pain has turned into a dull, steady throb, like a second pulse. I try not to wince.
“You know you could stay,” Ryan says, fixing his gray eyes on mine. “Coral Bay’s a small town… but it could get very interesting.”
I can see exactly where he’s going with this. For you. With me.
“We’ll see.”
“That’s better than a no,” he says, smiling.
I’m not staying.
We finish our drinks in silence. The server brings the check. Ryan pulls out his card before I have time to open my mouth.
“No, wait.”
I reach for the check, but he won’t let me take it.
“Next time, we’ll split it,” he says without even looking at me.
Second time he’s paid for me in two days.
Finally, we step out of the wine bar. The evening air is mild, and the coolness feels good after the warmth inside. Main Street is deserted.
Ryan’s gray convertible is parked right nearby, top down. On this street of surf shops and wooden storefronts, it looks like a very expensive lapse in taste.
“I’ll drive you back,” he says.
My right foot begs me to accept. The lodge is only a fifteen-minute walk, but in heels, in this state, that may as well be an hour.
“Okay. Thanks.”
He puts his hand at the small of my back to steer me toward his car. His palm is warm through the fabric of my dress. I shift a step away. He doesn’t take his hand back; he lets it slide, like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
I get in. The leather is cool. Ryan settles in, turns the ignition, and the car starts with a low purr.
He doesn’t turn toward the lodge. He goes right, toward the hills.
“We’ll take a little detour. The view’s insane from up there, even at night.”
It’s not a question. I don’t remember agreeing to a detour. But the car is already climbing, and the houses of Main Street shrink in the rearview mirror.
The road winds through the hills. The night air comes in through the open top, ruffles my hair. At the next bend, I recognize Coral Bay’s public high school. The main building is dark, the lot empty, the football field bleachers barely visible under the yellow streetlights.
The high school where Jace, Noah, Luke, Miles, Evan, and Sierra spent four years.
Not me. I had the summers—a month at first, then three weeks, then two, then nothing.
And Jace was that tan, easygoing boy, always barefoot, who had no logical reason to be interested in an ordinary girl like me. The textbook cool guy.
Except he didn’t play it up. He was polite, he listened when you talked to him, he was kind.
Or… that’s what I believed.
The car passes the high school. Ryan doesn’t look at me—he watches the road, one hand on the wheel, relaxed, in control. His other hand leaves the gearshift and settles on my knee—warm, self-assured, like my leg belongs to him.
“You’ve always been a lot more interesting than the girls around here,” Ryan says, low.
I flinch. A car I’m not driving, a road I didn’t choose, a hand I didn’t invite onto my knee.
I pull my leg away. The movement isn’t sharp, but it’s clear.
“Thanks,” I say. “That’s sweet.”
“That’s sweet” is the most polite wall I know.
Ryan puts his hand back on the wheel. His smile doesn’t change. He heads down toward the coast.
The lodge appears at the end of the drive, its string lights glowing in the palm trees. Ryan parks and cuts the engine.
“That was nice. We should do it again.”
“Have a good night, Ryan,” I say, opening the door.
I set my right foot on the gravel and the pain drills up my ankle to my knee. I grit my teeth. I climb out of the car and slam the door.
“Good night, Summer,” Ryan answers from the driver’s seat.
My first name, in his mouth, feels too intimate.
Back straight, I walk off toward the lodge entrance. Every step hurts. I start up the steps without looking back.
Tonight was a monumental mistake.