by Rachel Magee
He stopped that train of thought right there.
He was willing to admit that he might have more emotional capacity than he once believed, and that Millie ignited something inside him. He’d even admit she was quickly becoming one of his favorite people. But no one said anything about the L-word.
“I should probably have my bug guy come by a couple days before we start, just to be on the safe side. I’d hate for anything to bite you.”
She rolled her eyes. “How chivalrous of you.”
“I’m a giver like that.” He tucked the stray strand of hair that blew across her face behind her ear. “Good night, Millie.”
“Good night.”
He watched her walk across the sand to the brand-new, refinished boardwalk that led over the dunes to her backyard. She climbed the three steps and then paused at the top.
She turned and met his gaze through the starlit darkness. “For the record, I like the company, too.”
And despite his best efforts to avoid it, his heart reopened the conversation about the L-word.
Chapter Fifteen
Braxton did something the next morning he hadn’t done in almost two and a half years—he stepped onto a golf course.
He stood at the first tee box with his golf bag slung over his shoulder and stared out at the course in front of him. Fog rolled out from the trees and across the green grass as golden rays of dawn painted the sky. There’d been a time when this place felt more like home than any place he actually slept. A place where he belonged. A place he’d come to feel renewed, invigorated.
Then life had gone south and everything changed.
He’d been caught in a wave of grief, unable to tell up from down and fighting just to get his next breath. And when the wave finally washed him up to the shore, darkness had settled over everything.
Perhaps he could’ve fought his way back then, but he was too bruised and battered to find the will. So, he let fear and regret dictate where he could and couldn’t go and what he could or couldn’t do. Easier that way. And safer.
But lately a tiny glimmer of hope had pierced his dark world. And hope, even when it was tiny, was a powerful force.
The sun had risen and set many, many times since he had stood in this spot, but everything about it felt familiar. The way the gentle morning breeze skimmed his skin, the earthy smell of freshly cut grass, the way the excited buzz hummed through him. Everything about it felt right, as if nothing had changed.
“I’m sorry, sir, but the course isn’t open yet,” an unfamiliar voice called out from behind him. “You’ll have to make a tee time.”
Braxton turned toward the person. The guy was young, early twenties at best, and wore one of the golf club’s logoed staff shirts and was accompanied by the course’s golf pro.
“Wait, you’re…” The kid’s voice trailed off, a look of astonishment on his face.
The golf pro chuckled next to him. “Good morning, Mr. Channing. It’s nice to see you out here.”
Braxton nodded, taking a second to look around the course. It felt nice to be here, which was a welcome surprise. “Thanks, Grant. I was just going to try to get in a couple of holes. Is that still okay?”
Grant nodded. “Absolutely. We just finished mowing the front nine and our first group doesn’t tee off for another hour and a half.”
“Thanks. I’ll be off before they start.”
Grant nodded once more to show he understood. “Let us know if you need anything.” He slipped his hands in his pockets and continued walking past Braxton.
The new guy followed right on his heels. “That’s really Braxton Channing? I thought he didn’t play golf anymore.”
“Apparently he does today,” his old friend said. “And Mr. Channing prefers to practice when the course is empty before it opens. It’s part of the arrangement he has with the club.”
The golf pro’s voice trailed off as they walked away.
Braxton waited until they were out of sight to put his bag down. Anticipation was building inside of him, but he didn’t want an audience for his first swing.
He teed up his ball, grabbed his favorite club, and set up for his first drive. The breeze skimmed his skin, bringing with it a sense of calm. And then he did it.
Without so much as a practice swing, he pulled back and swung through, sending a satisfying thwack of the club hitting the ball in the exact spot echoing through the morning calm. He stood there with his golf club still over his shoulder as he watched his white ball sail through the air in a perfect arc. Farther and farther it flew, pushing away the darkness that had been hanging over him. It landed in the middle of the fairway, bounced once, and rolled to a stop some three hundred yards from where he stood.
Braxton dropped his club to his side and, closing his eyes, lifted his face to the sky. It didn’t matter that it was a perfect shot or that the ball landed in an ideal position. What mattered was that exhilaration pulsed through his body, and for the first time in two and a half years, he could breathe.
He slid the club back into his bag, hoisted it over his shoulder, and started down the hill to where his ball lay waiting for him.
“Hello there, gorgeous,” he said as he approached the ball. He set his bag on the ground next to him and grabbed a nine iron. Gripping the club between his hands, he stepped up to the ball. When he was satisfied with how he was standing, he lifted only his head to look at the exact place he wanted the ball to land on the green.
A grin tugged at the corners of his mouth. He was comfortable with where he was and knew where he wanted to go. How long had it been since he’d said that? Hope did some bizarre things.
With each stroke, Braxton felt lighter. His world seemed brighter, and it wasn’t just because the morning sun was rising over the trees. Something had changed over the past couple of months, and it wasn’t a coincidence that the timeline coincided with the arrival of his new neighbor.
