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I stop, inhaling sharply. Mitch is in there, looking at the view, but he turns as I go in. He walks around the bed and stands in front of me. Then, without asking, he opens his arms. I walk into them, and he wraps them around me and holds me tightly.

“Baby,” he says, rubbing my back over the towel. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.” I rest my forehead on his shoulder. Even though he hasn’t showered this morning, I can smell his cologne.

“Come and sit down.” He takes me over to the bed, and we sit side by side. He keeps his arm around me. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Part of me is ashamed to admit it, but it’s not going to remain a secret for long. “Jayden wants a divorce. And he wants to start the clock for separation around the date of the accident.”

He stares at me. “What?”

“He was going to leave me,” I reveal. “Before it happened, apparently. He was all set to go when he fell off the ladder. And he stayed because he had nowhere else to go.”

Mitch pulls me toward him and rests his lips on my hair. “I’m so, so sorry.”

“I feel like such a fool. I thought we were trying to work things out, but he’d already left the marriage.”

We sit there like that for a bit. I lean against him, drawing on his strength. The window’s open, and outside I can hear traffic in the distance and the hoot of the ferry’s horn as it arrives at the port.

Eventually, I push back a little and look up at him. His eyes are blazing—he’s furious.

“Are you going to pop a blood vessel?” I ask.

“I can’t believe he insulted you like that. Fucking wanker.”

I stifle a laugh. “You want to challenge him to a duel?”

“I’m thinking about it.” He rubs my arm. “What did you say to him?”

“I said I agreed.”

He looks astonished. “But it’s not true, is it? For you, the marriage ended the day he walked out, not when he had the accident?”

I study my hands. “He said I buried my head in the sand, and he was right. I refused to accept it was over. But it was.” I hesitate. Then I admit, “The last time we slept together was almost two years ago.”

Mitch’s eyebrows rise. “Six months before the accident?”

“Yes. So it wasn’t like the accident caused the breakdown. It was already happening. He was going to leave. And he was miserable after the accident because he didn’t want to be there.”

“That’s just awful.”

“It is. But it’s in the past. We have to look forward. And it means that if we take the accident as the start date… my divorce would come through in July.”

“Next year?”

“Yeah.” My face heats. “Um… I’m not saying, you know, we’d get married immediately or anything. But it means my life with Jayden would officially be over.”

Slowly, a smile spreads across his face, and my heart lifts.

“You like that idea?” I say softly.

He nods, brushing my wet hair back from my face. “I do.”

“I was thinking, in the bathroom, that I always worry about what everyone else wants. And I rarely ask myself what I want.”

He cups my face, his expression tender. “What do you want, Vix?”

“I want Millie to be happy. And even though she misses her dad, I know that him staying here isn’t the answer, because we were all unhappy with that. He’ll call her every week and come up here a few times a year, and when she’s bigger, she might be able to go and stay with him.”