Chapter one

The Bedroom

NOELLE'S POV

“That's it, baby. Take it.”

His voice was low and calm. Like his family wasn't forty feet away on the other side of that door.

I took it.

I bit down on my fist and took every inch of him. Roman Ashford was fucking me over his desk and I was letting him. wanting him. Falling apart slowly for him.

Because he had wanted this for a long time.

And so had I.

Three months earlier.

I found my fiancé on all fours.

Two men. One in his mouth. One in his ass. Derek was between them taking both. Making sounds I had never once heard him make with me. Not in three years.

I stood in the doorway for five seconds, my mouth ajar.

He saw me. His eyes widening with his mouth around the man's cock.

I closed the door quietly.

I went to the kitchen. I sat down. I stared at the fridge before opening it, picking up a bottle of water and gulping it down.

Derek came in twenty minutes later. His shirt was half open. He was running his hand through his hair. He always did that when he was about to explain something. I used to think it was cute.

Not anymore.

"Noelle—"

"Don't. Don't even." I said.

"It's complicated. I've been trying to—"

"Derek." I kept my voice flat. "I'm not angry."

He blinked. "You're not?"

I thought about it. I really did.

"I'm really not angry," I said. "I think I'm just disappointed. Disappointed in you as a person."

He sat down. He looked relieved and guilty and as time.

That was not reaction I was aiming for.

"We can fix this," he said. "I should have told you. I know that. But we can—"

"Please stop talking."

He stopped.

I looked at my hands. The ring on my finger caught the kitchen light. Three carats. He cried when he gave it to me. I thought that meant he loved me.

"Did you ever actually want me?" I asked. "Or was I just easy? Just — there?"

He opened his mouth.

"Don't answer that," I said. "Forget I asked.."

I got up. I opened my laptop. I booked the first solo trip I could find — Santorini, ten days, leaving in forty eight hours. Derek sat across from me and watched. He said nothing.

I closed the laptop.

"I'll sleep in the guest room," I said. "You keep the bedroom."

I didn't cry until I was in the shower. The water muffling my sobs with the door locked.

And even then it wasn't really about Derek. It was about myself. About the four years, we had been together. Building a life on something that was never real.

I cried because of that. It was not long. Then I turned off the water. Got into bed. Stared at the ceiling until morning.

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Morning came fast.

I packed one bag. Derek was still asleep. I put my key on the counter next to his coffee mug and walked out.

I didn't leave a note. There was nothing to say.

The cab smelled like air freshener and old seats. I watched the city through the window and felt nothing. Not sadness, not anger. Just emptiness. Like a room after the furniture is gone.

I had been engaged for fourteen months.

I had been unseen for longer than that.

At the airport I bought coffee and sat at my gate doing nothing. Derek called twice. I turned my phone over and left it there.

The flight was eleven hours. I slept for nine.

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Santorini warm salty air hit me as soon as I walked outside.

Sunshine that felt like it was in no hurry. I stood on the pavement with my bag and just breathed.

Okay, I thought. Okay.

The hotel was white and cute. My room had a small terrace that looked out over the bluest water I had ever seen in my life. I stood there for a long time.

I ordered food. Ate alone. Slept for twelve hours straight.

The next morning I felt almost like myself.

I put on my yellow swimsuit and went down to the beach, with stone steps and cool railing. The water was calm and the beach was nearly empty. Just me and the sea and the early morning quiet.

I waded in slowly. Floated on my back. I looked up at the sky.

This, I thought. This is why I came.

I stayed in the water a long time. When I finally walked back to shore and reached for my towel I stopped.

There was a man coming out of the water.

Not close. Maybe thirty feet away. But the sun was behind him and the water ran down his body in slow lines and he walked like a man who had never doubted himself a single day in his life. Tall. Dark wet hair. A body that had no business being on a public beach.

He didn't look at me.

He didn't need to.

I stood there holding my towel and watched him walk up the stone steps until he was gone.

Then I kept standing there.

No, I told myself. No. You came here to feel nothing. To be no one's anything. To breathe.

I wrapped the towel around myself and sat down in the sand.

The water sparkled in front of me like it had no idea what it had just done.

I was already in trouble.