Wyatt opens a glass door leading out onto the back deck. Behind the house, almost close enough to touch, are six mustangs, grazing on sea oats. Willa’s breath catches in her throat and Taylor gasps.

“. . . they love our backyard.”

Taylor dives for her digital camera from the bottom of the beach bag as Willa rests her elbows on the deck railing. The horses are varying shades of brown—tawny, chestnut, russet, and chocolate. Small and stocky and shaggy and utterly gorgeous.

“Finley would be losing her mind right now,” she says.

Finley always loved animals, but after she was confined to a hospital bed, she spent hours watching videos of baby sloths getting baths and rescue dogs finding their forever homes. She’d laughed for days over a video of a horse squeaking a rubber chicken. Taylor glances at Willa, and they exchange a knowing smile.

“I could give you the full tour spiel, but it’s actually my day off,” Wyatt says. “And watching is better than talking.”

“Does this happen a lot?” Willa asks.

“Yep.”

“Does it ever get old?”

“My mom is a vet who works with the Corolla Wild Horse Fund,” Wyatt says. “And my dad owns the tour company I work for, so we’d be in big trouble if it got old. But it really doesn’t. The mustangs don’t belong to us, but they’re ours . . . if that makes sense. We love them.”

The tenderness in his voice makes Willa’s heart thump extra hard, makes her want to reach for him. But that would be silly when she’s only just met him. Instead, she curls her fingers into her palms and watches the horses shuffle slowly over the dune, nickering softly as they munch sea oats and fallen persimmons from the Kennedys’ tree.

Wyatt leans on the railing, his elbow resting lightly against hers. His voice is soft, with a note of wonder, as he says, “Where did you come from?”

Willa tells him the whole story, beginning with their promise to Finley and the list of clues. She omits the part about Campbell. He’s not irrelevant—after all, if he hadn’t pushed her away, she might not be here right now—but maybe he doesn’t deserve to be part of the story anymore. She talks about the Hurricane Deck at Niagara Falls, the storm in New York City, nearly getting arrested in Atlantic City, and the speargun incident on their way from Norfolk. She even tells Wyatt about meeting Captain Norm.

“The next clue on Finley’s list was ‘Get a little wild,’ ” Willa explains. “We have no idea if she picked that phrase to reference wild horses, or if she researched tour companies and found yours, but when I saw your shirt . . .”