Rogue Wave by Isabel Jolie (reading eggs books txt) 📕

introduce me, so told me the guy wasn’t a friend.

The back screen door slammed shut, and Poppy exited the porch. “He’s not home.”

I dropped Tony off at the construction site and delivered Poppy to her cottage. Poppy tried to drill me with questions about Tate. On a different day, I might have filled her in and told her that yes, I’d convinced him to give us a go. I might have told her it was the best sex of my life, and I’d developed the kind of crush that creates emotional waves. Maybe I would have enjoyed dissecting with her my highs. But I couldn’t squish my unease, and visions of Tate getting beaten to a pulp kept circling, so I dropped her off with a terse, “I’ll tell you all about it later.”

“You promise?” she’d asked, hand on her hip, empty coffee mug flailing in the air.

“I promise.” I’d tell her plenty, when I could focus.

I circled the island and couldn’t find any sign of Tate other than his golf cart parked by the ferry landing. The only logical explanation was that he boarded the ferry with his non-friend and left the island.

An unease settled into my gut. I would have texted him, but I didn’t have his number. Half the time texts didn’t go through, and service was so splotchy phones didn’t feel necessary.

Back at the conservancy, I sat down at my desk and performed some of the mindless tasks. Read through updates from conservation groups, answered an email from someone seeking to arrange a private group educational visit, and updated the website with offseason information. Then I pulled out some of the readings due for one of my classes.

I read the same paragraph over and over, then gave up and called home.

“Hello.” The familiarity of the gruff timber settled my unease.

“Hi, Dad. It’s Luna. How’s recovery going?”

“It sucks. But you know how it goes.”

Yeah, I did. This wasn’t his first injury. “Have you started physical therapy yet?”

“No. I need to heal a bit more before they torture me. How’re things out there?”

“They’re okay.”

“When are you coming back home?”

“I’m not sure yet. We’ll see what makes sense.”

“What’s going on, Lil Ariel?”

Ugh. I should’ve known he’d pick up that something was off.

“Nothing.”

“You met someone?”

“Why would you ask that?”

“Because you’re at that age.”

“And what age is that?”

“The age when I met your mother.”

“Dad,” I droned.

“What? I’m not happy about it. If I had my choice, you’d still be five years old and excited to go to kindergarten. I miss my little girl. Doesn’t mean I can’t recognize it when my adult daughter has something weighing her down.”

“Dad.”

“What? If he doesn’t see you for the amazing woman you are, then he doesn’t deserve you. You just remember that.”

“Dad.”

“What, baby girl?”

“I love you.”

“Ditto. You know, your ex keeps coming by. Brings me sports updates. Snuck me some beer. Always asks about you.”

“How’s he doing?” I hated to even ask at the risk of getting my dad’s hopes up for a reunion.

“He’s getting along. He’s been home every weekend since I fell. He’s a good boy.”

“He always liked you. How’re his parents doing?”

“You know they got divorced, right?” I had known that. A year ago. “Well, his dad moved away. Montana, I think. His mom is dating. I don’t think he’s crazy about seeing that. Probably why he spends so much time here.”

“Yeah, that’s probably it. It’s good he has you.”

“Doesn’t bother you any?”

“No. Why would it?” If anything, given my mom was never home, it was good Dad had someone coming by. Also probably took some strain off my sister. Did it stir up more guilt? Yeah, but I would never ask my family not to see him.

“Just checking.”

“Why?”

“Because sometimes when emotions are raw, we can tend to be a little irrational. And maybe your ex hanging out with your old man would, you know, rub you the wrong way.”

“There’s no rubbing.”

“Huh. Then you’re really over him.”

I’d been over Brandon for years. If I had been honest with myself, I probably would have broken up with him in high school. Brandon gave me a promise ring our senior year in high school. Asked me for forever. As if I’d ever tie myself down at such a young age. Just went to prove he never really knew me. It struck me Dad might be probing, holding out hope for a reunion, because my Dad loved him like a son. “I am over him. But I love that the two of you are friends.”

“So, tell me about this new boy.”

I considered what to tell my father about Tate. “He traveled around the world. Used to work for Greenpeace.” Dad would like that bit.

“So, there is someone. I knew it. I know my little girl. Greenpeace, huh? Is he a scientist?”

“A marine biologist. But now he’s more of an activist. Or he was. Now I think he’s trying to figure out what he wants to do next.”

“Nothing wrong with that. Is he working at that conservation center with you?”

“No. He’s fixing up his grandmother’s place. She passed away, and he inherited it.”

“Huh.”

“I think it’s good for him. He spent, like, over ten years in Asia. He doesn’t talk about it much. Remember how Tim used to not talk much about his ex, and we never knew exactly what went down, but we knew it was bad?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well, he’s that way.”

“Is that right. Now, how old did you say he is?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Mid-thirties.”

My dad coughed into the phone.

“What?”

“You realize he’s closer to my age than to yours.”

“Yeah, but since when does that matter? You and Mom raised me to look beyond race and age.”

“Hhmm. I remember raising you to be colorblind. I don’t remember saying anything about age.”

“Well, you should’ve. And in a way, you did. You always told us to have an open mind. To go with the flow. You’d say we have the sun and the sea, and that’s enough.”

“Your mom always told me that one was gonna come back and bite me