Cute guy? Is that what she saw? I felt a vague stirring of unease.

“You mean the Book Dude?” Rubio squinted after Daniel assessingly. “He was sharing news of the Mainland.”

“What news? He has news? What did he say?”

“Rube, don’t . . .” I began.

Too late. Jenn was already slipping among the boat admirers backed up in the mudroom, Daniel hard in her sights. I was glad the crowd had thinned by the time we climbed down the ladder to the underbelly. The float wasn’t large, planks laid across plastic water barrels, maybe twenty by twenty. Once a vast cavern under here, now Rubio’s head near brushed the ceiling when the float rocked on a swell. The three war canoes, ganged in parallel along one side to save dock space, were being readied for the nightly patrol. Rousseau stood by with Tito, discussing moorings and repairs for the new arrivals.

Daniel hollered that the Floating Library would be opening. Several people charged up the ladder to be first in line. He grinned after them, then hopped into his own dinghy, a tidy little wood shell fitted with a small solar outboard. The storage batteries took up most of the cargo space. “One passenger for the Book Boat. Any takers?”

Rubio raised a hand, but Jenn beat him to it. “Me!”

She was an old hand at boats now, also at putting her own needs first. Daniel saw an eager, pretty woman and helped her in. I watched them motor off, confused by wanting it to be me in that boat instead of Jenn.

Rubio leaned in like he’d read my thoughts. “You gonna show me your big score?”

“Right.” I pointed out the Zodiac, the battered canoes, Rivera’s kayak, and finally, my shabby rowboat. “Not much, but it got me home.”

“Got us both home.” Breakers nosed in beside us. “Needs bailing already. I’ll go find something.”

Rube studied the shipped oars and the slosh of dirty water in the bottom. “Gracie said you got right in and started to row like you were born to it. That true?”

“I guess.”

“And you could name every obscure part of a sailboat.”

“Don’t know about obscure . . .”

“It’s a big clue, you know.”

“But it doesn’t lead me anywhere.”

“Well, it does.” Rubio gazed out through the arches as Daniel moored his dinghy to the big boat across the Lagoon. “It closes off some possibilities. Like, only folks with some means know their way around a sailboat.”

“Means. You mean, money?”

He nodded. “Usually. So you weren’t living on the streets. But I knew folks who lived on their boats. Their only home. Tied up at a marina, or later, just anywhere sort of safe. More and more of them, as the waters rose.”

“I could’ve read about boats in a book.”

“You don’t learn to row from a book.”