Flirting with Forever

by Jennifer Bernard

  He found Bo on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, watching soap operas and munching on Skittles.

  “Are you busy?” he asked the kid dryly. He lowered himself with a groan onto the armchair opposite the couch.

  “Never too busy for you, Uncle Ian.”

  Ian smiled, his mood already lifting. Despite everything, Bo made his life more entertaining.

  “Chrissie called about a potential job as a deckhand on a fishing boat. Does that sound like something you might want to do?”

  Bo flung the blanket away and jumped onto his knees. “Did you say fishing? I’ve never been fishing, but I’ve been to the Pike Place Fish Market in Seattle. The smell, argh.” He pretended to gag.

  “That sounds like a no. I’ll tell Chrissie.” Disappointed, Ian took out his phone to text her. Back to square one.

  “It’s not a no! Those were dead fish. I was in my fruitarian phase then, back in middle school.”

  “Right. How could I forget?”

  “I want to do it,” Bo said decisively. “I want to tell everyone back home that I went to Alaska and became a fish hunter.” He jumped to his feet and pretended to throw a spear into the imaginary ocean.

  Ian didn’t have the heart to tell him that he most likely wouldn’t be spearfishing. Then again, he didn’t actually know how the Lost Harbor boats operated. Nets? Fishing rods? “Chrissie invited us to meet her and your potential boss at the Olde Salt tonight.”

  “The Olde Salt Saloon? Awesome!” Bo froze in his spear-throwing posture. “Uh oh. Mom. I don’t think she’ll be too crazy about me going to a saloon, let alone working on a fishing boat.”

  “Let’s worry about that if you get the job, yeah?”

  “Yeah.” Bo beamed at him through his black eyeliner.

  Ian gestured at his own eyes. “Do you think you should…you know…”

  “What?” Bo braced his legs apart on the couch and planted his fists on his hips. “Don’t you think I look like a pirate?”

  Actually, he kind of did. “I can rig you up an eye patch if you want.”

  “Nah, I’m good. But if you could grab me my motorcycle boots…”

  Ian had to draw the line somewhere. “You sort out your own outfit. I’ll see you in the car. And no drinking at the Olde Salt. Try to take this interview seriously, if that’s possible.”

  “Sure, Uncle Ian. I’ll be very serious about my interview in a saloon called the ‘Olde Salt.’ You got it.”

  Sixteen

  Ian had never been inside the Olde Salt before. As they strode in, Bo still in his black cloak along with his swashbuckling motorcycle boots, Ian expected all eyes to turn their way. But one glance around the place and he realized he’d gotten it all wrong. Bo didn’t stand out here, because the Olde Salt seemed to be the mothership of all the offbeat eccentricity of Lost Harbor.

  The beards alone were extraordinary. Trimmed, overgrown, everything in between. He noticed little braids in one fisherman’s bushy growth. Another fisherman had waxed his beard into points. Alongside the fishermen was a scattering of the younger generation, more Bo’s age, kids with ear gauges and reggae hats and pierced eyebrows. Ian wasn’t sure who had more tattoos, the fishermen or the hipsters.

  But maybe there was no difference; he knew that a lot of the younger Lost Harborites worked on fishing boats. Just as Chrissie had said, it could be a very good living.

  His nephew’s eyes shone as he took in the scene. “This is so rad,” he said in a hushed voice. “It feels like we’re in an old ship.”

  It did feel that way, thanks to the vintage ship’s lanterns that hung above the bar, the old-fashioned many-paned windows, and the gentle tilt of the floor. Foundation problems, no doubt.

  “More like a shipwreck,” Ian muttered. A flash of blue in the far corner of the room caught his eye, and he knew—without actually seeing her face—that Chrissie was in that direction. Nothing else was that shade of sparkling blue; only her eyes. “This way,” he told Bo, who followed him through the crowd like an awestruck baby duckling.

  At a table crowded into the far corner, under a mural of a fishing vessel caught in a violent storm, Chrissie rose to her feet to greet them.

  “Hi Ian, hi Bo. This is Tristan Del Rey. He owns the Desperado. It’s one of the best fishing boats in Lost Harbor.”