“Nice shot.” Jerry, one of the groundskeepers, drove up after Braxton had sunk his putt on the second hole.
“Thanks. This was a tricky pin placement.” He gestured to the hole as he bent down to pick up his ball. “I don’t think I’ve seen it here before.”
Jerry hopped out of the cart and picked up the long flag to put back in the hole for Braxton.
“We’ve changed up the rotation of some of the holes. And I guess you’ve heard about the new twelve? New tee box, new green. You’re hitting across the creek now for a par five instead of a par four. It’s nice.”
Braxton stared out in the direction of the area of the course where holes ten through eighteen were located. Had he heard something about them changing a hole? A familiar zing of excitement pulsed through him.
“I don’t think I’m going to make it to the back nine this morning, but maybe I’ll start over there tomorrow.”
Jerry placed the flag back in the hole. “You tell me what days you want to start on the back nine and we’ll make sure they’re ready for you.”
Braxton picked up his bag and they both headed toward the cart path. “I appreciate it. I haven’t figured out my new practice schedule yet. But as soon as I do, I’ll let you know.”
Jerry nodded as he climbed into his golf cart and released the brake. “It’s nice to have you back, Mr. Channing.”
The smile that crept across his face was genuine. “Thanks. It’s good to be out here again.” In fact, it had energized him in a way he hadn’t expected and by the time he finished the third hole, everything looked different.
After he placed the pin back in the hole at the third green, he paused and looked out over the course. Everything even appeared more vivid than it had in as long as he could remember. The deep green of the oak leaves was a vast contrast to the soft gray of the Spanish moss that hung from them. The sky was a brilliant azure striped with wisps of pink-tinged clouds.
It wa
s like someone had lifted the foggy veil that had been hanging over his world so he could see color again. And he knew exactly who that someone was.
Millie.
Just the thought of her sent a jolt of excitement buzzing through him and he savored the feeling. For the first time in years he felt like himself.
Somewhere along the way he’d given up the idea of ever feeling like this again. It wasn’t a conscious decision, but something that sort of evolved out of self-preservation. His main focus for so long had been to survive. Every ounce of his energy went to putting one foot in front of the other. He hadn’t had any time to try to figure out how to deal with the pain or figure out how to dig himself out of the emotional void he was falling into.
As time wore on and his daily steps fell into more of a routine, he’d embraced it. So what if the world around him was colorless and he felt dead inside? He was making it, wasn’t he? That was all he could ask for in his situation.
But then, when he was least looking for it, Millie showed up with her bright, sparkling eyes, big smile, and unrelenting optimism and shined a light on the darkest depths of his soul. She managed to breathe life into the parts of his heart he thought had died long ago. The result was nothing less than intoxicating.
Now that he realized what he’d been missing for the past few years, he wasn’t willing to let it go. From this point forward, everything was going to be different.
Sure, there was an underlying fear that everything could go south again. The one thing he knew for certain was that life had no guarantees. Everything could change in a split second, but now he had hope. And hope changed everything.
He marched with a new determination to the fourth tee box.
He’d just set his bag down and pulled out his club to tee off when his phone buzzed in his pocket. After bending down to tee up his ball, he quickly pulled out his phone to make sure it wasn’t anything important. While he wasn’t a slave to fear, he did have a responsibility to two very important people. Hopefully, if he played his cards right, that number would increase to three soon. His mind swirled with the possibilities of what a future with Millie could look like as he read the message on the screen.
It was a local news alert about the hurricane, and he was about to slip the phone back into his pocket when something stopped him.
With a hurricane in their vicinity it wasn’t unheard of that he would be getting updates about its path. It was so close to the coast that they were expecting rain from the outer bands as it passed by them later this afternoon. The media loved to hype up anything that seemed exciting in their sleepy little town. He almost ignored it, but he paused. There was something else about the message, something his subconscious had seen that prompted him to take another look.
He clicked on the alert and read the full headline: Hurricane Makes a Sudden Path Change, Heading Straight for Summer Island.
It felt like someone pulled out a plug and every last ounce of warmth in Braxton’s body drained out through his feet. Shivering, he scanned the article, searching for some sort of good news to counteract the bomb dropped in the headline. Then he reread it again just to make sure he’d read it right.
When he got to the bottom of the article for the second time he looked up, stunned. This couldn’t be happening. Hurricane Axel wasn’t supposed to hit Summer Island. It should’ve glided right past them. Every strand of the spaghetti model had it making landfall farther north, almost a state above them.
Well, every model but one. That single strand had it taking a sharp left turn right around where they were. But they’d called that chance an anomaly. No one paid any attention to the outlier, least of all him. He played the odds, and the odds said the storm was headed north.
Only this time, the odds weren’t winning.
Acid roiled in his stomach as he pulled up the official announcement from the National Hurricane Center. As soon as his eyes flickered across the last line, his head popped up.
Rogue outlying model or not, the storm had turned.
Still holding his golf club in one hand, he flung his golf bag over his shoulder and broke into a sprint for the parking lot. Hurricane Axel was now predicted to make a direct hit to Summer Island and the only thing that Braxton could think was that someone needed to tell Millie.
