Page 143 of As a Last Resort
“Captain?”Sam asked.
“He hasn’t told her yet.”Lexi smiled at Patrick.
“You haven’t told her yet?”Patrick asked me.“Dude!What are you waiting for?”
“It’s not that big of a deal, really,” I said, feeling my cheeks heat a little.
“The hell it isn’t.”Patrick nodded his head toward my parents’ dock.“Take a peek at his new legs.”
Her eyes went wide as she looked to the dock.It was hard to see in the dark, but alongside my parents’ wooden speedboat was a vintage white and navy fishing boat bobbing in the water.The moonlight reflected off the center console and long poles pointed to the sky off the back.
“Turns out this kid just needed his heart broken again to finally follow his dreams,” Patrick teased.
“It’s yours?”Sam asked me.
I swatted Patrick in the chest then looked at Sam.“It’s small.Just something to test the waters out.Turns out the owner from the charter business up north was also trying to dump this.Needs a lot of work.”
“But it’s a start.”She was beaming.
Her eyes lingered on the name painted on the back as the boat rocked gently in the water, swaying in time with the waves—As A Last Resort.
She kissed me, soft and certain, and everything in me settled.
“It’s perfect,” she whispered.
I brushed my thumb along her jaw, the future suddenly something I could reach for.
Epilogue
SAMANTHA
Eighteen months later
The wind changed on the island once the tourist season officially ended.It became cooler, either from the lack of bodies crowding the local restaurants or the shift in weather—I wasn’t sure.
It felt good to call the island home again.New memories started to take away the sting of the old ones and there were fewer landmines the longer I stayed.It didn’t feel like a gut punch every time I drove by the light pole downtown.I still made Austin in charge of the weekly grocery store runs to avoid kindergarten teachers and late-night regrets of my mother.I was making progress, but no need to overachieve.
It was a strange and disorienting thing sometimes, walking around the town and living a new life where an old one used to be.
Mom ended up staying at the rehabilitation clinic and took a job as the activities director.She was the unofficial cheerleader of sobriety.Whether it was because she liked it so much, or didn’t trust herself outside of its four walls, she never said.But I was thankful she was there, taking it one day at a time, sober.Her daily calls dripped with gossip from clinic patients instead of high school acquaintances, but her sobriety was more than I could have hoped for.
Ivy was on the island way more than she intended.I was beginning to think she liked it more than she let on.She was a beast at getting the media to pay attention.After a whirlwind deal and fast-track construction schedule, a small section of the resort opened early for travel partners, agents, and influencers, and the reception had been incredible.We’d been written up in the top travel magazines, touting “an unparalleled boutique resort experience that will change the landscape of tourism.”
The few weeks we’d been operating under the radar couldn’t have gone any better.The soft opening was scheduled in the offseason to get staff acquainted with the ins and outs of the resort as the rest of the compound was built.It wasn’t even technically season yet and the weather was perfect.
I moved in with Austin temporarily.But that turned into a more permanent situation when he wouldn’t let me leave.I still went back to the city every month for meetings, but I was happy when I got home, not missing the familiar noise outside my city window that used to lull me to sleep.
Austin’s ferryboat business expanded.Patrick and his cousin—whose name tag readWILL SMITH—ran the ferries across, including the new five-hundred-person passenger boat the resort footed the bill for.We negotiated a partnership where Scuttle’s Ferry was the exclusive party responsible for the Lighthouse guests sea transportations, which allowed Austin to focus his efforts on the fishing business.His uncle Harold still offered fishing charters but only deep sea, which apparently washisdream, which left inshore for Austin.His little old lady fan group made another trip down from New Hampshire and booked one of the first fishing charters he had.Ethel hooked a humongous tarpon and he had to help her reel it in.Her grandson had just downloaded TikTok on her phonebefore the trip and no one knew how to use it.Turns out Shirley was livestreaming the whole thing and had no idea.
And of course, it went viral.His schedule was booked up overnight.He now had a fleet of three fishing boats that ran weekly in addition to managing the ferries.
Austin and I tookAs a Last Resortback over to the Birchwood Beach.It had become a special place for us, being the inspiration for the Lighthouse Collection idea as well as one of the first places he took me.
I loved how Austin and I fit.He made me feel safe and loved.He made me think I could take on life without getting road rash.I thought about how much my dad would have loved him.
After we anchored the boat, he led me under and around the downed branches and laced his fingers in mine.“Ivy told me she’s heading to South Carolina this week.You think it’s the next one?”
We found a new plot of land for sale in a coastal South Carolina beach town.On paper, it was perfect.The spot mirrored Rock Island.Miles of beach stretched across flat land with a small community already established and thriving.But it flew under the radar from tourists and publications.Ivy was set to scout out the location, then was planning on being back on the island for the month after the grand opening.
