sadness seemed to last forever after he died. Mom sold the fishing boat and their house. Then they’d moved to a small condo on Padre Island. While her mother tried her best, their lives were never the same. Holidays were lackluster, forced. In Anna’s senior year of high school, her mother died of a massive heart attack at the young age of forty-two, and, once again, life for Anna drastically changed. With no family to speak of, she’d stayed with Elizabeth Callahan, her best friend in high school. As soon as she graduated, she moved to Lubbock to attend Texas Tech University. With three part-time jobs and a few scholarships, she managed to earn a bachelor’s degree in marketing. She found a job with a small, family-owned ad agency in which she earned enough to rent an efficiency apartment and buy a secondhand Honda. Anna had many friends during her time in college, but none were so close that she shared with them the tragic story of how she’d lost her parents. It was still painful and raw, especially the loss of her mother and the nightmare of the panic attacks her death had caused. Those attacks almost crippled her as she blamed herself for her mother’s death even though she knew it was impossible for her to have caused her mother to have a heart attack. It just seemed that everyone she loved died.
If she learned anything from her parents, it was to move forward and make each day count, to never live in the past. Positive to a fault, Anna did her very best to stay upbeat, but there were times when she thought she might fall apart. One lonely weekend, beyond homesick, she drove to Corpus Christi to check out her old house and all the places that were once so familiar to her. She’d purchased a sub sandwich from Heavenly Hoagies, taking it down to the docks at Red Dot Pier, where her father had anchored his fishing boat, and her life changed. Almost instantly.
She’d been lost in memories when a giant of a man caught her attention. For a moment, she’d thought it was her father, then realized how ridiculous that was. Her father was gone, but from a distance this guy reminded her of him. Tall, broad-shouldered, with light brown hair streaked from too much time in the sun. There was a worn leather tool belt hanging loosely around his hips, his muscular legs were encased in faded denim, and a too-tight, faded Houston Oilers shirt clung to his chest. Mesmerized, she’d watched him as he carefully sanded what appeared to be a piece of delicate wood. She wasn’t sure of the type. Whatever it was, his long fingers touched it as though it were the most delicate object in the world. She was unsure how long she’d been sitting staring at him. Apparently it had been too long because he’d suddenly stopped and looked up, his eyes settling on her. He was the most beautiful male specimen she’d ever seen.
He tilted his head, as if in question, and she nodded, unsure why. She remembered the sound of the ocean slapping against the boat’s hull, the briny smell, seagulls plunging down into the water, their high-pitched squeal piercing the air as they swooped down for their catch of the day.
It was as though time stopped. Anna had no memory of walking down the pier to the boat, though she did recall that his eyes never left hers. Time was endless. Without invitation, she’d reached for the hand he held out to her and stepped onto the deck. “I’m Wade Campbell.”
“Anna Ross,” she’d said, taking his hand. She’d never experienced such physicality from a single touch.
After that moment, her life was a whirlwind of change. She returned to Lubbock, gave a two-week notice at the ad agency. Luckily, she didn’t have a lease on her small apartment. She packed what little she owned into the trunk of her Honda and, two and a half weeks later, she’d rented a dingy but cheap apartment in Corpus Christi. She wasn’t so lucky finding work in her chosen field, so she’d taken a job as a desk clerk at the exclusive Omni Hotel. Eight months later, she and Wade were married in a small ceremony on the beach. Her life was almost perfect, and not a day passed that she didn’t thank her lucky stars for her spur-of-the-moment trip to Corpus Christi.
For the next few years, Anna and