Page 2 of Lost Love Cove 2
"It's no trouble," Carrie told him, her voice sharper than she intended, the words cutting through the humid air between them. Her fingers gripped the car keys until the metal teeth bit into her palm. "Besides, I needed to park my car on this side anyway. The island permit expired today, and the last thing I need right now is another battle with authority.”
"You know where to leave it?" he asked as they climbed inside. The leather seats of her SUV had baked in the Florida sun, radiating heat through her thin cotton shorts.
"I have a vague idea." Carrie adjusted the air conditioning vents, aiming the cool blast directly at her flushed face. Outside, palm fronds swayed against a sky so intensely blue it hurt to look at.
"I'll show you," Matt said, fastening his seatbelt with a decisive click. His forearm brushed against hers, leaving a whisper of warmth that had nothing to do with the weather.
Forty-four minutes later, Carrie's car was parked securely in the gravel lot, and they had managed to find the private ferry that serviced Lost Love Cove docked on the mainland side. The weathered wooden vessel, its blue paint peeling at the edges, rocked gently beneath them as they crossed the glittering channel. Carrie leaned against the sun-warmed metal railing, letting the salt-laden breeze cool her flushed cheeks and tangle through her hair. Below, emerald water slapped rhythmically against the ferry's hull, sending up tiny rainbows of spray that evaporated almost instantly in the late afternoon heat.
She turned back to Matt, the wind whipping strands of her hair across her cheeks. The ferry's weathered deck swayed beneath her sandals as a gull cried overhead.
"It's a relief there's a private ferry for the cove," Carrie said, watching sunlight dance across the water's surface like scattered diamonds. "I don't know what we'd do otherwise. Swim across with our groceries tied to our heads?"
A grin split Matt's weathered face for the first time in hours, crinkling the sun-etched lines around his eyes into a map of hard-earned laughter. He nodded, resting his forearms on the ferry's salt-crusted railing. "It takes a little longer to get it if it's out, but it's worth the wait. We can bring vehicles across when we need to. I've got a special permit for my pickup because of the renovations. Costs extra, but beats hauling lumber on your back across that channel."
Carrie let the detail sink in. She remembered Lori mentioning the ferry family, the Marshalls, who ran it year-round. “Lori always said she and Trevor came to know the ferry family well over the years.”
Matt’s gaze shifted toward the young man piloting the boat. “That’s Arno,” he explained. “Ian’s son. Ian usually runs it, but he and his wife are away on vacation. Arno’s home from college and covering for the summer.”
The ferry nudged into its slip with a hollow thunk against the weathered rubber bumpers. As they rolled off the wooden ramp, its planks creaking beneath their weight, Matt slowed his pace. His eyes caught on a sleek black Lincoln sedan parked near the waiting area, its tinted windows reflecting the late afternoon sun. The vehicle was angled toward the ramp as though poised for a quick departure, engine still ticking with residual heat.Matt's shoulders squared beneath his faded t-shirt, and his jaw tightened into a hard line.
“That car…” he murmured, pointing and turning towards Arno, who was securing a rope to the dock. “Do you know who that belongs to?”
Arno wiped his hands on his shorts and shrugged. “Some gentleman my father knows. He’s here on business with someone staying at the resort.”
Carrie frowned. “Why would he need a car on the island for that?”
"He said he had something too big to carry," Arno replied with a lazy shrug, his sun-bronzed face betraying neither curiosity nor concern. He squinted against the glare bouncing off the water, one hand absently toying with a frayed rope end as gulls wheeled overhead in the cloudless sky.
Matt’s jaw tightened. “What’s his name?”
Arno’s brow furrowed, uncomfortable. “I’m not sure. I stay out of my father’s business. I just ferry for him.”
Carrie’s instincts sharpened. “What business does he have with your father besides the ferry?”
Arno straightened, and for the first time, a grin slipped across his face, careless and a little cocky. “Real estate. You didn’t think we lived in that big house on ferry money alone, did you?”
Carrie and Matt exchanged a sharp glance. Her gut cinched tight.
