Chapter 10

10

T he midday heat turned the boat into a floating oven. We’d anchored in the shade of a secluded cove, its turquoise water shimmering like rippling silk, the only respite a gentle wind that carried the scent of sun-warmed seaweed.

“My kingdom for air conditioning,” Tom mumbled.

“If you can’t stand the heat...” Yet Logan sounded just as sleepy, his hair still damp and curling at the tips. Eyes closed, he was lying on a towel, his feet propped up on the railing. My attention stuttered over the thin stretch of pale skin where his trunks had inched low.

“Never was one for the kitchen anyway,” Tom said.

Logan snorted. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

I got up to grab some water from the fridge and passed by the honeymooning couple in the front of the boat. They were lost in their own bubble, barely even offering me a glance and a thanks when they accepted their chilled bottles. It seemed more blissful oblivion than snooty dismissal, so I shrugged it off.

Grabbing more water, I made it back to Logan and Tom, Nia joining us a moment later with lunch wraps for everyone. She plopped down next to me, her toes nudging up against Tom’s calf. He fumbled with his wrap as he shot her a smile .

“Aww,” I said, deliberately saccharine.

Nia slid me an unimpressed look. “Glass houses, Milo.”

I glanced down at where Logan’s hand was loosely wrapped around my ankle, and yeah, all right. We were all quiet for a minute, loose-limbed from the heat and the peaceful lapping of water against the boat’s hull.

“Seriously, though.” Tom shifted, suppressing a half-formed yawn, before he nudged Nia. “Ever thought of trading tropical paradise for... I don’t know. A temperate office with regular work hours?”

Was he fishing for some kind of future? I kept my gaze on the water and told myself it didn’t matter that Logan had yet to hint at anything like that. Blinding sunlight sparked on the waves like scattered diamonds.

“God, no.” Nia exhaled a long breath and tipped her head back, slouching against the side of a tank. “I’d die if I had to spend eight hours inside, tapping away at some document. Fresh air is a lifestyle.”

“Not sure ninety percent humidity counts as fresh,” Logan put in. “But potayto, potahto.”

“At least you’ve got the degree to do something else,” I told Nia. “Means it’s a choice. Me, I’ll be schlepping tanks until my back gives out.”

“You don’t know that.” Logan’s tone was surprisingly serious when I’d been joking. Kind of. “Maybe five years from now, you’ll be traveling the world and taking award-winning pictures for National Geographic or something.”

“That would require him actually publishing his pictures,” Nia said.

“I’ve got a couple on the resort website,” I protested.

She pursed her lips in a way that conveyed just how weak an argument that was. “That would require you actually publishing your pictures somewhere visible .”

“Hey, maybe some high-powered magazine editor will come across them when booking a vacation,” Logan said. “You never know. Could be the first of many pictures you sell. ”

“ Sell ?” Nia laughed. “Oh, no—not this one. Told him he should ask for a couple hundred bucks, but does he listen to me? No.”

Way to make me look like a doormat in front of the guy I was... something, anyway .

“I’m not a pushover.” A slice of tomato had slipped out of my wrap, and I picked it up and tossed it into the water. Some fish would have a grand old time with it. “But I took those photos on the job. It’s just the honest thing, letting the resort use them.”

“Kinda discounts the creative value, doesn’t it?” Tom asked.

“Huh.” That was Logan, sounding suddenly thoughtful as he squeezed my ankle. Even though it was hot, hot, and hot , I didn’t mind the contact. “Actually, Milo’s not wrong—it’s kind of ambiguous. I only took one course on intellectual property during my Art studies, but with stuff created during work hours, even if it’s with your own camera, the employer kind of has a claim. Unless it’s okayed in the contract.”

Nia’s face fell. “You’re kidding.”

“That’s bullshit,” Tom said around a bite.

“Hey, intellectual property laws are why artists mostly don’t get screwed.” Logan’s grin was fleeting. “It’s just that when you’re on the job, you’re on someone else’s dime. Like, it’s their sandbox, so they get to keep the castle.”

