I paused by the wooden gate that separated my backyard from the path to the dune and looked up at Morgan’s house, unable to let go of the nagging feeling in my chest that I needed to check on her.

“Need a hand?” Sawyer asked as he came up behind me, the volleyball under his arm.

“Nawh, I’m good,” I told him.

“You sure? You look a little scrawny to handle that.” He motioned to the cooler.

“Fuck off.” I spent a hell of a lot of my downtime at work running and lifting, refusing to give into the dad bod, as Sawyer once implied. “You can barely handle that ball.”

“Speaking of which, you ready to get your ass kicked?”

“Never going to happen.” I smirked at my best friend. Movement in Morgan’s window caught my eye, and my attention drifted to her house—to her—again. Had she seen sunlight since her friend left? “You know what? Why don’t you take Brie to the party? I’ll be there in a second.”

“No problem—”

“I can wait for you—”

I put the cooler down by the edge of the deck. “Brie, go ahead. I’m going to invite my new neighbor over. Go have some fun.”

Brie rolled her eyes at Sawyer’s offered arm and took off up the path.

“Prickly as a cactus, that one,” Sawyer remarked as she disappeared over the dune. “I swear she hates everyone but you and Fin.”

“Nope. Just you. And she’s family, which Fin is in short supply of.”

“She coming back tonight?” he asked. “Kinda miss your little urchin.”

Sawyer acted all tough until faced with a certain redhead. Then he was pretty much butter, just like every other guy we worked with.

“Tomorrow. It’s Vivian’s weekend, and it’s a three-day weekend for the preschool.”

“Seriously? We could hit up McGinty’s tonight and catch the end-of-spring-break crowd, or you could break your not-in-my-house rule for one of the ladies currently stripping down to their bikinis. Over the dune. Fifty feet away. While we stand here. Where we can’t see said bikinis.” He raised his eyebrows.

“One, I never break the house rule. My daughter lives in that house, jackass. Two, I’ll be there in a second.”

“Yeah, yeah. Okay, you go invite your new neighbor, and I’ll see you down there. You sure you don’t want me to bring the cooler down? I’d hate for you to injure your back. Old age is a bitch.”

“You’re exactly two months younger than I am,” I reminded him.

“I figure Finley’s aged you at least a year for every one of hers, so that makes you five years older. Right? She just turned five? Man, you’ll be pushing forty soon if you don’t watch it.”