Page 2 of The Pilot

The last straw was when he’d said her mom would feel the same way.

It was a low blow, and Harper was done. She’d stormed away before she could say something she’d really regret.

To save face, her dad yelled at her to get out when she was already halfway to the door. It was typical Victor. Always determined to have the last word.

With nowhere to go, she’d ended up in the parking lot of her workplace. Where she felt as if she spent most of her time these days. She’d missed out on too much of Kash’s life. Before she knew it, he’d be graduating and moving on. She’d already missed his amazing performance at the crate race at Lobster Fest because she was working.

Her boy was growing up, and Harper both hated that and was as proud of him as she could be.

Pressing her lips together, she decided everything that was shit in her life was karma doing her thing. Harper was well aware that she hadn’t been a nice person when she was in high school. For no reason at all, she’d thought she was better than most of the kids in her class. And when her so-called friends started bullying some of their classmates, she went right along with the pack. Back then, it was more important for her to fit in than to do the right thing.

Those thoughts led Harper to think about Lincoln Young.

She’d been particularly horrible to him. A total bitch. A classic mean girl. And she had no clue how to make it right now. Or if she even could after all this time.

Linc had been a scrawny kid back then. Which didn’t make it right that she and her friends picked on him every chance they got. And having a kid like Kash made her actions back then seem so much worse . . . because he reminded her so much of the boy Linc used to be. Smart, lost in his own head, obsessed with all things nerdy.

But the man Linc grew into was someone to be admired. She’d heard the stories of his career as a fighter pilot in the Air Force. How he was literally an American hero. It made her treatment of him when they were kids all the more painful. She wasn’t the same person she was back then, but she wasn’t sure how to change the perception Linc, and everyone else, seemed to have of her.

The truth was, she liked Linc. Was grateful to him and his family for embracing Kash the way they had. She knew about the fort in the woods that used to belong to the Young boys, the one that Kash had taken over. She wasn’t upset about it in the least . . . not like her dad would be. He disliked the Young family and did his best to discourage Kash from spending time with them, to no avail.

Kash loved Evelyn Young. She was the grandmother he’d never had. After a misunderstanding about the kind of person she was—thanks to his very own grandfather—hanging out at Lobster Cove, the Youngs’ property, was one of Kash’s favorite things to do after school. Mostly because of the cookies he got from Ms. Evelyn . . . but also because he got to see Linc.

Harper’s mind went back to the man she’d so badly wronged when they were teenagers. He was so good with Kash. Had taken him under his wing, so to speak. Been a mentor to him. Encouraging him, supporting him, and her son had a huge case of hero worship . . . not that she could blame him.

She wished moving into the small house on the Lobster Cove property had worked out. It would’ve been a huge break. Her dad was making her pay rent to live with him, which she honestly didn’t have a problem with . . . but she was barely making ends meet. She was managing, but living at Lobster Cove would’ve helped her actually save money. Evelyn had only planned to charge her two hundred bucks a month. Which was ridiculously low, but Harper wouldn’t have complained.

That opportunity had fallen through when unexpected repairs had to be made to the small house. Unfortunate . . . especially considering her dad had been even more impossible ever since she’d told him that she and Kash were moving to his neighbor’s property.

It was as if he considered it a personal attack against him, which it wasn’t. Harper would literally move into the heart of enemy territory if it meant improving Kash’s life. At this point, her life was all about her son. His needs. His wants. What she wanted didn’t matter.

Although Harper had no idea what she wanted. She’d been on autopilot for so long, struggling to keep her head above water, that she hadn’t been able to stop and think about what she hoped to get out of life.

Motherhood hadn’t been something she’d aspired to. Kash wasn’t planned, but she wasn’t sorry she’d chosen to have him. She didn’t even want to think about where she might be today if he hadn’t come along twelve years ago. Probably dead in a gutter in New York City.

With that depressing thought swirling through her brain, Harper didn’t even see the car pull up behind her and cut its lights. She was so lost in her head, she also didn’t hear the car door shut or see the man walking up to the driver’s side of her older-model minivan.

So when he rapped on her window with his knuckles, she jumped about ten feet and let out a girly little screech in fright.

When she turned her head, Harper saw the very man she couldn’t get out of her head, slowly backing away with his hands up as if to show he was no threat.

Her heart beating a hundred miles an hour, Harper frowned. What was Linc doing here? How did he know where she was? Was he driving by and just happened to see her car? Her face flamed. The store wasn’t open. So there was no good reason for her car to be sitting in the lot.

Karma, that bitch, was still hard at work. Making Harper pay for the way she’d treated this man all those years ago. Making sure he saw her at her worst, time and time again.

Frowning, Harper disengaged the locks and cracked her door open—she didn’t have the engine running, to save on gas, so she couldn’t roll down the automatic windows. “What’s wrong?” she asked Linc. “Is it Kash? Is he okay?”

She both hated and loved that her son had such a good relationship with Linc. That he felt comfortable enough to text him whenever the mood struck.

“He’s worried about you,” Linc said simply.

Harper closed her eyes for a beat. Of course her son had overheard her arguing with her dad. Of course he’d been worried. Her son had taken on the role of protector as well as he could at such a young age.

“I told him I’d check on you.”

“Well, you’ve checked on me. I’m fine,” Harper said, her words sounding sharper than she meant them to. This man brought out her defensiveness faster than anyone she knew. Well . . . maybe other than her dad.

In response, Linc stared at her for a beat, then walked around the front of her minivan to the passenger side. He climbed inside as if he had every right and sat, slamming the door behind him. He turned in the seat so he could see her better and simply stared without saying a word.