Page 85 of Pull Me Under

Jude hesitates. Looks at me, then at Cassie, then at me.

‘I’ll be back,’ he says.

‘Take your time. We’ll be fine.’

He holds my gaze a beat longer than necessary. ‘Yeah. I know you will.’

He heads towards the boathouse, and I’m left with a pregnant stranger smiling at me like we’re already friends.

‘So,’ Cassie says, lowering herself onto the crate Jude vacated. ‘How long have you two been doing this?’

‘Doing what?’

‘The whole we’re definitely not falling for each other dance.’ She gestures between where I’m standing and where Jude disappeared. ‘The loaded looks. The meaningful pauses. The pretending you don’t notice when the other one’s watching.’

Heat rushes to my cheeks. ‘We’re not – it isn’t⁠—’

‘Oh, my love’ Cassie laughs. ‘I was a nurse for ten years. I’ve seen people fall in love in hospital corridors, in hospice rooms, in the middle of absolute tragedy. I know what it looks like.’ She pats the crate beside her. ‘Sit. Tell me everything.’

I should deflect. Retreat to the safety of engine parts and fuel systems.

Instead, I sit.

‘I don’t know what we’re doing,’ I admit. ‘I don’t think either of us does.’

‘That’s usually how it starts.’ Cassie leans back, hands on her belly. ‘Cal and I had no idea what we were doing either. I thought I was going mad, falling for my patient’s husband while she was dying in the next room. Felt like the worst person alive.’

‘What changed?’

‘Melissa, mostly. She sat me down one day – near the end, when she could barely sit up – and she said, That man is going to need someone to love when I’m gone. And I think you might need someone to love too.’ Cassie’s voice softens. ‘She gave us permission. To feel what we were feeling. To not be ashamed of it.’

The words hit somewhere deep.

‘That’s a lot to live up to.’

‘It is. Every day.’ She turns those warm eyes on me. ‘But here’s the thing, Brynn. You can’t control when love shows up. You can’t schedule it or make it convenient. It just happens. Usually at the worst possible time, with the worst possible person, in the worst possible circumstances.’

‘That’s not exactly reassuring.’

‘It’s not meant to be. It’s meant to be honest.’ She smiles. ‘Whatever’s happening with you and Jude, and there is, so don’t bother denying it, you can’t outrun it. Trust me. I tried.’

I look towards the boathouse. Jude’s silhouette through the open door – leaning over paperwork with Cal, focused, competent, in his element even if he’d never call it that.

As if he feels my gaze, he looks up. Our eyes meet across the distance.

He doesn’t wave. Doesn’t smile. Just looks.

And a tightness I’ve been holding onto, like a constant within me, loosens.

‘I’m scared,’ I say, still watching him. ‘Of what happens when this gets complicated.’

Cassie shrugs, one hand rubbing small circles on her bump. ‘Who says it has to be?’

‘I’m a Trelawney. Complicated is our thing.’

‘Nina tells me you’ve been good for her,’ Cassie says, shifting tack in that deliberate way. ‘Showing up at the café when the alarm goes off. Sitting with her. Not everyone would do that.’

‘It’s nothing.’