  Tristan also rose to his feet to shake their hands. It seemed to take him a while; the man was huge. At least six foot four, broad across the shoulders, just physically extremely impressive. Ian never gave much thought to his own physique, except to make sure he was in good shape for his long workdays.

  But right now, he experienced a moment of jealousy. Chrissie had called him an old boyfriend.

  Tristan gave them both a friendly nod and gestured for them all to sit down. “Which one of you is interested in the job?”

  “Not me, I’m a neuro—” he began, before he realized Tristan was joking. He snapped his mouth shut. “Bo is.”

  “The Desperado?” Bo’s eyes glowed with excitement. “That’s the coolest name ever.”

  Tristan gave him an indulgent smile. “I always thought so. I named her when I was about your age. Have you ever worked on a boat, Bo?”

  “No. But I’ve been on a boat. I took the ferry to Whidbey Island once. I didn’t get seasick. And I went through a pirate-worship phase. I wanted to be Blackbeard.”

  “Haven’t we all at some point?” Tristan’s easy manner seemed to put Bo at ease.

  “Did you know he put firecrackers in his beard?”

  “I did not.”

  “He wanted his reputation to intimidate people so much that when he boarded a ship everyone would just surrender and he wouldn’t have to fight them and kill them.”

  “Huh.”

  Ian caught Chrissie’s eye. She seemed to be working hard to hold back her laughter.

  “We don’t have a lot of pirates in these waters,” she told Bo. “I hope that’s not too disappointing.”

  “Well, a little,” he said, his face falling.

  “I do know a guy with an eye patch,” Tristan offered. “No wooden legs, though. Possibly a gold filling or two, I’ve never checked.”

  Ian’s jaw tensed Apparently Tristan had charm and a sense of humor to go along with his size. He glanced at Chrissie, but she’d turned away to talk to a lithe woman with a blond pixie cut. They were laughing together over something, and Ian had the sudden impression that sparkles were fountaining through the dimly illuminated air.

  Then Chrissie turned back toward him, her face still alight, and it felt like a literal punch in the gut.

  “Ian, this is my friend Toni. Toni, this is Dr. Ian Finnegan.”

  Toni bent to shake his hand; hers was so strong he hid a wince. “I’ve heard of you, Dr. Finnegan. Old Crow keeps singing your praises. He said if you ever show up, to bring you a drink and put it on his tab…that he never pays,” she added in an undertone.

  “It’s Ian. Please.”

  He didn’t know what to do about the Old Crow offer. He rarely drank, since he knew what alcohol did to neurons and brain cells and he had a hard time forgetting that long enough to enjoy himself.

  He turned to his nephew. “Bo, what would you like?”

  “I’ll need to see an ID, kid, if it’s anything besides club soda or Bloody Mary mix.”

  “Bloody Mary mix,” Bo told her with a piratical snarl. “Extra bloody.”

  Toni folded her lips together, mirth filling her eyes. “I like your style. Anyone else? Tris, want something more than that nonalcoholic beer?”

  “Nah, I still have work to do.”

  “At this hour?”

  “Office work. Fucking payroll. Bill paying. I can already feel the headache coming on.” He ran his fingers through his thick hair, a few shades darker than Toni’s. “Chrissie, are you still looking for a job?”

  Ian stiffened. For reasons he didn’t want to analyze, he didn’t want Chrissie working that closely with Tristan. “She’s flying medivac at t
he hospital.”

  Chrissie shot him a surprised look, her eyebrows lifting. “Ian’s right. I don’t have time to play bookkeeper, Tris. Besides, Bo’s the one you’re interviewing. Bo, how are you with accounting?”

  “I have no idea. But I can try. Is it the kind of thing where you can use a calculator or do you have to add things up by hand? In school sometimes it was—”

  “It’s okay,” Tristan said quickly. “I’ve got a handle on the bookkeeping. Let’s talk about the deckhand job.”

  Bo straightened his spine, clearly trying to make the best impression possible. Ian felt a rush of affection for him. Bo was always…himself. Even better, he had fun being himself. There was something special about that, even if it did involve some outrageous clothing choices.

  So there, Helene.

