I peer at the gooseneck and then up and across the rigging. Study the carefully furled sails. I’m practically daring something to be amiss, which is a bad plan. But “things going amiss” seems to be the theme since we docked here. I know it’s just a run of bad luck. Or due to the disregard my father showed this boat over the last few years. Every time I turn around, I hate him more.

“Dean. It’s fine.” Sebastian slaps me on the back. “I’ve never seen you so worried about this stuff.”

I take a step back and reach for the bottle of water he offers me.

“I don’t think it’s the gooseneck Dean’s worrying about.” Dev grins at us from the quarterdeck and pulls off his dark glasses.

I flip up my middle finger at him, but he grins wider. He’s mostly just been sitting up there with Matty and throwing comments at us. Although he took off his shirt a while ago looking like he was going to get some sun, but I’m waiting for him to start flexing as soon as anything female happens by. Sebastian called him a douche-rooster earlier, and I don’t think we’ve stopped laughing about it since. That’s exactly what he’s doing: preening.

“What’s he worrying about?” Sebastian asks Dev, like I’m not standing right next to him.

“Dean’s got a girl.” Dev points toward the Harborwalk. “Or, at least, he wants a girl.”

“The one with the sexy hair?” Sebastian laughs that deep chuckle of his. He’s been more at ease today. Maybe because we stayed up until two in the morning reminiscing about sailing and climbing until we both crashed out on deck and woke up to an overly bright sunrise.

“She sprinted away from him yesterday,” Sebastian continues. “Not sure I’ve ever seen a woman run so fast. Maybe she should try out for the Olympics. You could just stand behind the starting block, Dean.”

Now Dev’s laughing loudly. “He practically shoved her into the water the other day. Manhandled her until she had to pull away from him.”

I rake a hand through my hair. “Can we stop talking about her now?”

Usually I don’t mind a few digs at my expense. But today it’s hitting harder than normal. Maybe because I didn’t get much sleep last night. And when the sun woke me up, I set to work on painting the ticket hut until Dev and Sebastian were ready to change the gooseneck. There’s just so much stuff to get done, and I’m getting irritable as fuck about it.

Or maybe because her running away hit me. Hard. I’ve been rejected before. Well, not that often. But usually I shrug it off.

With her, it’s impossible to shrug for some reason.

Sebastian nudges me with his elbow, but he’s still looking up at Dev. “Last night, Dean told me he visited her in the bakery and made her drop a tray of cupcakes.”

“It was a loaf of bread,” I shoot at him. “Do you have to broadcast my failures?”

“Fuck, Dean, you really know how to get a girl, don’t you?” Dev stands up and stretches out his shoulders. And does a pec flex like he’s posing for a calendar. “You need to start working out more.”

I shake my head. “I could run laps around you on this boat.”

“Laps don’t get girls, man. Muscles do.” Dev points at Sebastian. “Your brother knows what I mean. He’s bigger every time I see him.”

I take a drink and look at Sebastian. Yeah, I guess he’s bigger. I should have noticed, considering we look so much alike, but it’s not like I go around comparing us. And I can’t picture myself in a gym. Ceiling overhead and all those people packed close together. Just the thought makes me tense. Sailing and refurbishing boats have kept me fit, and I don’t even have to think about it.

“Girls might come for the muscles,” Sebastian says. “But they don’t stay for them.”

“What are you? Some kind of dating Yoda?” Dev laughs and drops to a seat next to Matty, giving him a head scratch that’s rewarded by a tail thumping against the deck. The conversation about what happened with Matty and Elly went easier than I had anticipated. Although I’m pretty sure it’s going to get brought up every time I dog-sit again. Which I can live with.

Sebastian looks off toward the bay and crosses his arms over his chest. I lean forward a little, eyeing him. He turns and puts his shoulder between us. “What?”

“There’s a woman in Colorado.” I’m sure of it. Last night I’d gotten the idea he was talking around something. Like there was something he didn’t want to admit about why he stayed in Colorado for a full year.

“Yeah, man,” he says. “There’s probably about two million women in Colorado.”

I’m not going to be put off that easily. “That’s why you stayed the full year.”

He takes a drink from his water. “The climbing’s good. I did some boarding this winter too.”

I shove him lightly on the shoulder. “What’s her name?”

Sebastian shakes his head.

“Giselle?” I ask.

Dev laughs. “That’s the first name you come up with?”

“Okay, douche-rooster”—shit, I can’t even keep from smiling when I call him that—“you come up with one.”

“Megan?” Dev calls a bit too loud.

Sebastian just rubs one hand over his chin and shakes his head.

“Imogen?” I offer—getting another laugh from Dev. “What? That’s not a strange name, is it?”

“Cassandra?” Dev takes a drink and then crushes the bottle.

“There’s no girl,” Sebastian insists, his hand rubbing his jaw.

I pull out my phone. “How about we start with the As and go through one letter at a time?”

He cuts a glare at me. “No girl.”

I only get about twenty names in—with Dev throwing out other random ones—before he finishes his water and tosses the bottle at my chest. “Sloane.”

“I’m glad you fessed up, because it was gonna take a really long time to get to S.”

He runs a hand over the back of his neck. “It’s not worth talking about because I’m here and she’s there.”

“That doesn’t mean much. It’s not like Colorado is a walled prison state.” I don’t think. I’ve never been to a landlocked state. “Just go back there. Or invite her out here. She can stay on the boat. We’ve even got that third cabin, if that makes her more comfortable. We can clean it out.”

“I don’t know.” He rubs his chin. “She’s not really into… she doesn’t sail. Or climb.”

My smile falls. Not at her lack of sailing—although it’s unfathomable to me why people don’t sail—but because something about this woman has him twisted up, something I can deeply identify with right now. Besides that, I’ve never quite seen Sebastian like this. He usually moves as quickly between women as he does between states.

“I’m missing the part where these are relevant things.” I cross the deck to grab a second water out of the cooler and then throw one to Sebastian when he gestures for the same.

Sebastian catches the bottle but doesn’t open it. “She’s a cop.”

Okay, that’s unexpected. “A police officer?”

“A woman in uniform,” Dev says. “Sounds hot.”

Sebastian crosses his arms over his chest, looking up at him darkly. “She could kick your ass.”

Dev slides his glasses back down. “Even hotter.”

“How’d you meet her?” I ask. “Wait—you didn’t get arrested, did you?”

“She arrested you?” Dev demands. “Dude, this girl sounds incredible. Where in Colorado does she live?”

“No, I didn’t get arrested.” Sebastian shakes his head at Dev but turns toward me. “There’s nothing to talk about. She’s never thought about living anywhere except for the tiny town she’s in. I mean, she’s a cop there. She’s entrenched. And her sister and mother are there. I just… I need to let this one go.”

I rock back onto my heels. “If that’s what you need to do. But if you’re thinking about her this much, then maybe it’s not that simple.”

“It is.” He takes a drink and nods toward the Harborwalk. “Besides, you’re one to talk.”

I follow his gesture up to the shops, and there she is. Elly. Slowly pushing a cart down the street with some kind of tent on it. Her hair is pulled back, bouncing behind her in a ponytail as she stares at the sidewalk intently. And I immediately hate that she’s walking away from me. Hate it so freaking deeply.

I don’t want to let this one go.