Playlist

James TW — “Butterflies”

Holly Humberstone — “Livewire”

Holly Humberstone — “Please Don’t Leave Just Yet”

Natalie Taylor — “Wrecked”

Drew Holcomb & The Neighbors — “Live Forever”

Judah & The Lion — “Only To Be With You” (Unplugged)

Matt Maeson — “Put It on Me”

Matt Maeson — “Tribulation”

Matt Maeson — “Hallucinogenics”

John Legend — “Wild”

Josie Dunne — “Good Boys”

James Bay — “Wild Love”

ZAYN — “It’s You”

HRVY — “Me Because of You”

The Driver Era — “Natural”

Dedication

For Jenn, if only Fisher were Scottish … this would be perfection.

Chapter One

The day I met the naked fisherman, I was a wholesome eighteen-year-old girl, fresh out of high school with lots of opinions and zero big ideas. The perfect target. I had only heard about men like him through sermons and Bible studies on temptation.

However, as I spent the morning packing, I was unaware of his existence. I should have embraced the final few hours of my innocence instead of fretting over the thought of seeing my mom for the first time in over five years. It made me want to throw up my scrambled eggs and at least one piece of buttered toast. Six months earlier, she’d been released from a women’s correctional facility in Nebraska. Apparently, she had a few too many marijuana plants growing in the storage room of her hair salon. My dad said he knew nothing about it, and the judge believed him.

My grandma snatched everything I tossed into my suitcase and refolded it. “You’re an adult now, Therese. You don’t have to live with her … or us. You don’t have to live with anyone. Are you sure you don’t want to get an apartment with some friends? There are mission trips that can take you all around the world.”

Three years earlier, my dad’s heart had stopped working. A congenital defect he didn’t know he had. No high blood pressure. No high cholesterol. Not a single sign before he just … keeled over while sitting at his drawing board. We’d had pasta that night. I still couldn’t look at pasta without tearing up.

He was a brilliant architect. My grandparents (his parents) got custody of me since my mom was in prison and her parents lived in a dinky but expensive apartment in Boston. They were Catholic liberals with a special detest for my father’s parents—conservatives who took advantage of my mom’s incarceration and my dad’s death by enrolling me in a private Christian academy in Houston, Texas.

“She’s my mom. I haven’t seen her in five years. And it’s only temporary until I decide what I want to do with my life.” I gave my grandma a reassuring smile, but her frown told me she wasn’t feeling the least bit reassured.

“You didn’t invite her to your graduation. Why are you so curious now?”