Lorne rejoined Catherine in the cockpit, and they hugged. "Well done, Ma'am. You didn't yell at me at all." He laughed.

"Your confidence is infectious. I'd never think of doing that."

"Great, don't think about doing things. Do them. Doing does things, thinking doesn't. Often prevents."

"Engine shut down?"

"Yeah, button here, then the key." Catherine quickly shut down, then in the silence, they resumed their hug.

A while later, he lifted his head from her hair, nodded toward the float and said, "We should finish mooring."

"Interesting. Only the breast line. We're stable."

"Her side is held tightly to the float. There's no way for the bow or the stern to swing out."

"Why do the others use two, three or more lines when they come in? Dad always has us bow and stern with lines."

"Possibly because that's what the books and the courses teach. Maybe it's so everyone can look busy. I honestly don't know."

He gave her a hand down to the float and showed her his line arrangements, all easily reached from ashore. He led the bow line forward to loop a bollard and then back to secure it to a staghorn at chest level on Tastevin's deck a few metres aft of the bow. "We don't need springs... Two hours, near calm in here." They walked aft and secured the stern line in a similar way, then he undid the breast, coiled it and hung it on its hooks.

"Why do you undo the breast line? I saw you do that the other day too."

"It's a temporary mooring. It holds the boat in place while we properly moor. Another thing is that it's secured to the float, so we'd have to step ashore to undo it when we leave."

"The GPS thing?"

"Let's look at the video again, confirm that's all that was done." They sat in the cockpit and watched as Lorne keyed to the first alarm. "Sea lions. Still have to find a way to keep them off without doing them harm." He keyed forward to the next alarm, and they studied the sequence. "No pauses from boarding to foredeck. Knew where he was going." Lorne paused the video.

"But he said he had no sailing experience. Maybe powerboats."

"Could be he had advice. Doesn't seem bright enough to be into this on his own." Lorne resumed the video, and they viewed the action on split screen, the pulpit camera and one of the lower spreader cameras. "It appears George planted only one item."

They followed the video sequence back to the stern and into the tender. "I see one only. You?"

"Yeah, no other stops. It seems as if he knew exactly where to put it. Little hesitation." Lorne closed the computer. "It's probably common to have the rode stowage without a lock. What's your father's like?"

"No lock. No need, only the anchor chain in it."

"Yeah, most are likely that way. Whatever, I'll go remove the thing. You search for a better place for it on the float. I'll get zip ties and duct tape and meet you there."

After they'd zip-tied the tracker to a diagonal reinforcing cable under the float, Lorne locked Tastevin and they walked along to the office to book in. Then out through the gate and up the ramp, they headed into Stanley Park for a stroll.

"There's an enchanting old-growth grove through here." He pointed off to the left and led her. "I used to wander through it, looking up in awe at the red cedars and Douglas firs, some four metres and more thick. There's a beautiful little nook I would lie in. Deep duff and moss forest floor. I'd lie on my back and sink in. Dream of you as I reached to the sky like the trees."

"Oh, fuck!"

"Yeah, that's what I was thinking. It's along here a short distance, well hidden."

An hour and a bit later, as he was handing her onto the transom step, she said, "I love the way you commune with nature."

"Much better doing it with company. So much better."

"You spent a lot of time alone, didn't you?"

"Far too much."

"You always seemed so happy."

"So did you."

"Yeah, I guess. Sad, isn't it?"

"Yeah, quiet sadness inside. Happy crust around it. Protecting it. That's strange, isn't it? Protecting it? From what? Not letting the sadness out, or not letting others in?"

"But you always let me in, Lorne."

"Partway, yeah. Same with you, I saw you were frustrated, but never suspected you were unhappy. You and Nathan."

"I told you I was a good actress."

"No more acting, promise?"

Catherine stroked Lorne's cheek. "Not even with my steamy talking?"

"Oh, fuck! Okay, one exception." He wrapped his arms around her, and they swayed. "We should get going. Time and tide and the rest of the quote. You take her out."

"Sure?"

"Yeah. You brought her in here, that's the hard part. You know how to start the engine and the chartplotter, you've seen me do them."

"Yeah."

"Good, the rest is easy, intuitive."

She switched on the instruments, flashed the engine and looked at him. "Mooring lines... You do the bow."

"I'll show you a little trick." He walked forward, took the bow line's turns from the staghorns and said loudly enough that she could hear, "Watch." He pulled steadily on the line, swinging the bow in to compress the fenders, then released and flipped the line off the bollard and onto the deck. The bow rebounded and slowly swung out as he coiled the line, hung it then walked aft. He smiled as he saw her flip the stern line off the bollard and aboard.

"Neat trick." Catherine slipped the lever to slow ahead and watched the starboard quarter as she increasingly added port helm to swing Tastevin into the fairway between the lines of floats.

Lorne stood behind her, framing her waist in his hands and lightly pressing himself into her back as she steered through the narrow passage and out into the more open waters of Coal Harbour. "Yeah, I guess it is easy. All those years I watched Dad, and I never had the courage to say yes when he offered."

"Courage. Confidence. Missing ingredients often."

"Where do I go here?"

"Stay a bit to the right of centre, blend with the traffic. Most boaters here know what they're doing. Stay clear of the seaplane zone." He pointed to the lines on the plotter. "They're clearly marked. We're in sufficiently open water now to steer with the autopilot."

"This button, the Set?"

"That's the one. Steer with those two lines of buttons. One, five and ten degrees per push." He squeezed her waist and nibbled her earlobe. "You're smart enough to figure this out."

"And you're brave enough to let me try." She pushed the button, let go of the wheel and monitored for a while before she turned to receive his kiss. 

As they motored out of Coal Harbour and into more open waters, Lorne was checking the wind. "Looks like we'll have to motor the whole way through the Narrows, wind's too light and fickle. An extra twenty minutes on the engine won't hurt."

Through the Narrows and out into English Bay, they shut down the engine as they picked up a westerly wind and hauled out the sails to beat up into it. Catherine smiled at him from the jib sheet winch. "God, you're good at giving me confidence."

"Not giving, simply allowing you to see it. It's been there all along. You need to let it out."

"Yeah, true. Doubt, self-doubt is so common and seems so easy to accept. We undersell ourselves... No, I undersell myself."

"You should publish your blog piece. It's great."

"You think so?"

"Confidence?"

"Yes, it's a great piece, isn't it?" She giggled and reached for her computer. "I'll read it through again."

A few minutes later, after two minor corrections, Catherine pushed Publish and smiled at the confirmation. "Done. No comments yet, though." She laughed. "I remember checking the hit counter every few minutes after my first posts. Got nothing else done. Stupid, eh?"

They finally made enough westings to fall off on a reach across the bay past the cardinal buoy marking the edge of foul water. At 1950 they arrived at the entrance to False Creek, furled the sails and began motoring in toward the marina.

Catherine's iPhone pinged as they were passing Spruce Harbour. She read the text: "Gr8 blog post. Whosit? See u at lunch, Cynth. Well, that's good, at least one person's read it." She laughed. "Cynthia's curious. I'm looking forward to lunch."

Her WebMail app icon showed 14, so she selected it and scrolled through the emails. "Don't like this one." She turned her screen toward Lorne, and he read:

Don't fuck with our restaurants. We're bigger and meaner than you.
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