Seventeen-year-old Melanie Akamu lives for the ocean. It’s the one place where nothing can touch her—not the fear, not the future, not the illness she’s spent years trying to outrun.

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Then she meets Chase.

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He’s new to the island, a little guarded, a little reckless, and completely unexpected. What begins as a spark on the beach quickly turns into something neither of them can ignore—something real, something worth holding onto.

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But just as life starts to feel bigger than her fears, everything changes.

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When Melanie’s cancer returns, the world she fought so hard to rebuild begins to slip through her fingers. As she struggles to face what comes next, an injured dolphin named Kona—rescued and fighting to survive—becomes an unlikely reflection of her own battle.

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With time no longer promised, Melanie must decide how she wants to live: safely and afraid… or fully, fiercely, and without regrets.

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Because love doesn’t wait.
And neither does life.