Cindy’s POV
The beach day had been perfect, the kind of perfect I didn’t know I’d been starving for.
Alaric’s deep, rumbling laughter filled the air, reminding me of when he was twelve and playing catch with Dad in the garden.
Vicky, on the other hand, wouldn’t stop shrieking every time the waves chased her.
I felt light, sun-kissed, and whole.
By the time the sky turned peach and violet, I was already aching to get back to Damian.
I’d been texting him silly little things all day (pictures of my sandy feet, a heart drawn in the wet sand, a voice note of me saying “wish you were here, baby”), and he hadn’t answered a single one.
At first I thought he was sleeping, then working, then maybe his phone had died. But by 7 p.m., worry had started crawling under my skin like ants.
We stop
