Damn him.
After yesterday, after Valerie chose him, how can he still look at me like that? Is there more to the story, or does he think he can have his cake and eat it, too?
I break first, sliding out of bed, and being careful not to disturb the sheets still warm from Damon’s body. I reach for my cardigan on the nightstand, pull it on, and pad toward the bathroom without looking back.
The morning unfolds the way morning on this island has since day one—coffee, fruit, the low hum of half-awake voices.
I claim the chair beside Emily, curl both hands around my mug, and let the group’s chatter wash over me like white noise.
I’m halfway through my second cup when I hear familiar footsteps behind me.
“Can I talk to you for a minute?”
Scott’s voice echoes in my ears, sliding under my skin like it always does, low and steady. He stops beside my chair, holding a glass bowl of granola and yogurt. He sets it in front of me like an offering, then waits.
I set my mug down beside the bowl. “Scott?—”
“Not here.” He angles his head toward the far side of the pool deck where the morning shade still clings and the nearest camera is twenty feet away. “Just for a minute.”
I sigh. If I don’t go now, he’ll keep asking me until I do.
Standing, I follow. The space between us stays careful, deliberate, like we’re both afraid one wrong step will ignite whatever’s still smoldering from yesterday.
What else could he have to say other than what I already know? That doesn’t change the strain between us.
When we reach the quieter end of the deck, I turn to face him, arms crossed. “Go ahead.”
He studies me for a long beat, blue eyes scanning like he’s reading every line I haven’t spoken. Whatever he sees makes him tighten his jaw before he smooths it away.
“I know you don’t want to hear this,” he starts, voice rough. “But what happened yesterday wasn’t?—”
“Scott.” The word comes out flat, tired. Last night I felt confusion and heartache. Now I just feel numb. “I already know what you’re going to say. And I’m not going to call you a liar. For all I know, you could be telling the truth. But I will never know that for certain. I don’t care if it was real or scripted or whatever the hell it was between you and Valerie yesterday. None of matters to me anymore.”
His expression shifts. Jaw flexing. “How does it not matter?—”
“Because it doesn’t,” I reply plainly, flat and final. Yesterday still sits heavy in my chest like a stone I can’t swallow, but I refuse to let it drag me under again. I have to choose me. I can’t keep pining for a man I’m not sure I can trust with my heart—or my body. “I’ve said it before, but I mean it this time. I can’t keep doing this. I can’t keep letting myself want you when I don’t know if any of what you say is real.”
I pause, the truth scraping raw on its way out. “We both just need to move forward. Whatever that looks like.”
“Not with me?”
Silence falls between us, thick and electric. The ocean keeps its steady rhythm behind us, but everything else holds still.
He looks at me solemnly, those blue eyes reading every flicker I’m trying to hide. “Is there anything I can do to change your mind?”
I sigh, the sound too heavy for the morning air. “I don’t know what to think or trust anymore.”
He holds my gaze. I meet it. We stare at each other like this for a long, aching moment. The part of me I’ve been locking down, the traitorous one that still remembers his hands and his mouth and the way his voice used to say my name like it belonged to him, almost wishes he’d reach for me. Just once. Just enough to make me break. To change my mind.
But he doesn’t.
“Okay,” he says quietly. No fight. No push. He simply nods, turns, and walks away.
I should feel better about this.
I don’t. Instead, I feel like a huge hole has been punched through my chest.
I head back across the deck toward the table. Emily is watching me over the rim of her coffee cup. That careful expression on her face that says she’s debating whether to ask.
