The voice cuts through the water and the dark behind my eyelids, sharp as broken glass.

“What the hell, Imogen?”

My eyes fly open. He’s standing at the edge of the plunge pool, a dark silhouette against the villa’s golden lights, shirtless and dripping. I didn’t hear him approach. The water seems to turn to ice around me.

“You startled me,” I say, my voice strangely calm. A act. Always an act.

“Did I?” Sebastian’s tone is low, taut. He runs a hand through his wet hair, and I see the tremor in it. “I thought you were breaking it off with him. That was the plan. Try this. *Try us.* Not… not parade him in front of me like a fucking trophy.”

A sound escapes me—a short, brittle huff of air. A laugh that isn’t one. “Rich. That’s rich, coming from you.”

“Don’t,” he warns.

“The *engaged* guy. The one with the five-year plan that somehow omitted a whole fiancée. You let me sit there and feel like a cheat, Sebastian. You let me twist in that wind. All while you had a ring waiting back in London.”

“It’s not a ring. It’s complicated. Eleanor asked, and I hadn’t answered yet—”

Now I do laugh. A real, ugly laugh that echoes off the water. “Oh, brilliant. So you’re not *technically* engaged, you just hadn’t gotten around to saying ‘no’ to the woman your mother introduces as your future wife? Where does that leave me, then? The scheduled distraction? The mistress slot in your meticulously organized Google Calendar?”

He takes a step closer, his body coiled. “That is not what this is.”

“Then what is it? Tell me. Because from where I’m treading water, it looks like you wanted your cake and to eat it too. The safe, appropriate future with Eleanor, and the… the chaotic, dramatic fling with the messy American sister-in-law. A bit of adventure before you settle down.”

“You think that’s what this is? A *fling*?” His voice breaks on the word. “After everything I just said to you in that pool? After I told you I was *terrified*?”

“You were terrified of getting caught!” I push through the water, stopping a foot from the edge, looking up at him. “Not of losing me. There’s a difference.”

He stares down at me, his blue eyes black in the shadows. The muscle in his jaw works. “And Mark? What’s he, then? The good man you’re using as a human shield?”

The words land, precise and cruel. They’re true, and that makes them worse. “At least he’s honest,” I fire back, the lie tasting like ash. “At least he’s not pretending I’m some grand passion while he’s got a ‘complicated’ understanding with another woman. You know what the funny thing is? I thought you were this impossible, perfect standard. The unattainable, proper professor. But you’re just a coward.”

He flinches as if I’ve struck him. Good. I want him to feel it. I want him to feel this cracking, splintering thing in my chest.

“I am trying,” he grates out, each word measured, “to navigate a minefield I created. To end something with care, to not devastate my family on the eve of my brother’s wedding, and to somehow not lose you in the process. Is that cowardice? Or is it just a fucking disaster?”

“It’s both.” The fight drains out of me suddenly, leaving a hollow, cold exhaustion. I look at him—the water beading on his shoulders, the anguish etched into his handsome, serious face. “We were never compatible, Sebastian. That was the fantasy. The uptight Brit and the chaotic trust fund baby. It’s a rom-com tagline. Not a life.”

“Don’t do that,” he whispers. “Don’t reduce what’s between us to a… a *pitch*.”

“What’s between us?” I let out a shaky breath. “A few secret kisses. A lot of arguing. And you know what you are? You’re my worst regret.”

He goes utterly still.

“Not because you’re terrible. But because you made me cheat on a good man. You made me into the person my sister thinks I am. The drama. The mess. You were just… a beautiful, devastating mistake. And I can’t do it anymore.”

The silence that follows is absolute. The night-blooming jasmine smells suddenly cloying, suffocating. He doesn’t move. He just looks at me, and something in his eyes shuts down. The raw, open wound I saw earlier stitches itself closed behind a wall of pure, impenetrable ice.

“Right,” he says finally. The word is crisp, formal. Dismissive. “I see.”

He takes a step back. Then another. Putting distance between us as if I’m contagious.

“Sebastian—”

“No. You’ve made yourself perfectly clear.” He gives a short, sharp nod, the kind you’d give a colleague after a unsatisfactory meeting. “Enjoy the rest of your swim.”

He turns and walks away, his bare feet silent on the stone. He doesn’t look back. I watch him go, the broad line of his back, the tense set of his shoulders, until he disappears into the shadowy path leading to the villas.

I sink down until the water closes over my head.

