Josephine is radiant at dinner.

I’d like to think I had something to do with it. In the suite, I pushed her backward onto the bed, stripped off her little shorts, and devoured her. Then, like the torturous tease she is, she declared that she was too hungry to go on.

I drink her in from across the linen tablecloth. Little black dress. Dark hair shining, curled with a deft hand. And her lips, perfectly pink and kissable in the candlelight.

She smiles into her wine glass and looks up at me from underneath her lashes. In the restaurant, she’s a little shy. 

“I don’t want you to feel sorry for me,” she says between bites of pork tenderloin that’s so melt-in-your-mouth that I want to order it again. It was almost too cutesy, but I couldn’t stop myself from saying I’ll have what she’s having when she ordered. I don’t regret it.

I put my fork down. “Why would I feel sorry for you?”

“Because of what happened with Rolly.”

I force myself not to roll my eyes at such a ridiculous name. “I don’t feel sorry for you.” Josie looks at me like she doesn’t quite believe me. “Not like that. I feel sorry that he was an asshole.” I shouldn’t say any more, but I do. “His loss is my gain.”

Josie grins a little. “It’s a temporary victory.”

I arch one eyebrow. “Is it?”

“God knows you won’t stay here forever. And neither will I.”

“You’re right.” I sit back in my seat, taking a break. The dinner is disappearing too quickly for my taste. “Vacations never last.”

“That’s your favorite thing about them, isn’t it?”

“It’s hard to say. I haven’t taken many.”

Josie shakes her head. “It’s too bad, Charlie. You’re missing out.”

“I never thought I was missing out on much before this.”

“Oh, don’t flatter me.”

“I will flatter you, whenever I please.”

Josie smiles, her cheeks going pink. “I don’t feel sorry for you, either.”

“Thank God. It was keeping me up at night.”

She shoots me a look across the table. “I wish your father hadn’t done all that crazy shit.”

“Me, too.” It flashes into my mind, then, what my life could have been like. Maybe it would have been the same. Or maybe I would have done all those things I dreamed about growing up. It’s impossible to say. All I know right now is that Josie is the most interesting thing on this island, or any other island. All the stupid getaway activities on the planet couldn’t compete with her. “So, Josie…” I search for a classic first date question. “I can’t remember from school. Do you have any siblings?”

Josie’s eyes go wide, and all the color drains from her face.

My mind spins into overdrive, and I follow my first instinct, which is to look over my shoulder. Her ex has to be standing there, or else someone intent on ending our lives, because she looks horrified.

“Josie? What is it?” I swivel around. She lifts her napkin to her lips and coughs ineffectually, giving me a little smile. It’s the cover-up of the century, and she’s not hiding it very well. “The look on your face—”

She feigns another cough, then drops the napkin, smiling.

“Josie.” I keep my voice level and soothing, because my entire body is on edge, like a tuning fork that’s too high-pitched to hear has been struck in the room. “You don’t have to hide from me. Even on vacation.”

Then her face crumples, and she starts to cry.

* * *

If nothing else, I’m good in a crisis.

That’s what Julia says. 

I feel like I’m having an out-of-body experience, watching her cave in like this, but first things first. We need to get out of this restaurant and to somewhere private. I’m out of my seat before I have time to think about it, gathering her up with my arm around her shoulders. At my touch, she dissolves into harder sobs, which she tries to keep muffled with her hands. It’s agonizing to hear.

On the way out, I catch the waiter by the elbow. “Box it up,” I say, following it up with my room number. 

Back in the suite, Josephine takes heaving breaths, but she can’t quite stop. I don’t know what this is. I hold her until the moment she pulls away, heading for the balcony.

Outside, in the night air, she looks toward the sunset.

I put my arms around her again.

She trembles against me, the sobs gradually subsiding. After a little while, I step back in and come out with tissues. She dabs at her eyes, sucking in a shuddering breath. Then she looks up at me, her cheeks on fire. “I’m sorry,” she whispers.

“You don’t have anything to be sorry about.” I pull her close again, and she leans into me.

“It’s not the kind of thing I would normally talk about on vacation.”

“What isn’t?” It’s been so intense, this flash flood of emotion, that I nearly forgot what started it in the first place. 

“My sister.”

My throat goes tight. “I shouldn’t have asked something like that. We do not have to talk about it, now or—”

“I had a sister,” she barrels on. “Until I was fourteen, and she was twelve. Her name was Beatrice.”

I can’t form the words. I can’t bring myself to press her. She’ll tell me whatever she wants to tell me, and no more. I just hold her. It’s the rightest thing I’ve ever done.

“A brain tumor.” She spits out the word and presses the heels of her hands to her eyes. “That’s what happened.”

“I’m so sorry,” I murmur into her ear.

“You don’t have to feel sorry for me.”

“I don’t feel sorry for you.” The words come tumbling out. “I care about you, Josephine. I care that your heart is broken. I care that you lost someone you loved. I’m only sorry that I can’t make things perfect for you. That’s all. That’s all.”

She twists in my arms and lets out one final, strangled sob, and then she’s kissing me, the salt of her tears on her lips, and I know, like I’ve never known anything before, that there’s no turning back.