His hand strokes a path up my back. He shifts my hair out of the way and holds me tighter, tucking his chin better into my neck, where he speaks in a soft voice against my skin. “I knew when you walked into the bookshop that day that my life was about to change.”
“You did?”
“I did. Maybe it was the curse,” he says, lightness in his voice, “Or … I don’t know.”
“What?”
“Because I saw you, and it just felt like everything that had gone wrong in my life just magically healed … like I’d been walking around all broken, and all my broken pieces suddenly reconnected.”
“Oh,” I whisper on a soft exhale.
He groans. “That sounds stupid.”
“Not at all. I’m magic,” I tease. “That’s what you’re saying.”
“Maybe we’re magic together.”
“It does feel that way, doesn’t it?”
“It really does.”
“Oh, Lucky,” I whisper against him. “What are we going to do?”
“I don’t know, but we have to try.”
I unfold my wings to be able to get my hands around his back. He sighs against me when I do, and we melt into each other for a long moment. Then he kisses me softly on the neck.
“Sorry,” he whispers, smiling against my skin. “I couldn’t help it.”
“You couldn’t?”
“Nope.” He kisses my neck again, tickling me. “Oops. Sorry again.”
I laugh, shoulder reflexively jerking upward to push his face away from the crook of neck. Or trap him there. I’m not sure which. “Lucky Karras. I don’t believe you’re sorry at all.”
“Well … not about that.”
“Me neither.”
I pull back and smile up at him. Was he always this beautiful, when we were kids? The way he looks now, with the light gilding his skin, and his dark hair all mussed up and windblown. And the way he’s looking at me now, like I’m the only thing standing for miles that matters … I don’t know.
Maybe it’s just the magic of golden hour.
“Hey, Josie?”
“What?”
“Can we agree to not talk about the ticking time bomb that is your grandmother returning from Nepal for the moment, until we figure some things out?”
“Most definitely,” I agree. “Let’s not.”
“And in the meantime, there’s one thing I want to do together.”
My pulse races. “What’s that?”
He shakes his head. “Nope. You’re just going to have to trust me. And meet me Saturday night. Same time, same place—after we both get off work. Deal?”
“I guess you’ve got yourself a deal.”
“Oh, almost forgot.” I dig in my pants pocket until my fingers find the folded-up hundred and fifty dollars he left on the counter in the Nook. My hundred and fifty dollars … along with another hundred and fifty that I added for our payment plan arrangement. I quickly stuff it all inside the front pocket of his jeans before he can stop me.
“Hey now—”
“This photography session is free.”
“Josie, Josie, Josie,” he says, sucking in a quick breath. “You can’t just go around sticking your hand down guys’ pockets like that without a warning.”
“Consider this a warning then. I might even do it again one day when my mom’s not watching us.”
“Saturday night.”
“Saturday night,” I repeat, grabbing my camera off the brick wall as I smile back at him. I feel warm and hopeful for the first time since he left me that afternoon in the darkroom. And I want to keep feeling that way. I want to believe that if we try hard enough, we can figure out a way to diffuse the ticking time bomb … or keep what we have if I go to California.
A year is a long time.
Is it long enough?
OLD FISHERMEN NEVER DIE, THEY JUST SMELL THAT WAY: Yellow-and-black sign attached to the cabin of a geriatric fishing boat docked behind Nick’s Boatyard. (Personal photo/Josephine Saint-Martin)
Chapter 15
I find out what Lucky has in store for me when I meet him behind the boatyard again. It’s early evening, but summer heat is still warming the dock boards when Lucky coaxes me down a couple of steps into the belly of a beast.
And by “beast,” I mean the Nimble Narwhal.
And by Narwhal, I mean a cabin cruiser fishing boat, circa before I was born.
Maybe even before my mom was born, if the carrot-orange color scheme of the boat’s interior is any indication. Below the main part of the boat, it has an underdeck living space big enough for a hermit serial killer, with a teeny, tiny kitchenette, built-in sofa, and a matchbox bathroom that’s pretty much the same as an airline toilet.