Did that mean...? Wow. It wasn’t like I’d had great plans for my pictures or anything, and I’d meant it—I did feel like the resort had a certain right to them. But full ownership? That was... something else.

I must have gone still because Logan gave my ankle another squeeze. “Listen.” His voice went low and firm. “It’s not set in stone, all right? Ask them to amend your contract—say, as long as it doesn’t interfere with the job, any pictures you take are yours but the resort can use them for promotion. Something like that. Mutually beneficial, right?”

I drew a breath and met his eyes. Blue-green hazel, shifting like the tide.

“Fuck,” Nia muttered, heartfelt. “Pretty sure that’s not something I can approve. I mean, I can’t even post a job ad for a third person. And Richard’s been hovering more than usual, feels like.”

He’d gleefully demand my entire portfolio from the last three years. I tipped my head back against the railing and closed my eyes. Fuck.

“Maybe,” Logan said delicately, “it’s best to keep quiet for now. Managers change.”

“Yeah.” I blew a sharp breath through my nose. “Could take a while, but what he doesn’t know won’t harm me.”

“That’s the spirit,” Tom said, far more upbeat than the situation warranted. I pasted a weak smile onto my face and reminded myself that this didn’t really change anything. The only change was in how I’d been stripped of my ignorance.

Three, even two years ago, I would have beat myself up over my own stupidity. I’d trained myself to be kinder, though—or maybe Nia had trained me. ‘Would you talk like that to a friend?’ she’d ask. ‘No? Then why do you do it to yourself?’

So. I’d overlooked something. It happened.

Didn’t mean I wanted Richard’s dirty paws all over my photos. But as long as I tucked them out of sight and stayed off his radar—well, no need to break the status quo.

Later that day, Logan suggested we drag some cushions from the pool furniture upstairs so we could sleep on the balcony, mosquitoes be damned. I agreed before I realized it reminded me of camping trips with my parents—rustling sleeping bags, open tent flaps, cool night air on my face, and a dying campfire nearby.

I hadn’t thought of that in years. Hadn’t let myself.

Wrapped up in shadows, Logan’s arm was warm around me, a vast sky arching above us, stars like sprinkles of salt on deep black fabric. It was my dad who’d taught me about constellations, a new one for each camping trip, where no city lights paled the stars.

“You know...” I slotted my fingers into the gaps between Logan’s, my voice hushed. “It’s kind of funny how being here—it can feel like you’re on a different planet, tropical island life and all. But then you look up at the night sky, and there’s the same old sea monster you saw back home.”

“Sea monster?” Logan’s question melted into the distant rhythm of the sea.

“Cetus, over there.” I raised our joined hands to point out the constellation, in a slow descent toward the horizon. “Basically, he was the original sea monster villain—tried to eat Andromeda and was turned to stone for his trouble.”

A smile showed in Logan’s voice. “How cold .”

“Yeah.” I bit the inside of my cheek against a grin. “You could say he got a rocky ending.”

Logan’s laugh drifted like smoke in the night air. It was strange that he thought I was funny—Michael never had.

“Guess that’s karma,” Logan said, then fell quiet for a beat. “And with the stars, how it’s not so different here than it is in the States... It’s nice, isn’t it? A little reminder that some things don’t change, no matter how far you go.”

“Or maybe it’s a reminder that you can’t outrun yourself.” I focused on the weight of our hands on my stomach. “This reminds me of camping—us being out here, I mean. Like, sleeping outside when the weather was good, or in a tent when it looked like rain.”

“Childhood memories?” he asked.

“Yeah. My parents took me when I was younger.”

“That’s cool.” Logan shifted slightly to face me, his tone blending into the darkness. “Never did that with my parents—we only ever stayed in hotels. First time I went camping was just before I came here, at a festival. Kyle took me.”