The heat is a shock. It swallows everything. My own heartbeat, the faint chime of a distant bell, the ragged sound of my own stupid breathing. I stay under, eyes open, watching the steam curl and dance on the surface. I said the words.

I ended it. I should feel clean. I should feel free.

I feel like I’ve carved my own heart out with a dull spoon. The ache is a hollow, grinding thing. It’s not a clean cut. It’s a ragged tear, a brutal scooping out that leaves everything raw and throbbing and wrong. The space where it was is just a hot, sick cavity. I can feel the ghost of it beating, a frantic, useless pulse against nothing.

When I break the surface, gasping, the cedar deck is empty. The only proof he was here at all are the wet footprints on the pale wood, already vanishing in the steam.

The afternoon sun is a weight on my shoulders as I haul myself out. The water isn’t water. It’s a slow, thick syrup of light and failure. My limbs are stupid things. I fumble with the robe, the white terrycloth like sandpaper on my chilled skin. The air is a dry, hot slap. I belt the robe tight, a clumsy armor, and shove my feet into the sandals. Tying the knot is a puzzle. Walking is a theory I no longer understand. One foot. Then the other. Back to the suite. Back to Mark. The world has collapsed into this: thirty steps of scorched tile.

The villa courtyard is still, bleached in the hard light. Through the open doors, the room is a cave of cool shadow. Mark is on the sofa, scrolling. He looks up, and his face does that thing. It softens. It’s a good smile. It sits in my gut like a stone.

“Hey,” he says, putting the phone down. “How was the spa? Go for a swim?”

My hair drips a cold trail down my spine. I am a creature dragged from a different element.

“Yes, Hot,” I say. My voice is a flat, foreign object. “Refreshing.”

He stands. He comes over. He smells of clean cotton and decency. “You’re shivering.” His hand finds my arm. The warmth is an accusation. It is a blanket thrown over a corpse.

“Go shower. I ordered iced tea. It should be here soon.”

I look at his hand on the white robe. Sebastian’s touch was a fracture. Mark’s is a suture. I chose a world. I chose it in the bright, silent water. So why am I marching, numb, into this wrong room?

“Tea sounds perfect,” my mouth says. The lie is smooth and practiced. I am the girlfriend. I am fine. I turn away. “Just gonna rinse off.”

The bathroom door clicks shut. I lean my forehead against the cool glass. The water hits the porcelain with a hiss meant to drown out the silence. It doesn’t. Because beneath it, through the wall, another sound bleeds through.

Muffled voices. From Sebastian’s suite. Eleanor’s, first—tight, strained. “I saw you. By the pool. Don’t insult me by pretending it was nothing.”

My hand freezes on the tap. The water screams.

His voice is a low rumble. I can’t make out the words. Just the tone. Tired.

“I will not be made a fool of, Sebastian.” Her words are clear now, sharpened by the plaster. “Do you think I don’t see it? The way you look at her. She’s… radiant. She’s free in a way I’ll never be. And you can’t take your eyes off her.”

A pause. My heart is a frantic bird. I press my ear to the wall.

“It’s not what you think,” he says, closer now.

“Isn’t it? Our families are in the same room. Your mother and my father are watching. This alliance matters. It has always mattered. So you look at me.” Her voice cracks. “You look at me, and you stop looking at her.”

“Eleanor.”

“No. You don’t get to soothe me. I see the want on your face. It’s humiliating. I won’t stand for it. I am not some placeholder you glance past while you fantasize of the dream girl.”

“That’s enough.”

“It’s not enough! It will never be enough for me. You will be a proper husband. You will honor this. Or you will explain to both our families why you’re throwing away every piece of respect you have.”

The silence that follows is thick. I can picture him. The muscle in his jaw jumping. That terrible, still calm.

When he speaks again, his voice is hollow. “Is that what this is? A transaction of respect?”

“It’s what it has always been,” she says, but the fight has drained from her words, leaving only a raw fear.

There’s a sound—a sharp intake of breath. Then footsteps, moving away. A door slams, a distant thud.

I slide down the wall until I’m sitting on the cold floor, the robe soaking up water. The shower is still roaring. I can’t move to turn it off. He’s in there. Alone. With her insecurity hanging in the air between them, and my reflection smudged on the glass.

A proper person would get up. Would go to the good man in the next room. But she’s right. I’m just a fantasy. So I just sit on the bathroom floor, drowning in the steam, and press my palms to my eyes until I see stars.