The next morning, I grabbed my notebook and the treasure map and was out on the beach just as the sun was coming up. I found a chaise lounge that had been left out from the day before and settled in to work on my letter assignment to Sam. I flipped open to a clean page and thought back to Dr. P’s instructions. He wanted me to write a letter to Sam that explored the good and bad parts of our relationship, where I was to take some responsibility for my part in its ultimate demise.
I set pen to paper, and before I knew it, I had filled several pages of the notebook with musings about Sam’s affair. Maybe I had played a role, but there was no way my mistakes even came close to touching his. After all, an affair was the ultimate betrayal of the heart wasn’t it?
I scribbled out a few more thoughts and set the notebook down—that was quite enough indignation for one day. I picked up the treasure map and looked out to the horizon. Tucking the notebook into the back of my shorts, I slipped on my aqua shoes and set out for the lighthouse.
This time, I made it all the way across the jetty to the lighthouse and retrieved the second clue from up inside the bell tower. I unfurled the tightly rolled paper and read the scroll.
Teach me to steer the ocean swell, where untouched I glide, through a place I’ll never belong, but that beckons me always to ride.
The surf school! I hurried back up the beach and over to the shed. I pushed open the swinging door and squatted down to look for the next clue behind the surfboards lining the wall.
“Need any help?” said a familiar voice above my head.
I spun around on my knees and came face-to-face with Todd’s…knees. I looked up and into his handsome face. His hair was pulled back into his signature man bun, and his wet suit was glistening from a recent dip in the ocean. He stood his surfboard up against the wall.
“Joanna, what are you doing here?” he asked when I didn’t respond to his offer of help.
I stood up and brushed off my shorts. “I’m still in search of that buried treasure.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Any luck?”
I pulled the first clue out of my pocket. “I made it all the way out to the lighthouse this time.”
Todd looked down at my ankle. “Unscathed?”
“Unscathed,” I repeated, pointing at my aqua shoes.
“Smart.” He peered over my shoulder to read the clue. “Want any help trying to find the next one?”
After Louisa’s revelation, I’d decided I would take a step back from my budding friendship with Todd, or whatever it was that was developing between us. It’s not that he owed me an explanation, exactly, but he’d been so forthcoming about his restaurant going under and what brought him to Topsail, all the while conveniently leaving out the bit about his ex-girlfriend’s role in all of it. I couldn’t help but wonder what his angle was.
“I’m okay, thanks.”
“I don’t have to be anywhere for a while. Between the two of us, I’m sure we can find the treasure,” he said.
“I’m supposed to find it on my own, part of the Boot Camp experience.”
He smiled and put his finger over his lips. “I won’t tell if you won’t.”
“You won’t tell whom? Louisa?” The forcefulness of my tone surprised me, but after Sam, I had no intention of being blindsided by a man ever again.
He closed his eyes. “She told you.”
“She told me the two of you used to date. What I don’t understand is why you didn’t tell me. I know you don’t technically owe me anything, and maybe I’m crazy, but it felt like there was something developing between us.”
“You aren’t crazy,” he said softly.
“So why wouldn’t you just be honest with me?”
“I didn’t want to scare you off. Lou’s built a whole career around helping women get over the men who broke their hearts. If I told you I was the ex-boyfriend of the founder of THE Breakup Boot Camp, I can only imagine what you would’ve thought of me. I wanted you to get to know me a bit better before all of that came to light.”
“So, you are the reason she started this place?”
“I don’t think I can take all the credit, but yes. I was a different guy back then, though. Lou and I met during the height of Ma Belle Ferme. I loved her, but I let the fame and money get to my head. I’m ashamed to admit it, but I treated everyone like they were disposable—friends, family, my girlfriend, it didn’t matter. I had a publicist in my ear, telling me I was going to be the next big thing, and I drank way too much of the Kool-Aid. Truth is, I ruined a lot of relationships—ours was just one of them.”
“But it can’t have been that bad if she helped you get the job here?”
“What better way to show that her camp works than to have the person who broke her heart here as proof positive that you can get over an ex?” he teased.
“Is that really true?”
“No, not at all. Lou’s a good person. She has a good heart, and I think she just took pity on me. I was a pretty lost soul when I arrived at Retreat House.”
I shifted my eyes to my feet. “Me too.”
Todd tipped up my chin. “But it’s over between me and Louisa and has been for a long time now.”
I wanted to believe him, but, how could I? I knew that I still had feelings for Sam, and I had to be honest with myself. Even with all the therapy in the world, I might always have feelings for him.
“I’ll always care about her, but that chapter’s finished,” he said. “We aren’t the same people we were then. I’m sure it’s the same thing for you and Sam. After all that went down between the two of you, you’d never really want to get back together with him, would you?”
I felt like I’d been sucker-punched. I knew the answer he wanted, the answer he was expecting, but I also knew in my heart it wouldn’t be an honest one. In the end, though, I didn’t have to say a thing, my deafening silence spoke volumes.
His pupils narrowed and seemed to flee from the expanding whites of his eyes. “Oh, I see.”
I reached out and touched his arm.
He stepped back and away from me. “No, no, it’s my mistake. I was starting to think there was the spark between us, but I guess I was wrong,” he said.
“You aren’t wrong, you’re just not exactly right either. My heart’s still an open wound. Sam wasn’t just my fiancé, he was my family. We were together for so long, it’s hard for me to imagine a world without him.”
“I should get going. I have to prep for tomorrow night’s clam bake.”
“Tonight’s the last performance of Romeo and Juliet. I was going to check in later to see if you still wanted to go with me?”
“Maybe some other time.” Todd zipped up his wet suit and reached around me for his surfboard. As he did, he leaned in and whispered in my ear, “Oh, I am fortune’s fool.”
“Todd…”
“See you around, Joanna.”