Page 4 of Second Chance with the Half-Elf

AERON

T here’s no outrunning the sea.

You can turn your back on it, sure. Let yourself believe it’s just water and tide and bone-deep ache. But it waits. It watches. And it always knows when to pull you under.

Much like a certain woman stalking the boardwalk with a camera pressed tight to her face.

I tell myself I’m here to work. To handle the vendor permits, check structural supports, and coordinate the final lighting rig.

But every time I turn a corner, Evie Bright is there—lean and stubborn, that camera strap digging into her shoulder, eyes sharp as glass behind the viewfinder.

She moves through the crowd like she’s mapping it—hunting the right angles, moments, and the perfect escape route.

Part of me understands that too well.

I watch from the edge of the main walkway, clipboard in hand.

She crouches low near one of the vendor stalls—Liara’s latest mural project. The boards blaze with swirling cobalt waves and arcane foxfire blooms, painted so bright it feels like the sea itself might leap free.

Evie angles her lens, tracking the patterns with clinical precision. But there’s something softer at the edges of her mouth—something unguarded when she thinks no one’s watching.

And that’s when she looks right at me.

A breath catches hard in my throat.

Gold-green eyes flash with something unreadable—anger, grief, longing—then shutter tight again as she lifts the camera and breaks the connection.

Before I can turn away, a voice like cracked stone rumbles beside me.

“Subtle as a gaff hook to the ribs, Thalen.”

I glance over.

Drokhaz stands there, arms folded, gaze flicking between me and Evie like he’s reading the currents. His tailored charcoal coat strains over his broad frame, black hair tied in a sharp knot.

“Don’t start,” I mutter.

His mouth twitches in a faint, knowing smile. “Just observing. You’re watching her like a storm’s about to break.”

“It already did.”

He grunts. “Then maybe it’s time you stopped standing in the wreckage.”

I scowl down at the clipboard. “She came here to finish business. That’s all.”

“And yet here you are, keeping count of her every step.” He pauses, eyes narrowing. “Do you want closure, or a second chance?”

I tighten my grip on the board. “Neither.”

Drokhaz snorts. “Liar.”

“How do you even know about any of this?” I ask the orc who, it feels like, just got here yesterday. And somehow is already Mr. Popular in town thanks to Rowan.

“Word travels fast.”

He claps my shoulder hard enough to rattle my teeth, then strides off toward the festival tent, leaving me stewing in salt-thick air.

I last exactly twenty more minutes before the need to move drives me off the main boardwalk.

The festival prep hums behind me: vendors hammering stakes, kids chasing each other between string-light poles, Rowan shouting orders with her usual fire.

But I cut through the side path toward the east docks, boots thudding solid against the aging planks.

Here, the air tastes different. Brine and cedar and rust. The scent of old boats and older regrets.

I pass the row of moored skiffs, their hulls swaying in time with the lazy tide. A gull shrieks overhead, wheeling through the bruised sky.

Twilight creeps in faster here—long shadows stretching from the piling supports, lanterns still dark, waiting.

I make for the damaged east post.

The council’s been dragging their feet on repairs, too worried about keeping the damn lantern budget fat.

Typical.

I drag a replacement beam from the supply stack and heft it over one shoulder. Muscles strain with the weight—good. Physical work keeps my mind tethered.

I haul it into position, wedge it tight beneath the warped crossbeam, and start bolting it in place.

Hammer swings and metal sings.

One breath. One strike.

Good.

Don’t think too hard.

But memory slides in like fog through an open door.

I see her here.

Not as she is now—wary and distant, camera between us—but as she was that night.

The last lighthouse festival.

We’d spent the day chasing sea spray and sun, daring each other to jump from the high rocks, mapping stars on old napkins.

Later, long after the crowds faded, we ended up here—barefoot, salt-streaked, half-drunken on stolen cider and unspoken words.

She stood close. Closer than she ever had before.

“You ever think... we’re missing it?” she whispered, voice unsteady.

“Missing what?”

“This.”

She looked up then—eyes wide and wild, lashes wet with sea mist.

I remember reaching out—slow, careful, giving her room to run.

She didn’t. Not at first.

But when I brushed a knuckle down her cheek, her breath caught, fingers curled hard around that damn camera strap.

And at the last second, she turned.

And vanished.

Next morning, the house was empty. No note. No goodbye.

Just gone.

The hammer stills mid-swing, breath sawing rough in my chest.

Fifteen years and that scar still bleeds when I least expect it.

I drive the last bolt home harder than I should, the crack echoing across the empty dock.

Closure. That’s all I need. Or so I keep telling myself.

But the lie tastes bitter tonight.

Because deep down, I’m not sure I want her to leave again.

By the time I pack up, twilight’s surrendered to full darkness.

The boardwalk glows faint ahead—lanterns flickering like low stars.

Voices drift through the air—music, the clink of glasses, Rowan’s laugh cutting sharp through the softer hum.

I skirt the edge of the crowd, boots whispering over weathered planks, not ready to face her.

But fate’s never been kind that way.

“Harbor Master.”

The voice is soft, low.

I stop cold.

Turn.

She’s there—standing beneath a lantern pool, camera strap loose, hair slipping free in sea-damp waves.

“Missed a hell of a sunset,” she says.

My voice comes out rougher than I mean. “Busy.”

She nods once, unreadable. “Figured.”

For a breathless moment, the space between us hums—thick with everything unsaid.

“You—” I start, then clamp my jaw.

Get a grip, Thalen.

I force my voice steady. “East dock’s reinforced. Watch your step there tomorrow. Beam’s solid, but the sealant’s not set.”

Her mouth curves—barely. “Thanks.”

And not just for the warning.

I can hear it in the way she says it—in the way her gaze lingers half a second longer than it should.

I nod once, sharp, and step past her before the tide drags me any deeper.

Distance.

You promised.

But as her scent follows me into the dark—salt and wildflowers and memory—I know this fight’s far from over.

And I’m not sure who’s going to drown first.