Kyle—Logan’s assigned roommate back in college. They’d moved from the dorms straight into an apartment they still shared. The way Logan told it, Kyle was some kind of legend who pre-gamed harder than others even partied.

“ Coachella ?” I asked Logan.

“How did you know? ”

“You were wearing the bracelet, first day you showed up here.”

“Oh, you noticed that?”

“It seemed at odds with your snooty rich boy act.”

He snorted, soft and amused. “Guess it’s true that the right accessories make the look. But, yeah, we went to Coachella . Crazy fun. You ever been?”

“Not to that one,” I said. Because Coachella had been too mainstream, too commercial, a line-up of sellouts—at least according to Michael. “Other festivals, though. Smaller. Nothing you’d know.”

Logan’s thumb rubbed small circles into my skin, the touch light and easy, like he wasn’t even aware of it. “So you went camping with your parents? I guess it’s because they liked it more than because it was cheap, right? Since you also stayed here with them once, even if it was at a discount.”

They’d loved it. I had too. Some of my brightest childhood memories stemmed from those trips—swimming in lakes, lazy days in the sun, the crowded city reduced to a distant concept. My dad whistling a warbled tune as he shook out the tent, my mom frowning over instructions that hadn’t changed at all from the previous time.

“We went once a year.” I blinked their ghosts from my mind. “To commune with nature. Back to the roots and all that.”

“Modern bohemian types, then? Met plenty of those during my Art studies.”

“Not quite.” At least not when we’d last talked. I let my mind skim past the ache, rolled into Logan, and exhaled against his shoulder. “We didn’t live in a yurt and make our own soap or anything like that. But they did try to teach me that we’re not above nature but part of it. Eat organic, trust your heart to lead the way.”

Yeah, that had worked just great for me.

Logan’s thumb resumed its slow, hypnotic pattern on my skin. “You love them a lot, don’t you?”

The question landed like lightning, bright and unavoidable in its immediacy.

I needed a second to grapple for a reply. “They’re my parents . So, yeah. You love yours, don’t you? ”

“Yeah.” Just the mention of them coated Logan’s voice in fondness. “I’m really lucky to have them both.”

We were quiet for a few seconds, just breathing. Cetus wouldn’t be long for this part of the world, dipping ever closer to the horizon.

“Do you,” Logan asked right into the hoarse croak of a frog nearby, “ever feel like you have to prove yourself to them?”

Not really. My parents weren’t the kind to impose expectations—if anything, they’d refused me guidance, hoping I’d set my own path. Instead, I’d found Michael to do it for me.

I moved our hands so I could curl into Logan’s side, head on his chest. His heart beat under me, faster yet no less steady than the ebb and swell of the sea. “No,” I told him, almost a whisper. “My parents were very… accepting, I guess? They believed in non-interference. I could have decided to become a professional ice cream taster, and that would have been just fine.”

“Well, don’t be afraid to dream big, darling.”

I pinched his hip, and he snickered into my hair.

When he continued, his voice had gained a serious note that fused with the shadows. “Not quite how I meant it, though. It’s more that mine set such a high standard. My whole family, really—smart, driven, good entrepreneurs, mostly well-liked…”

“ I like you,” I offered, and he shot me a smile that faded a little too soon.

“Yeah, well.” A small pause. “It’s just, you know. There’s all that family clout, and then there’s the black sheep—me. Who’s just drifting from one thing to another, one short-lived boyfriend to the next. Meanwhile, my parents have been together for almost thirty years, and they’re still in love. How am I supposed to live up to that?”

Almost thirty years?

I moved past it to think of my own parents—they’d loved each other in their own way, but they weren’t in love. They were friends who happened to share a home and a child. No passion, no arguments. When they disagreed, they discussed options with the calm detachment of my dad’s professor and my mom’s lab scientist mindset, and then they found a joint way forward .

Maybe it was why I’d thrown myself headfirst into my thing with Michael—embracing the addictive cocktail of emotions, an obsession that had quickly spiraled into mind games and possession.

