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"So," Marcus said during a lull in the conversation, his voice lowered for her ears only. "You never actually answered my question earlier. How's it really going with Serena?"

Lila took a swig of her beer, buying time. "It's going fine. Professional boundaries stayed intact."

"That wasn't what I asked." He nudged her with his elbow. "You've got that look."

"What look?"

"The 'fascinated by damaged brilliance' look. I've seen it before."

Lila sighed, watching the flames dance before them. "She's... not what I expected."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning there's more beneath the surface than just corporate ambition and control issues." Lila poked at the fire with a stick, sending sparks spiraling into the night sky. "She had this moment today... this tiny crack in her perfect mask. Just for a second, but it was real."

Marcus studied her face in the firelight. "And that tiny crack has you hooked."

"I'm not hooked," Lila protested, though the defensiveness in her voice undermined her words. "I'm professionally intrigued."

"Right." Marcus drew out the word skeptically. "Just like you were 'professionally intrigued' by Dr. Montgomery last season?"

Heat that had nothing to do with the fire rushed to Lila's cheeks. "That was different."

"Was it though?" Marcus's teasing tone softened with genuine concern. "Look, I'm not judging. God knows you've listened to enough of my romantic disasters. I just worry that you keep getting drawn to the same type—brilliant women with walls so high you need oxygen to scale them."

"Serena is a client," Lila reminded him, and herself. "Nothing more."

"Now, maybe." Marcus stretched his long legs toward the fire. "But she won't be a client forever. And when that professional boundary disappears..."

"Then she'll go back to Manhattan and her billion-dollar company, and I'll stay here doing what I always do." Lila tried to keep her tone light, though the thought carried an unexpected sting.

"Unless..."

"Unless nothing." Lila tossed her stick into the fire with more force than necessary. "Can we talk about something else? Literally anything else?"

Marcus raised his hands in mock surrender. "Fine, fine. But just so you know, you're not nearly as unreadable as you think you are."

Before Lila could respond, Kai dropped onto the sand beside them, dramatically throwing his arm over his forehead. "If I have to lead one more 'mindful paddleboard excursion' for tech bros who check their watches every three minutes, I'm swimming to the mainland."

The conversation mercifully shifted to Kai's complaints, then to island gossip, then to plans for the upcoming full moon celebration. Lila let herself be drawn into the friendly chatter, grateful for the distraction from her own mixed-up thoughts.

Later, as the fire burned down to glowing embers and staff members began drifting back to their quarters, Lila found herself alone at the edge of the water. The moon cast a silver path across the gentle waves, and stars crowded the velvet sky with impossible brightness.

She kicked off her sandals, letting the cool water lap at her ankles as she breathed in the night air. The ocean stretched before her, a vastness that always put her own concerns into perspective.

"Penny for your thoughts," came a voice behind her. Lila turned to find Tomasi, the resort's elder groundskeeper, his weathered face kind in the moonlight.

"Not sure they're worth that much," Lila replied with a smile.

Tomasi came to stand beside her, his feet planted in the wet sand with the sureness of someone who had known these shores for decades.

"You've been quiet tonight," he observed. "Not like you."

Lila shrugged. "Just tired. It’s been a busy day."

"Ah." Tomasi nodded, gazing out at the horizon. "The new guest, the one with silver in her hair. She's keeping you busy?"

"How did you—" Lila stopped herself. "Never mind. Small island."

Tomasi chuckled. "I was trimming the hibiscus near the east point this morning and saw you both at Whisper Cove." His eyes, still sharp despite his seventy-plus years, held gentle understanding. "She carries much weight for someone so slim."

The simple observation struck Lila with its accuracy. "Yes. She does."

"And you want to help carry it." It wasn't a question.

Lila dug her toes deeper into the sand, anchoring herself. "It's my job to help."

"There's helping, and then there's taking on." Tomasi’s voice carried the easy wisdom of experience. "The first heals both people. The second wounds both people."

"You sound like Marcus," Lila said, though without irritation. "He thinks I have a type."

"Smart friend," Tomasi said with a nod. "Though I wouldn't say it's a type so much as a pattern."

"What's the difference?"

"A type is about who they are. A pattern is about who you are." He picked up a shell from the water's edge, turning it in his palm. "Why do you think you're drawn to people who hold themselves apart?"

The question caught Lila off guard. "I'm not... I mean, I don't specifically..."

"It's okay," Tomasi said gently. "You don't have to answer an old man prying into your business."

Lila sighed, staring at the moonlit water. "Maybe because I know what it's like to be seen as one thing on the surface while feeling something completely different underneath."

The admission surprised her as soon as it left her lips. She hadn't consciously formed the thought until this moment.

Tomasi nodded, accepting her words without judgment. "The helpers often know the pain they try to heal in others."

"I'm not in pain," Lila said quickly.

"Now, maybe not," Tomasi agreed. "But we carry the imprints of old wounds, even after they've healed. Like this." He held up the shell, its surface smooth except for a single crack that had mended over time. "Beautiful not despite the break, but partially because of it."

He pressed the shell into her palm, closing her fingers around it. "Just remember, genuine healing happens with, not for. You walk beside, not carry."

With that pearl of wisdom delivered, Tomasi turned and walked back toward the dying fire, leaving Lila alone with the shell and her thoughts.

She opened her hand, examining the shell in the moonlight. Its pearlescent surface gleamed with subtle blues and pinks, the healed crack visible only when she turned it just so. Imperfect yet whole, stronger at the mended place.

Was that why she felt drawn to Serena? Some unconscious recognition of similar fractures beneath different surfaces?

The thought was unsettling in its plausibility. Her attraction—and yes, she could admit it was attraction, at least to herself—might have less to do with Serena specifically and more to do with patterns woven into her own history.

Sophie's face flashed in her memory. She was brilliant, passionate, and ultimately unable to give what Lila needed. Always taking, rarely returning. The relationship had left Lila feeling hollow, emptied by giving without receiving.

Was she unconsciously seeking to replay that dynamic with Serena? The thought was troubling enough to make her close her fingers tightly around the shell.

The tide had begun to turn, water rising around her ankles. Lila stepped back from the advancing waves, tucking the shell into her pocket as she made her way back toward the staff quarters.

Tomorrow would bring another session with Serena, another opportunity to navigate the complex current between them. Professional boundaries would remain firmly in place, Lila resolved. She would be present, compassionate, and completely focused on her client's needs, not her own fascination.

As she walked the moonlit path, the shell a small weight in her pocket, Lila couldn't quite silence the quiet voice that wondered if those boundaries would be enough to contain whatever was beginning to stir between herself and the woman she was supposed to be healing, not falling for.

The question followed her into dreams of ice-blue eyes and unexpected vulnerability, of walls that crumbled not from force but from patient presence, of two broken places that might, just might, fit together in ways neither woman had anticipated.