Page 4 of Plot Twist in Pelican Point
His mouth twitches. “She wanted a fantasy. I gave her real life.”
I blink. “Wow. You’ve been practicing that line for years, haven’t you?”
He shrugs. “People waste a lot of time chasing things and stories that don’t exist.”
And there it is—the bitter edge of a man who once believed in something too. The proverbial chip. Probably carved out of stone and placed right on that impossibly broad shoulder.
“Well,” I say brightly, “thank god, I make mine up.”
He hesitates, and I catch the tiniest flicker of something—surprise? amusement?—in his eyes. It’s fleeting, but it’s enough.
I lean in with a cheeky grin. “You didn’t expect me to have a brain, did you? Fair warning, I have teeth too."
He opens his mouth like he might respond, then thinks better of it and turns back to his bracket.
I let the silence hang just long enough to claim victory.
“Right. Well then, I’ll leave you to your screws and brooding and spare the world another grumpy architect forced to endure the horrors of pleasant conversation.”
He doesn’t reply. Just turns away, dismissing me like a fluff on a beach breeze.
I haul the box into the cottage and kick the door shut with my heel.
This is going to be fun.
Hours later, and he’s still under my skin. Not in a good way. Not in a bad way. Just... lodged there like an itch I can’t scratch. I’m still stewing over Mr. I-Don’t-Believe-in-Romance and the way he said 'false hope' like it was poison. But instead of glaring out the window, I’m halfway through a plot outline that might actually work—new setting, new heroine, less angsty hero—when something slams into the side of the cottage.
I jump, spilling iced coffee across my notes.
Scrambling up, I rush to the window and see Sebastian kneeling beside a large wooden crate now cracked open, tools scattered everywhere.
He looks... furious.
Now there's a surprise.
I open the door and step out. “Need help?”
“No.”
“Well, that clears it up.” I crouch beside him anyway, eyeing the splintered crate like I’ve just discovered an ancient artifact. “You know, if you’d used a little more bubble wrap and a little less wishful thinking, this might’ve stood a chance.”
He doesn’t look up. “You don’t know anything about transport logistics.”
“I know that’s a lot of metal in a sad little heap. Pretty sure even I could’ve done a better job strapping it down—and my last DIY project was hot-gluing sequins to a French bulldog's costume.”
That gets the corner of his mouth to twitch. “Please tell me you’re joking.”
“I never joke about sequins.” I flash him a bright smile, the kind that makes most people either chuckle or quietly back away. He just blinks, clearly trying to decide whether I’m insane, irritating, or some combination of the two.
I crouch beside him anyway. “What happened?”
“Crate slipped off the damn lift. Custom ironwork. Weeks of designs, back-and-forths, ego-taming. All splintered in seconds.”
“Can it be salvaged?”
He shoots me a look. “Can a soufflé be uncollapsed?”
I grin. “Spoken like someone who’s never baked a day in his life. Actually a collapsed soufflé can be successfully uncollapsed with a second baking or reheating. By the way I'm not sure uncollapsed is an actual word."
