Elias Rowan had been standing in that same corner of the pier every morning for the better part of eight years, sanding the same fishing trawler that had been in worse shape than its owner would ever admit when it first limped into his yard. His hands moved automatically, the motions smooth and practiced, the scars across his knuckles pale and thickened like old rope burns, and although anyone watching him might have thought he was simply concentrating on the work, there was something about the way his gaze occasionally drifted across the water that suggested he was looking far beyond the harbor.
He had the posture of someone who never quite relaxed.
Even when he stood still, there was a quiet alertness in him, a subtle shifting of weight, an instinctive awareness of where every sound came from.
It was the kind of awareness that didn’t belong to a boat mechanic.
“Dad.”
The voice broke through the steady scrape of sandpaper.
Elias turned slightly, lowering the tool as he saw his daughter approaching down the pier with two coffee cups balanced carefully in her hands.
Lena Rowan was seventeen now, tall for her age and carrying herself with the easy confidence of someone who had grown up in a small town where everyone knew her name. Her violin case hung across her shoulder, and strands of wind-tangled hair kept falling into her eyes as she walked.
“You skipped breakfast again,” she said, handing him one of the cups.
Elias took it with a small nod.