Anyway.

“It’s not a competition,” I told Logan. “I’m sure your parents just want you to be happy. In your own way, whatever that looks like.”

“Probably, yeah.” He puffed out a self-deprecating laugh that feathered over my forehead, his fingers playing with the short hair at the nape of my neck. “When I was little, I thought all marriages were like that, you know? Or—relationships in general. Loving and close. I mean, they had their rough patches here and there, sure. But even now, I sometimes come into a room and they’re just standing there, hugging and talking quietly.”

Crickets sang in a nearby chorus, their voices rising and falling. I exhaled, strangely heavy. “Is that what you want, then—to find someone like that?”

“Isn’t that what most people want?” He paused, his fingertips warm on my skin. “Like, find someone who’s similar enough to get it, but different enough to challenge you. Who sees you , not the size of your wallet or whatever.”

No. I didn’t want that. Somehow, the words wouldn’t quite come.

Silence stretched for a brittle second before I shrugged, made awkward by how we were tangled on the ground. “I don’t know. Haven’t really thought about it, I guess.”

Logan shifted. “Guess you don’t exactly meet guys by the dozen here, so…”

Not me, no. But he would. Compared to Dominica, Miami was like trading a single village pub for an all-night rainbow circuit party. If he wanted, he could date an entire parade of Mr. Wrongs to find his Mr. Right.

I didn’t want to think about it, so I changed the topic. “You said it’s been almost thirty years that your parents have been together. They had you quickly, huh?” It hit me a second too late that if he’d been an accident, he might feel sensitive about that.

“Sort of.” His voice twisted into something that didn’t quite pass for humor. “My sperm donor didn’t care to stick around once the reality of diapers and short nights sank in, so, you know. He left my mom to fend for herself with hardly any money, just a scholarship, in her last year of college with a baby. My mom and dad met when I was just a few months old—I grew up thinking he was my biological dad.”

Hot damn. Watch me step right onto the closest conversational landmine.

“Wow.” I propped myself up to study Logan’s face, his features a shadowed relief in the near-absence of light. “That’s… quite something.” Eloquence and emotional competence? Sorry, we’re fresh out. “How did—how old were you? When you learned that he wasn’t.”

“They told me when I turned eighteen.” He exhaled a soft sigh. “Shook me up quite a bit.”

I reached out a hesitant hand and cupped his cheek, thumb light against the corner of his eye, thin skin stretched over fragile bone. Affection bloomed in my chest—delicate like a moonflower unfurling its petals under the cover of darkness.

“Because they lied to you?” I asked, soft like a secret.

“Partly, yes. But also…” He tried for a tiny laugh that fell shy of its mark. “My dad’s a great guy. My sperm donor, on the other hand, is a deadbeat jerk who didn’t even care to see me when I reached out. It’s not fun, realizing you’re one half asshole genes.”

“So that’s what made you grow up?” I wasn’t sure whether he remembered our conversation about that—my half-joking claim that since he was hot and rich, he had no reason to question himself.

“My traumatizing eviction from la-la land?” The humor felt slightly more genuine this time. “Yeah, maybe. I went rebel for a while—Kyle says I needed to test if my parents really loved me.”

At eighteen, I’d been a fucking idiot, convinced I had it all figured out. My heart ached a little for Logan, who must have had the rug pulled out from under his feet at just that age.

“I take it they do?” I asked.

“Yeah.” A smile warmed his voice. “I’m lucky—I get that now. Just got stuck in my own head for a while. ”

“Is that why you went for an Art degree? To spite your entrepreneur parents?”

“Part of it, I guess.” He curled a hand around my shoulder. “I mean, it’s cool—I enjoyed it. The way it taps into a different part of our brains, you know? Or how it says so much about how we see the world. Like how Impressionism came out of the Industrial Revolution, and it’s all about capturing fleeting moments because everything changes from one minute to the next.”