  “We work long days on the Desperado. Sometimes we go out in conditions other boats wouldn’t risk. But I keep my boat in peak operating condition and I know what she can handle. That’s why we consistently rank at the top of the fleet in terms of haul and share. As a first-timer, you’ll get a five-percent share. Every year you come back, that’ll get upped. We take turns cooking the meals. As the captain, I set the schedule and the shifts, and as the newest crew member, it’s quite likely you’ll object at some point. You’re free to complain, but when I overrule you, you have to do your job anyway. You’ll need some gear; I’ll give you a list. I get a discount at the Lost Harbor Gear Shed, and if you can’t afford it, they’ll let you pay when you get back to port with a buttload of money.”

  Bo looked riveted to every word. “That’s the pay? A buttload of money?”

  Tristan smiled. “It is when you work for me. But it’s not guaranteed. You’ll get a share of whatever we catch. That’s the way it’s done. That way when you’re working a two a.m. shift in a thirty knot gale, with icicles dripping off your eyebrows, you know why we push so hard. I get the biggest share because it’s my boat and I shoulder all the expenses that go with that. But the guys—and one woman—who’ve been with me the longest make a very good living for just a few months’ work.”

  “Wow.” Bo was virtually speechless. “Wow. I want that. I want to do that. I want to work for you.”

  “Wait.” Ian couldn’t let his exuberant nephew get ahead of himself here. “What exactly will he be doing? What are you fishing for?”

  “Hauling line, for the most part. The sablefish season just opened—also known as black cod. A lot of washing the decks. Stowing gear between hauls. Cleaning the living quarters. Errands when we’re in port. Anything and everything that we need him to do.”

  “I can do that!” Bo insisted. Ian raised a hand to get him to pipe down.

  “What about safety? I get a lot of injured fishermen at the hospital.”

  “Yeah. Fun fact. Fishing is the most dangerous profession there is. By far. Do you have any idea how much my insurance costs me?” Tristan shook his head and set down his bottle on a Shipwreck Ale coaster. Ian hoped the coaster wasn’t an omen. “That said, I have very strict safety protocols and I’ve never lost a crew member.”

  “What about injuries?”

  “Injuries are inevitable. But I’m a trained paramedic, and so is my second-in-command. I’ve set broken bones two miles out to sea. I’ve treated knife wounds, infections, frostbite.”

  At every word, Ian winced a little more. How the hell was he going to get Elinor to accept this? Technically, Bo didn’t need parental permission. But Ian didn’t want to cause her too much worry.

  “The most dangerous profession,” Bo said breathlessly. “That’s so cool.”

  “No.” Tristan turned a severe look on him. “It’s not ‘cool.’ It’s a reality that we have to be aware of at all times. Do you understand? I don’t allow alcohol on my boat. If anyone’s caught with a flask, or weed, or pills, or anything that might interfere with their judgment, I take them to the closest port and let them find their own way home. Zero tolerance. Zero. Out there, we all depend on each other. Our lives are in each other’s hands.”

  Bo nodded. By his lack of snarky comments, Ian could tell that he was absorbing every word. Elinor wouldn’t believe her eyes. He was tempted to take a video so she could see for herself. Bo had been an irreverent flouter of authority since the age of five. But somehow, not with Tristan.

  “Why knife wounds?” Ian asked. “Just out of curiosity.”

  “We work with knives a lot. Cutting line, cleaning fish. It happens. But don’t worry, we have very few knife fights in the fleet.”

  Ian took heart from Tristan’s dry tone. He must be joking.

  “And those mostly take place in port,” Tristan added.

  There went that reassurance.

  “I’m not going to get into a knife fight, Uncle Ian.” Magically, Bo already sounded more mature. “I’m a lover not a fighter.”

  Tristan smiled and lifted his beer bottle to click against Bo’s tall glass of bloody Mary mix. “Cheers to that.”

  “Amen,” Chrissie chimed in. Shuri chose that moment to lumber to her feet and rest her chin on Chrissie’s thigh. “Shuri approves too.”

  Tristan reached over Chrissie to pet Shuri’s furry head. Ian resisted the impulse to object—too close, too intimate, back away. Tristan and Chrissie had history together, after all. For all he knew, they were going to try again. It was none of his business. And yet he felt every muscle going taut.

  Shuri gave a low growl, and Tristan’s hand fell away.

