Page 33 of The Beach Shack (Laguna Beach #1)

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

M eg sat in the back office of the Beach Shack, laptop open among the scattered invoices and order forms that seemed to multiply when she wasn’t looking.

The lunch rush had ended, and the afternoon lull provided the perfect opportunity to catch up on her San Francisco work—if she could focus long enough to make a dent in her overflowing inbox.

Her phone buzzed. She glanced down. Brad.

Can you jump on a quick call? San Clemente wants revised comps before EOD. CFO’s in town unexpectedly.

Meg sighed. She typed out a placeholder response:

Give me a sec. Mid-shift. Will circle back shortly .

Before she could set the phone aside, another message from Brad appeared.

Just make sure we’re not the bottleneck. If we lose momentum here, we’ll be behind for Q3 review.

Meg stared at the messages, feeling the familiar tug of corporate urgency pulling her away from the Beach Shack’s quieter rhythm. She’d been managing both worlds for weeks now, but the balance was getting harder to maintain. Brad’s messages had been getting more frequent, more insistent.

She opened the deck file for San Clemente, stared at the sleek mockups, the precise branding copy she’d finessed over weeks. It was good work. She knew that. But for some reason, the usual fire to prove herself wasn’t kicking in. Not today.

Her phone buzzed again. Brad calling this time.

She answered on the third ring. “Hey.”

“Meg, thank goodness. Look, I need you to walk me through the San Clemente positioning strategy. The CFO wants to review everything before the committee meeting, and honestly, the client’s getting nervous about the remote situation.”

Meg felt something tighten in her chest. “Nervous how?”

“They keep asking when you’re coming back. When they’ll get face time with the lead on their account.” Brad’s voice carried that edge it got when he was managing up. “I’ve been reassuring them, but... ”

“But they want to see me in person.”

“It would help. A lot. Can you get back here by Thursday? Even just for the presentation?”

Meg stared at her laptop screen, at the carefully crafted slides she’d built from Tyler’s kitchen table. At the branding strategy that felt like it belonged to someone else’s life.

“Actually,” she heard herself say, “I have a better idea. I’ll come to them.”

“What?”

“San Clemente’s only thirty minutes from here. I’ll drive down Thursday morning, present in person, handle their concerns directly.” The words felt foreign in her mouth, but also somehow right. “It’s the biggest pitch of my career, Brad. It deserves better than a video call.”

There was a pause. “You want to drive to San Clemente? Instead of coming back to the office?”

“The client’s in San Clemente. That’s where I need to be.”

Another pause, longer this time. “Okay. Okay, actually that’s... that could work really well. Shows we’re prioritizing them, taking the account seriously.” She could practically hear Brad recalibrating. “Can you handle the presentation prep from there?”

“I’ve been handling everything from here,” Meg said, surprised by the steadiness in her own voice. “I’ll nail this presentation, Brad. Trust me.”

“I do trust you. That’s not... Meg, are you okay? You sound different. ”

She looked around the small office, at Margo’s handwritten notes tucked into the desk corners, at the window that faced the ocean instead of a downtown high-rise.

“I’m figuring some things out,” she said. “But the work’s still good. The presentation will be good.”

“Alright. Keep me posted. And Meg? This client meeting could really solidify the promotion track for you.”

After Brad hung up, Meg sat motionless for a long moment. She’d just committed to driving to San Clemente, to presenting in person, to proving she could manage both her career and... whatever this was she was building in Laguna.

She spent the next hour refining her presentation, tweaking slides and polishing her talking points.

But even as she worked, part of her mind was elsewhere—thinking about Margo at the grill, about Joey’s dreams of marine systems training, about the way the Beach Shack operated on relationships rather than metrics.

It wasn’t until nearly closing time that the back door opened and Luke appeared, leaning against the doorframe.

“How’s the corporate empire building going?” he asked with a slight smile.

Meg looked up from her laptop. “Just handled a minor crisis. I think.”

“The kind that requires emergency phone calls and frantic typing?”

“The kind that requires me to drive to San Clemente Thursday and convince a client I haven’t abandoned them for the surfing life.”

Luke raised an eyebrow. “San Clemente? That’s a big step.”

“It feels like it.” Meg stood, gathering her things. “Terrifying, actually.”

Luke stepped into the office fully. “You know, sometimes the scariest thing is also the right thing.”

She surprised herself with the words even as she said them. “Want to come with me? To San Clemente?”

The question hung in the air between them.

“To your presentation?” Luke asked.

“For moral support. Or just... company. It’s been a while since I’ve done anything this important without backup.” She felt heat rise to her cheeks. “Sorry, that probably sounds?—”

“I’d love to,” Luke said simply. “If you’re sure.”

“I’m sure.” And surprisingly, she was.

He started toward the door, then paused. “Do I need to wear, like... shoes?”

Meg smiled. “And a shirt. Preferably one without a wave pun.”

He placed a hand over his heart. “You drive a hard bargain, Walsh.”

“Closing time,” Luke said after a moment. “Need help with anything?”

“Actually, yes,” Meg said, a smile tugging at her lips. “I need to figure out how to be brave.”

Luke grinned. “I think you’ve already started.”

After he left, Meg closed her laptop and looked around the small office. For the first time in weeks, the work felt manageable. Not because it had gotten easier, but because she’d stopped trying to manage her life from a distance.

She sent Brad the updated slides, closed her laptop, and stepped outside. The last of the sun was sinking low behind the cliffs, and the ocean called to her like a familiar song. Maybe she couldn’t control what came next. But she could start by going down to the beach.