He was beautiful.

I wasn’t sure why it occurred to me right then, when I could barely even see his face—just his voice and the line of his naked body pressed against mine.

“So, more than a rebellion?” I asked.

“Yeah. Didn’t stop me from partying and drinking too much, all that stuff. Eventually, my parents were fed up with it. Told me that sometimes, love means you tell your child to grow the fuck up.” His tone held more fondness than hurt. “Because if you don’t do it, sooner or later life will kick them in the teeth. Hard. And life doesn’t care if there’s lasting damage—but a parent does.”

If only mine had done that. Then again, I’d been so blinded I might have refused to listen. It wasn’t their fault.

“That’s...” I poked the inside of my cheek with my tongue. “You know. I’m with them, kind of. Like, even if it’s tough in the moment, it’s done out of love, and to help you have a better life in the long run.” Okay, this conversation had taken a fast plunge into the deep end. I considered grappling for some kind of joke, anything to lighten the mood. Instead, I slotted our fingers together and dropped my voice. “And, hey. You were willing to listen. Good on you.”

“Trust me, it wasn’t an overnight process.”

“But you got there in the end.” I framed his face with gentle fingers, just enough pressure to tug him into a light, close-mouthed kiss. It took him a moment to respond, his lips parting ever so slightly, tongue nudging against the seam of my lips. Something heavy and dark twisted through my stomach. I inhaled around it, and it settled.

Our kisses slowed, tapering off into shared breath. I drifted off with my cheek pillowed on his shoulder, the black sky wide and vast in my chest.

The days spun by like stop-and-go traffic in the summer heat—slow like molasses, then stuttering forward in odd little jumps. Resort life had always been about rhythm, about the steady beat of tasks that came with running a dive center. Now, though, Logan’s presence added a sudden twist.

Oh, I kept busy with the usual—dive trips and snorkeling excursions, occasional shifts at the seaside bar and navigating the logistics of gear maintenance, measured by the mechanical hum of the compressor as it pumped air into the tanks. The resort hadn’t changed either—golf carts ferried guests to their next adventure, ice clinked in glasses at the bar, and laughter echoed off the pool’s surface.

But every night, I fell into a new pattern of urgent kisses and warm skin, of fingers digging into flesh and muscle, the salty taste of sweat mixing with sunscreen, and the spicy traces of Logan’s cologne. We talked about diving and the resort, about whether the Dolphins would ever make it back to the Super Bowl, about whether the golden age of superhero movies was fading into the rearview.

We didn’t talk about how our time came with an expiration date that loomed ever closer.

At least not until one night in my room, the ceiling fan moving hot, sluggish air from one corner to the other. Even then, it was in a vague, roundabout way—hinting at futures that didn’t intersect because reality was… It just was .

“Places you’re gonna visit?” Logan asked. He was tracing lazy circles on my back, almost absentminded. Pleasantly sore after riding him into the mattress, I raised my head from where I was sprawled beside him, skin still damp from the shower we’d shared. I followed his gaze to the world map taped to the back of my door. Colorful pins marked different spots .

“Not exactly.” I dropped my head back into the pillow. “It’s silly.”

“I’m hardly one to judge.” He shifted so we were facing each other, a dimple teasing at his cheek. “I told you about that college party when I didn’t realize I had toilet paper stuck to my shoe. And about my first crush on the manny.”

Aww, yes—he’d been seven and had sweetened his declaration of love with a macaroni necklace. The manny, a recent college graduate hired to foster Logan’s athletic abilities, had told him it was very sweet, truly, but Logan was a little too young. After being thus rejected, Logan had set his sights on girls, only to realize a decade later that his seven-year-old self hadn’t been so far off base.

“Yeah, okay.” I let my smile slip out. “It’s amazing places for underwater photography. Like the Blue Hole in Egypt, or Cocos Island for hammerhead sharks. Truk Lagoon for the wrecks. Like a geographical bucket list, you know?”

