Chapter 4 — The Turtle Sanctuary

Adrian

The midday sun hung high over the caldera, its golden rays shimmering off the waves as Adrian Cole trudged across the black-sand beach toward the sanctuary. The heat, familiar and unrelenting, pressed down on him, but it barely registered. Instead, a nagging irritation from his earlier encounter with Sophie lingered. Her hazel eyes—wide, apologetic, and searching—flickered in his mind like a question he didn’t want to answer. There had been something in her voice, hesitant yet earnest, that unsettled him in a way he couldn’t quite explain. He shifted the weight of his weathered field bag on one shoulder, his fingers brushing the worn leather strap as though it might tether him to the present.