Page 87 of Cara

There she is.“I’ll sleep with one eye open then.”

“Good.”

“And this man? He just took you in as a good Samaritan?”

Sophie’s eyes slant. “You know I like you jealous.”

“He’s had you for a year.”

“Heneverhad me.”

I think she emphasizes theneverfor my sanity. “Well, he’s a fool not to want you. I'm okay if he’s a fool?—”

“I never said he didn’t want me.”

She laughs, amused by how quickly that irks me. Still, irritation feels impossible when she’s looking at me with clear eyes.

As I continue to gaze, that playfulness in her shifts into something much more serious.

“How can I look at anyone else… when I’ve had the best?”

Fuck.

After a sleepless night and a day of battling emotions, those words are powerful enough to save me. To overpower the incessant voice in my head convinced she could do better.

“That’s my line, cuore mio.”

Hours have slipped by.

Blissful hours spent on the sand, her face nestled against my chest. We chose not to bring books, music, or any distractions. It’s been over an hour since she last said anything, but the movement of her hands shows she hasn’t been lulled to sleep by the heat.

Neither of us mentions the phone lying on the sand that hasn’t stopped vibrating. Eventually, I’ll have to take the call,leave this seclusion, and answer for my absence. I’ll have to show her the parts of me she couldn’t possibly love and hope she’ll stay—but for now, I need this. The corners of the quilt underneath us waft, held down by our shoes.

“You’ll burn,” I say, grazing my knuckles over her skin, as soft and as pale as the sand we’re lying on. She answers me by squeezing tighter, unaware of my tired smirk.

“You’re bigger,” she observes eventually, nuzzling into my shirt. “Wider here, I mean.”

“I work out often. It’s the only time of the day I'm alone.”

She falls silent again, and I instantly wish I hadn’t said it. I should have held back my honesty regarding life outside this beach.I can’t lose her. I can’t?—

“You’ve given up so much.” She lifts her head, resting her chin on me. That lost look has returned to her eyes.

“I wasted the freedom you gave me,” she whispers.

I shake my head.

Anything was better than where she was.

Maybe it hasn’t hit her that I’ve seen how thin she got, how rare it was for her to leave the apartment in Madrid. I’ve witnessed firsthand how my father destroyed her. Hoping that she would live a decent life after that was merely wishful thinking. “You’re in pain.”

You’reinpain.

Not was.

It’s still very much thriving in her.

“I didn’t want normalcy without you. Not knowing what you went through to give me it.” She closes her eyes, tormented by whatever she sees. “I know you. You’ll never tell me what he did, but this?” She reveals my torso. The sun highlights what was hidden in the subdued light of the bedroom. The small linear scars—and the ugly twisted ones—gleam brighter than the rest of my skin. She pays no attention to the unsavory texture, tracing them in silence.