Sea Star

She flew to Cocoa Beach to sell her aunt's place and say goodbye. She didn't plan on a reason to stay, or the thing she thought she'd lost for good coming back at first light.

At fifty-five, Frankie Lockhart has a quiet house in the Carolina mountains, a grown daughter who worries too much, a marriage that ended at a hospital bedside two years ago, and one last errand: fly down to Cocoa Beach, clean out the little oceanfront cottage her late aunt June left her, and sell the failing old motor court on the dune. Two weeks. In and out. Back to her careful, half-empty life, and the bakery she hasn't been able to walk into since Paul died.

Then she meets Hank Sutter, the gruff, widowed fix-it man next door who builds and mends the things nobody thanks him for and has quietly kept Aunt June's place from sliding into the Atlantic for years. And she walks into the Sea Star, the open-air snack bar and Friday-night dance deck where the whole beach used to gather under the string lights, only to find it shuttered and sagging, with a slick developer circling the lease.

A retired pastry chef who grew up on her aunt's key lime pie and Friday fish fries cannot walk away. So Frankie stays past her two weeks, and she and Hank start bringing the old place back board by board, two people who thought their best years were behind them, learning that the brightest light might be the one still rising. But a private resort wants the whole oceanfront, her daughter wants her home, and Hank swore a long time ago that he'd never stand at another bedside.

A sweet, clean, slow-burn second-chance romance with no spice and a guaranteed happily-ever-after. Welcome to Cocoa Beach, where every book is a new couple, a fresh start, and a happy ending.