He skirted a light hand down my arm, his tone casual but with an edge of something deeper. “And I guess the issue is money?”

“Yeah.” I focused on the shape of his mouth rather than the ever-changing blue-green hazel of his eyes. “Not like I’m raking it in as a dive instructor. I’m not complaining—it’s just the reality.”

“You could work there. Get them to pay for your flight, too.”

He wasn’t wrong. I had the qualifications, the experience, and, according to Nia, a face that drummed up business. But leaving here would sever the last connection to my parents, however intangible.

I shrugged, made slightly awkward by lying down. “Maybe, one day. But Nia needs me here. It’s just the two of us.”

“You really do need a third person.”

“Preaching to the choir, man.” I quirked up one corner of my mouth. “Richard claims he’s looking into it. But, you know, as long as we manage, there’s no rush. We’re not drowning, just treading water.”

“Right.” Logan’s hand stilled, cupping my elbow. Warm, humid air moved over our naked bodies. “You know,” he said, low and serious, “if I ever do run a hotel or resort—if I ever run anything, really… That’s not the kind of place I’d want it to be. I’d want it to be a place that’s good for everyone. Guests, sure, but also for the people who wo rk there. Don’t treat them like crap; treat them with respect. Trust them to do their jobs.”

I breathed, in and out. “Yeah, well. I think that takes a certain amount of self-confidence, you know?”

“What do you mean?”

“I think that people who are insecure, they struggle with trust. They want absolute control. They bark and put others down to feel better about themselves.” Like Richard. Like Michael .

“Yeah, I tend to agree with you.” Logan was silent for a second, studying me. The fading light that trickled in through the window softened his features, lashes casting feathery shadows on his cheeks. “So—if you had the chance, would you want to run a resort like this?”

“Me?” I scoffed. “ Hell no.”

His lips twitched. “Yeah, I thought that might be your answer.”

“I don’t have the patience to indulge idiots. That’s why Nia’s the boss—she’s good at that. Great, even. Helps that she actually likes people, I guess.”

“And you don’t?”

I reached out to touch his cheek, tracing the sharp line of the bone. “Only some.”

Silence spun out like the last golden light of the day. He seemed lost in thought, his eyes distant even as his hand kept tracing slow patterns on my arm.

“So that’s what you want to do?” I asked eventually. “Improve the world, one hotel at a time?”

“Sounds grand, doesn’t it?” His laugh was a puff of air on my face as his attention returned to me. “I’m sure you can dress it up in an economic rationale—staff retention, hiring good people for great guest experiences. But really, it’s also just the right thing to do.”

“I’d work for you.” It was an impulsive comment, a stand-in for what I really wanted to say. I like you, oh God, so much . “I mean, not—” I gestured at the way we were right now, cooling skin and his ankle caught between both of mine. “Not if we were doing this, of course. I mean, in general. I’d work for you. ”

“But not if we were doing this?” His voice was slow and quiet, gaze thoughtful. I countered with a wry grin.

“Sleeping with the boss? Not my style.”

It took a second for the corners of his mouth to turn up. “Yeah, I guess that could get messy.”

This is messy.

I didn’t say it because that wasn’t our deal. In a matter of days, he’d leave my life. Simple. Simple but for the sharp spike of longing that twisted through my chest.

“So that’s what you want once your degree is done?” I asked. “Run a resort?”

He hesitated, then nodded slightly, shaggy hair whispering against the pillow. “Something along those lines, I think. Yeah.”

He could go anywhere in the world. Meanwhile, I’d still be here.

I grappled for some kind of encouragement and landed on, “Well, how’s that for a sense of purpose in your life? Your parents will be pleased.”

His gaze slid away. “I imagine they will be.”

Okay, I was done discussing his shiny future. Shifting closer, I slid my hand up to cup his jaw and drew him into a lingering kiss, slow and soft and easy. Like we had all the time in the world.