Harbor Lights of Blackwood
When maritime archivist Evelyn Cross collapses in a coastal squall with a falsified harbor ledger, solitary engineer Julian Thorne opens his workshop door—and risks everything to guard her truth and earn her trust.
Fictional story. Depicts severe weather distress, mild emotional tension, and corporate wrongdoing. Contains no graphic violence or medical procedures.Chapter 1: The Squall at Blackwood Dock
Julian Thorne was not a man given to impulse. As the principal marine repair engineer for Blackwood Bay, he governed his life by coastal tide charts, structural tolerances, and the steady cadence of cold cedar timber. Outside his dockside workshop, the Pacific squall had turned the evening into a roaring wall of gray water. Wind rattled the heavy iron hinges of the boathouse doors, hurling spray against the reinforced lantern glass above his drafting table.
He was tightening the brass clamp on a refurbished brass quadrant when a dull, irregular thud struck the timber frame near the entrance.