  “Sorry, she’s not big on new people,” Chrissie explained. “Nothing personal.”

  The glee that filled Ian was ridiculous, and he knew it. Shuri had never growled at him. She’d ridden in the backseat of his car and let him touch her soft coat and never let out a single snarl of protest. Take that, fishing stud.

  Good lord, he was being absurd.

  “My underage workers have much stricter rules, by the way,” Tristan was saying. “No fights allowed, either in port or on the boat. So you can set your mind at ease, Uncle Ian.”

  “It’s actually his mother who will need to be convinced.” An idea occurred to Ian. “Any chance you could talk to her with me? She’ll have questions.”

  “Sure, I can do that. Zoom call, conference call, whatever you like.”

  “Is there Internet on the boat?” Bo asked. “So I can update my Instagram?”

  “It comes through the cell signal, so it depends on where we are. In port, you’ll likely be able to communicate. Out at sea, no.”

  For the first time, Bo’s face fell. “I guess I can take photos and post them later.”

  “Yeah. Just like the days of yore,” Tristan said dryly.

  Chrissie laughed at that. “Yeah, Bo, maybe you can whittle your Instagram posts instead.”

  He didn’t seem to mind the teasing. “So did I get the job?”

  “As long as you have parental approval,” Tristan told him. “I’d be happy to have you onboard.”

  “Yes!” Bo punched the air. “Uncle Ian, can we call my mom right now?”

  “From here? She’d probably put you on the next flight home.”

  “We’ll do it tomorrow,” Tristan put in. “But I can show you the Desperado right now. You should take a look before you commit to this. You might have questions for me too.”

  Bo jumped to his feet, causing Shuri to flinch in surprise. “Sorry, girl. Uncle Ian, I’ll be right back.”

  “You two want to come along?” Tristan offered. “Chrissie?”

  Surely there was an extra invitation in Tristan’s voice when he said Chrissie’s name. Or maybe Ian was imagining it. It was the kind of thing he wasn’t good at deciphering—at least with people who weren’t Chrissie. He found her easier to read than others.

  “No thanks, bud. You guys go ahead. I need to talk to Ian for a second.”

  Ian could barely hold back his grin.

  Seventeen

  Tristan squeezed past the table and steered Bo through the crowd with a hand on his shoulder. When th
ey were gone, Chrissie slid closer to him.

  “Tell me what you think, honestly. Is this a good thing for Bo? Because I can probably get Tristan to withdraw the offer.”

  Her blue eyes shimmered in the candlelight and gave her face an unusually mysterious cast.

  “How long was he your boyfriend?” he asked abruptly, with no idea that question was about to come out.

  She lifted one smooth eyebrow. “Maybe a year? It didn’t end well. I’m happy he’s willing to be friendly with me. I was a terrible girlfriend.”

  “Maybe you should try again.”

  “With Tristan?” She burst out laughing. “Oh no. For one thing, Toni would murder me. Literally, she would dismember me in my sleep. Okay, not literally, literally. But she’d be furious, and since I’m crashing on her couch, I can’t piss her off. Also, he’s been through some rough times lately, including a divorce. He’s a little tender right now. And thirdly, it was always more of a familiarity thing with us. What I really wanted was family. Toni was my best friend, so it seemed to make sense. But it didn’t. We’ve already talked it out. No sparks there at all.”

  The invisible band around his chest loosened. “He’s attractive.”

  “Do you want me to set you up with him?” she teased. “He’s pretty hetero, but you’re a looker, so ya never know.”

  “No. It was just an observation.”

  “I’ve known Tristan since we were kids. I know he’s attractive. He’s also a good person. I probably made a massive mistake back then.”

  “By breaking up with him?”

  “No, by getting involved with him in the first place. We should have stayed friends. And by the way, he agrees with me about that a hundred percent. However—” she paused for a quick sip from her drink, “there’s no one I’d trust more in terms of captaining a boat. Tristan and Toni both grew up on the water. He spent every summer fishing since the age of four. He knows what he’s doing. He’ll take care of Bo, I can promise you that.”

  “He does seem very capable.”

  She peered at him over her tall mug of ale. “You don’t sound like you like him very much. Believe me, once you get to know him, you will. He’s as solid as this table.”