Page 5 of The Single Dad Grump Next Door

“—and did you know that there’s a magical lady here in town? I mean, I think she’s like a fairy godmother or something. They call her thewise woman. Isn’t that cool? A waitress at the restaurant my dad took me to last night told me all about her.”

Oh, goodness… who is she even talking to? Probably the neighbors that we’re sharing this place with. I hope she hasn’t been talking their ears off for too long.

“Is that so?” Wren’s unknown companion replies. “I don’t think I’ve ever met a magical lady before.”

The voice is soft and feminine. Kind, too. At least she’s humoring my kid rather than telling her to scram.

“Me either! I really want to find her. I hope she tells me the future. I want to be a drummer when I grow up. My dad writes music, but it’sclassical—ugh! I like rock music, don’t you?”

An indulgent laugh follows. “Actually, I’m afraid to tell you that I like classical music, too.”

Weirdly, this stranger’s voice sounds a little familiar. Maybe she’s another Mermaid Shores regular—someone that I’ve unknowingly crossed paths with during past summers.

“Aw, really?” Wren whines. “But what about Metallica? Don’t you like when the guitars are all likeRAAHHH!”

When my daughter lets out a deafening roar, I know it’s time for me to intervene.

I push open the screen door and step out onto the back patio, where flat stones form a surface just large enough for a grill, a table, and some chairs before melting away into the brown sand that spills down onto the sloping beach.

There’s a woman sitting in one of the chairs at the table, a book laying open in front of her. I bite back a groan. I’ve really tried to teach Wren that interrupting people while they read is one of the worst things you can do. I’m sure she’ll learn eventually.

The woman’s back is to me. She has long, light brown hair that’s glinting a dark gold in the sunlight. It’s wavy and thick, spilling like a cascade of water down her back. What I can see of her bare arms is covered in a spray of freckles, and there’s a sharp glint of sunlight reflecting off a silver ring on her left index finger.

Wren is standing beside her chair, close enough to indicate that she’s treating the woman like an old friend instead of with the caution she should be using with a stranger.

I open my mouth to call her inside, but she notices me in her periphery first, whirling around with a bright smile on her face. Despite having her mother’s wild and unpredictable personality, Wren looks so much like me that it’s almost baffling. Black curls, light brown skin, and green eyes. Not to mention the gangly limbs, which she’ll eventually grow into just like I did.

“Daddy!” she exclaims when she sees me. “You should come meet our neighbor. I was just telling her all about Miss Maisie!”

“Honey, how about you come inside? Our neighbor is clearly trying to read her book.”

“No, it’s alright,” protests the woman, turning around at last.

She twists in the chair, gaze lifting from my boat shoes and slowly dragging up to the collar of my polo before finally resting on my face.

Instant recognition slams into me so hard and fast that it jolts me a step backwards. The woman has a similar reaction, flinching so dramatically that you’d think someone just reached out and tried to slap her.

Wren, already bored with the turn of events, slips past me and skips into the house. In the silence that follows her absence, the woman and I stare at each other with matching expressions of horror.

“You,” I bite out.

She narrows her eyes. “You.”

Alina Sokolov. Daughter of famed cellist Vladimir Sokolov, Juilliard graduate, and esteemed violinist from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

I haven’t seen her in years, but the hatred in those doe eyes—the color of honey—is viscerally familiar. Even after all this time, I’m clearly still her least favorite person.

Well, two can play at that game.

“What are you doing here?” I demand.

Alina rises from the chair, crossing her arms against her chest to square off against me. Just like that, I’m nineteen again, battling it out with her in a fluorescent-lit rehearsal room while our classmates look on nervously.

Very little has changed about her, though something in her facial features has become sharper, harder. Like she’s slowly been turning to stone since the last time we saw each other. I can see that she still favors dark colors in her attire, though, given that she’s wearing loose black trousers and a matching blouse even in the June sunshine. She looks like she’s about to walk onstage and perform a symphony, except that her violin is nowhere to be seen.

“I’m visiting my cousin,” she snaps back. “What areyoudoing here?”

“I’ve been coming to Mermaid Shores since I was a kid.”

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