Chapter Sixteen
Millie stood in her front yard and read the final step for installing the new pump that would return the splash to the three-tiered fountain that sat in the middle of her grand circular drive as the first welcome to guests of Seascape Inn.
Twenty-three steps were printed in the manual that came with the new pump. Twenty-three steps that turned out to be way more technical than the glossy directions made them sound.
But now that she was on the final step, her hands tingled with anticipation. “Here we go, Bear. You ready for this?” The satisfaction of finishing a project never got old.
Triumphantly, she held up the plug then squatted down to complete the final step. Bear’s tail wagged. Anticipation crackled as she made the final connection and then…
Nothing.
Millie’s soaring spirits fell flat, and she rocked back to sit on the driveway, staring at the motionless fountain.
“I was sure we did everything right.” She grabbed the manual next to her and flipped through the steps, searching for something she could’ve missed. It only took a second before the lightbulb went off, and she rolled her eyes at herself.
“Power, Bear. We forgot to turn the power back on.” She sprang up and jogged around to the side of the house to where the breaker box was located and flipped the switch in question. “All right. That should do it.”
She heard the old fountain sputter to life before she saw it, and as soon as she and Bear rounded the corner, it was flowing once again.
Pride caused her lips to twitch at the corners, and she stood a little taller as she propped her hands on her hips and watched the water flow. Nope, the satisfaction never got old.
“Look at that, Bear. We did that.” She rubbed the dog’s head, her lips giving way to a full-fledged smile. Bear’s tail thumped happily against the ground.
A familiar sound distracted her from the cascading water, and her grin widened as Braxton’s sports car rolled down her faux-cobblestone driveway.
There was no denying it anymore. Whether she wanted to or not, she was starting to fall for the boy next door. Last night had solidified that. The second he wrapped his arms around her, she knew there wasn’t anywhere else she’d rather be.
His car rolled to a stop and his door opened at almost the exact same moment. Millie opened her mouth to greet him but was cut off by his non-greeting.
“Where’s your phone?” There was a mild look of panic on his face.
For real? She understood his hypersensitive concern about safety, but seriously, there was little risk of getting hurt when installing a new water pump.
Millie shrugged. “I don’t know. The front porch, maybe.” She looked over her shoulder, scanning the yard for where she might have last used her phone.
“I’ve been texting you. You haven’t answered.” There was a hint of bossiness in his voice, and her mild offense was on the verge of blossoming into annoyance. His concern for her safety was endearing, but this might be bordering on the mildly possessive side.
“I turned the notifications off because they kept popping up over my YouTube videos.” There might have been an edge to her voice that she didn’t bother removing.
“You can’t do that.”
“Sure I can. Do you have any idea how annoying it is to—”
“Millie.”
She was about to launch into the story of how all the news alerts and texts kept popping up and would pause the how-to video she was watching. It was dragging the twenty-minute video out to a time limit she didn’t have patience for. But the way he said her name gave her paus
e. Before she could question him, he put his hands on her shoulders. Worry swirled in his eyes, sending a flutter of panic streaking through her gut.
“What’s wrong?” Possible scenarios of emergencies involving Alice and Henry raced through her mind as she considered all the things that could ignite panic in Braxton.
“The hurricane has turned.”
Since she’d been expecting the news to have something to do with one of the two people in his care, the words didn’t register with her at first. She tilted her head to the side as she untangled what he’d said. “The what?”
Braxton closed his eyes and drew in a breath, as if he was trying to figure out the best way to deliver the news.
For a second, everything around them got perfectly still. The wind stopped blowing. The birds stopped chirping. Even the fountain got quiet.
Braxton opened his eyes and his gaze flickered to the house behind her before they focused on her face. “The hurricane turned. The National Hurricane Center is now predicting that the eye will make landfall somewhere between the Broad River and Pelican Sound.”
Millie pulled up a map in her mind, mentally plotting the coordinates Braxton had said like the computer models they were always showing on TV. And that’s when it sank in. “Wait. We are between the river and Pelican Sound.”
Braxton nodded once, and the worry on his face was starting to make sense.
“But that can’t be. All the computer models pointed north. The weatherman. That Allan something or other who’s been tracking hurricanes for like thirty years said it was going north. It’s supposed to hit North Carolina tomorrow.”
Bear whined at her side, probably from the high pitch her words had taken.
Braxton shrugged. “That’s why they call it a prediction. Sometimes it’s wrong. This time, the high pressure from the north didn’t come as far down as they were expecting I guess and it’s pushing the storm west.”
“But…” Millie’s mind went blank. She looked over her shoulder at the sliver of water she could see between hers and Braxton’s house. That was the ocean right there. Landfall would be in her backyard. Everything surrounding them would be in the catastrophe zone. The new paint job, the roof repairs, the landscaping, even the fountain. Everything she’d spent the past month and a half working on would be in the storm’s direct path.
