Page 70 of Meet Me in Tahiti

Her throat tightened.

“I’m going to see him tomorrow,” he added. “After I drop you all at the airport. Talk to him face to face. But yeah…” He gave her a small smile. “Don’t worry, Tess’. It’s all going to be fine.”

She didn’t answer, just nodded slowly, and pulled herself closer to him, her arms around his neck, her head on his chest.

If this was the last quiet moment they’d get, she wasn’t going to waste it.

The cabin wasdark except for the faintest blue light from the navigation panel across the room. Russ lay on his back, one arm tucked beneath his head, the other resting flat against the sheet, fingers still curled slightly like they remembered holding her hand.

It was three in the morning.

The only sounds were the soft lap of water against the hull and the quiet creak of the rigging settling under night winds. Sounds he’d known for years. Sounds that usually comforted him.

Tonight, they didn’t.

He stared at the ceiling, eyes open in the dark, body too heavy with exhaustion to shift again. His mind wouldn’t shut off.

He hadn’t expected to go to her cabin. He’d told himself their moment on the beach had been enough. That ending it there, quietly, respectfully, was the right call.

But when he’d stood on the deck alone, when he’d thought about her lying in her bed just down the passageway, about the way she’d looked at him all those nights under the stars, like she knew him, aboutthe words she’d said to him on the beach tonight, he hadn’t been able to stay away.

And now… now he was back in his own cabin, and the night was gone, and there was nothing left to do but wait for morning.

He'd told her he was going to be okay.

But the truth was—he wasn’t sure.

He hoped he’d be. He knew what he was going to do, and he stood by it. But he had no idea how it would turn out. The line had been crossed. The email had been sent. The job he’d loved for so long, the career he’d built his life around… it might be gone by tomorrow night.

He'd worked with Malik for almost five years. The guy had been the very definition of a loyal friend and colleague. And Jules? She still sent half of every paycheck and tip she earned to her family on the island of Moorea. She needed this job. They both did. They were both from these islands, and they would both stay here long after Russ left. He hated the idea of letting them down, of walking away and leaving them to wonder what came next. But if this was the cost of owning what he’d done, so be it.

He’d led this boat the way he’d wanted to live his life—with honesty. Integrity. And even if the system couldn’t appreciate the nuance of how this had unfolded, even if it all ended badly for him, at least he’d lived by his values.

Because he did love her. He hadn’t told her, as much as he wanted to when she’d said the words, because it would just make things ten times harder when they hadto part. But he loved her, and that had to count for something.

He shifted slightly on the mattress, eyes still fixed on the ceiling. He thought of the way Tessa had curled into him earlier, her breath warm against his chest, her voice soft as she told him she wouldn’t trade a second of it. That she didn’t regret any of it.

Neither did he.

There was peace in that—real peace. The most bittersweet kind. The most honest kind.

He closed his eyes finally, and the tension eased. His thoughts drifted to her laugh, the way she looked up at him under the moonlight, the quiet conviction in her voice when she said she would have waited.

Maybe someday… But not now.

Now he had to show her what kind of man he was—not with promises, but with actions.

He let out a slow, exhausted breath and let the waves rock the boat gently beneath him.

Sleep came slowly, but thankfully, it came.

The smell of pancakes,sausages, and brewed coffee wafted across the main deck like a siren call.

Tessa blinked against the soft morning light, taking the stairs from her cabin slowly, her damp hair still twisted up from a shower. The boat rocked gently beneath her feet—not quite still, not yet sailing. The last morning. The one she’d tried not to think too hard about.

Jenna and Avery were already at the table, both wearing sunglasses and nursing steaming mugs of coffee like their lives depended on it. Kyle and Drew sat around the table, half-lounging, half-dozing, as they waited for the food.

“Late night?” Tessa teased gently as she approached, wrapping her arms around herself in her blue hoodie.

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