The summer air was thick with salt and nostalgia, the waves rolling in lazy and slow. The sky was painted in soft pinks and deep oranges, the kind of sunset that made everything feel a little more alive.

Rafe sat beside you in the sand, his arms resting on his knees, a cigarette burning between his fingers. He looked out at the ocean like it held answers, like if he stared long enough, he might figure out whatever the hell was always haunting him.

“You ever think about leaving?” you asked, your voice barely above a whisper.

Rafe exhaled, watching the smoke disappear into the humid air. “All the time.”

You leaned back on your hands, letting the last bit of sunlight kiss your skin. “So why don’t you?”

He turned to look at you then, his gaze soft in a way it rarely was. “You really think I’d leave you?”

Your breath hitched, but you masked it with a smirk. “You’d get bored of me eventually.”

Rafe scoffed, flicking his cigarette into the sand before shifting closer, his hand skimming over your thigh. “Not a fucking chance.”

The waves crashed, seagulls cried in the distance, but all you could focus on was him—the way his fingers traced absent patterns against your skin, the way his lips twitched like he had something else to say but couldn’t bring himself to.

“You know what I think?” you murmured.

He raised a brow. “Enlighten me.”

You leaned in, your lips brushing against his ear. “I think you’re already lost in me.”

Rafe chuckled, but it was breathless, his grip on your thigh tightening. “Maybe I wanna be lost.”

And then he kissed you—slow, deep, like the way the tide pulled back before swallowing the shore whole.

And for the first time in his chaotic, reckless life, Rafe Cameron didn’t care where the current took him.

As long as it took him to you.