Arno added casually, almost as an afterthought, “My father used to work with the same company as the man whose house you’re staying in for the summer did!”
Carrie froze. Her pulse thudded hard against her ribs.
2
CARRIE
The cove had taken on that late-afternoon stillness that always felt like a held breath before a confession. The sun hung lower now, its heat stretched thin across the water like melting butter, casting long fingers of light between the mangroves that edged the shoreline. The sky had transformed into a painter's palette—streaks of rose and amber bleeding into deepening blue, with wisps of cloud tinged gold at their edges. Carrie's running shoes crunched lightly against the packed sand of the path as she jogged, each footfall releasing the scent of salt and sun-baked seaweed. Her pace was steady as a metronome, her breath measured in the rhythm she'd perfected over decades of running away from, or sometimes toward, her troubles.
Luna kept close, the Dalmatian's spotted coat gleaming like polished marble against the golden sand. She darted ahead with the joyful abandon only dogs possess, then circled back with ears perked and tongue lolling, her paws leaving a chaotic constellation of prints in the damp sand. A salt-tinged breeze ruffled the fur around her collar, carrying the distant cry of gulls. For a moment, it almost felt like the world was calm—not just quiet, but genuinely at peace—the kind of tranquil respiteCarrie had been desperately craving since she'd fled to Sunset Keys with her nightmares and half-healed wounds. Her phone was zipped into the pocket of her running shorts, the occasional bump against her thigh a reminder of the world she was trying to outrun, though she hadn't checked it in an hour.
Earlier, Alisha had called to say she was taking Cody and Maggie to a movie and an early dinner at that seafood place with the paper tablecloths and crayons, so they would be in Key West for a little longer. Carrie had tried to sound casual when she told her granddaughter to have fun, though she'd felt a hollow ache spread beneath her ribs when she hung up. The house was suddenly too quiet around her. The emptiness had left her restless, pacing from kitchen to living room like a caged animal, until finally she'd laced up her well-worn blue running shoes, grabbed the roll of lime-green doggie poop bags and Luna's weathered leather leash in case they came across another dog on the beach, then set out into the golden afternoon light.
Jogging had always been her outlet, the rhythm of her footfalls like a meditation bell clearing her mind. On Nantucket, Carrie had run the same route along the harbor for years—past the weathered, gray-shingled cottages with their window boxes spilling with geraniums, around the marina where fishing boats bobbed like patient horses, and finally along the seawall, where salt spray misted her face. Each stride had pounded stress into submission, each exhale had released another knot of tension. But since the shooting, her jogs had been shorter, slower, the scar tissue pulling tight when she pushed too hard, a constant reminder of how close she'd come to death. Today, though, she craved the burn in her calves, the sweat trickling between her shoulder blades, the sweet ache that would crowd out everything else. She needed the distraction like a drowning woman needs air.
As Carrie’s trainers hit the sand, her thoughts circled back to Matt and the nightmare he'd stumbled into. The clerk's words at the county office still rang in her ears:This property is still in probate under the Winters estate. She wanted to dismiss it—this wasn't her case, wasn't her problem—yet the memory of Matt's face kept surfacing: tight, bewildered, that stubborn pride even as his world tilted sideways. It sat heavy in her chest, this unwanted concern for a man she barely knew, a man who'd done nothing but disrupt her peace since she arrived. Still, Carrie couldn't shake it, and that irritated her almost as much as the mystery itself.
Trevor's name tangled it even further. She had known Trevor Carlton since he and Lori had first met. He'd been the best man at her wedding, for goodness sake. She couldn’t think of a single time he’d ever let anyone down. The man had seemed to be a saint with broad shoulders and a ready hand to lend to anyone. Then the thought of Lori’s worry the months before he’d passed away hit her again.Stop it, stop it, Carrie.She gave her head a physical shake. She was doing exactly what she'd promised herself she wouldn't: letting suspicion poison everything. Trevor had been family. Carrie shook her head again, a little more violently this time, forcing her stride longer, as if she could outrun the doubt itself.
