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His phone is on the counter.

I don’t mean to look. I’m not the kind of person who checks someone else’s phone. But the screen lights up as I pass and a notification banner sits across the lock screen bright enough to read from three feet away.

Genevieve Holiday

Everett, I’d like to schedule a call this week to discuss—

The preview cuts off there.

His aunt wants a scheduled meeting, and the fact that it arrived at midnight feels odd. What could seem so pressing that she would text him when she knows we’re in France on our honeymoon. It has to mean business with the trust.

The kind of business that Everett doesn’t talk about. Not with me anyway.

The screen goes dark again.

I keep walking toward the office.

The glass doors are open.

The room is dark.

That unsettles me more than it should.

I head for the terrace instead, sliding one of the doors open just enough to step through.

The night air wraps around me, soft and warm and carrying the scent of salt and stone and chlorine.

Then I see him.

Everett is in the pool.

Not floating. Not drifting. Not doing anything that looks remotely restful.

He's doing laps like he's trying to beat something. His body cuts through the water in hard, punishing strokes, each turn at the edge too sharp, too forceful, like he's angry at the pool for existing.

Or maybe angry at himself.

I stand there for a moment, robe pulled tighter around me, and watch him.

He reaches the far end, turns, and catches sight of me as he comes up.

For a second, he just stays there with his hands braced on the edge, water running down his face and shoulders, chest rising and falling harder than a casual midnight swim should require.

"Sorry," I say quietly. "I thought you were working."

He pushes wet hair back from his forehead. "Couldn't sleep."

"Same."

That gets me a glance. Brief, unreadable, and somehow more exhausted than anything I've seen from him in daylight.

The underwater lights turn the pool an impossible blue. They make him look almost unreal in it—broad shoulders, slick skin, black trunks hanging low on his hips, every hard line of him sharpened by shadow and water.

He moves to the side and hooks one arm over the edge.

I come a little farther onto the terrace, enough that my feet hit the damp stone near the pool.

"You swim a lot?" I ask.