Chapter 16: Reid
The boat rocks slightly as it pulls away from the wharf, the groan of rope against metal singing out in the still morning air.
Sloane’s at the helm, focused, hands loose on the wheel, but precise in a way that only comes from years of navigating this coast. She doesn’t need orders. Doesn’t need noise. Just space and motion.
Finn and Liam are aft, tying down the last of the ropes, laughing about something that probably shouldn't be funny this early in the day. I don’t ask.
I lean against the railing near the port side and let the ocean wind hit me square in the face.
It’s cold and sharp. Salty. Real.
This part always helps. The part with no talking, no questions, no forms to sign, no awkward interviews or staring contests in diner booths.
Just the water and the sound of the hull slicing through it. The kind of sound that makes you feel small in a way that’s comforting. Like nothing else matters out here. Not meetings. Not payroll. Not—
Her.
Damn it.
I drag a hand through my hair.
I told Charlie to get started on her paperwork — tax forms, payroll, orientation bullshit. We need her in the system now, not in a week. If she’s going to be part of this team, she has to start being part of it.
Even if I’m still not sure she belongs here.
That’s not personal. That’s reality. We need a biologist — someone trained, someone who speaks whale behavior like it’s a first language. Up until now, we’ve been pulling samples, collecting photos, and sending it all off to labs and universities for analysis. Outsourcing the science. Watching our own data disappear into inboxes.
But that can’t keep happening.
We need someone here. Someone who sees it as it happens. Who knows what it means when a calf dives deeper than expected, or when the food drops faster than it should.
We need her.
Doesn’t mean I want her.
Especially not her.
Madeline Quinn is... something else.
Too shiny. Too clean.
When she walked into that booth this morning, she looked like someone who should be posing for a profile photo in a university newsletter, not standing on the back of a boat twenty miles out in unpredictable tides.
Small. That’s what struck me first. Not in a fragile way exactly, but in a way that made her seem breakable. Like one wrong gust of wind might carry her away.
Too much light in her. Too much softness. That damn braid swinging over her shoulder like she’s still halfway in a dream. Her skin was flushed pink from the cold, her voice unsure. But those eyes—green, sharp, too curious—they caught me off guard.
People like her don’t come here. They don’t last here.
The cold gets in your blood. The salt wears you down. The work doesn’t forgive mistakes.
And people who show up smiling usually stop smiling by the end of week one.
She’ll hate it here.
And she’ll leave.
But if she doesn’t…
If she stays…
That’s worse.
Because then she’s mine to deal with. My responsibility. My HR problem. And I don’t want another one of those. Not again.
I close my eyes, inhale once. The air is clean. Full of kelp and brine and something that bites at the edge of your lungs.
Better.
I push off the railing and head below deck, ducking through the narrow doorway that leads into the mechanical hold. Everything looks solid. Quiet hum of the generator. Nothing out of place. No warning lights. I check the pump gauge. Stable.
This is the world I understand.
Nothing blinking back at me with wide green eyes.
When I climb back up and into the wheelhouse, Sloane doesn’t look up from the horizon.
“Feels like new,” she says, her voice low and even. “She’s running clean.”
“Good,” I reply, watching the shore slip away behind us. The sky’s still pale, the sea churning low and steady. “Let’s take her a bit further. Another twenty minutes out.”
Sloane nods.
“And then we’ll call it,” I say. “Short day for the team.”
She finally looks over, raises a brow. “Merciful of you.”
I grunt. “Don’t make me change my mind.”
She smiles slightly, but says nothing. Just turns her eyes back to the sea.
I try to do the same.
But even as the town fades into a blur behind us, I can’t shake the image that’s still burned in the back of my mind—
Bright eyes. Pink lips. Freckles like constellations across her nose.
A girl built for calm water who somehow got dropped into a storm.
And now I’m expected to be the one who keeps her from drowning.
Great.
Just what I needed.