Chapter 9: The Beach Party
The party had announced itself from the top of the cliff path, a thrumming bass note carried on the salt wind, tangled with laughter and the sharp, sweet tang of spilled prosecco. Leonid had told Jennie he needed air. He had told her he would walk the terraces, smoke a cigarette, clear his head. She had nodded, her dark eyes tracking him with that mixture of hope and fear that had become her permanent expression, and he had felt the familiar, suffocating weight of her gaze pressing against his back as he left the villa.
He hadn't meant to find the party. He had meant to walk, to smoke, to let the cool night air scour the day from his lungs. But the music had pulled him down the winding stone steps, past the shuttered lemon groves and the sleeping villas, toward the crescent of beach that glowed like a fallen constellation against the dark water.
The sand was littered with bodies—beautiful, half-dressed, laughing bodies. Lanterns swung from bamboo poles driven into the wet sand, casting shifting pools of amber light across the revelers. A DJ had set up on a rocky outcrop, his equipment wrapped in plastic against the sea spray, and the beat rolled out across the waves like a heartbeat made audible.
Leonid stood at the edge of it all, a shadow in the periphery, his hands in his pockets and a cigarette burning forgotten between his fingers.
"Eh, bello!" A voice cut through the noise, followed by a burst of feminine laughter. Three women had peeled away from the crowd, their eyes bright with wine and the particular hunger of a night still young. The tallest of them, a woman with a cascade of auburn waves and a dress that seemed to be made of little more than gold thread, sidled up to him with a confidence that was both practiced and genuine. "You stand there like a lost soul. Come. Dance with us."
Leonid's lips quirked, almost against his will. "I'm not much of a dancer."
"All men say that." She stepped closer, close enough that he could smell her perfume—something floral and sharp, nothing like the vanilla-and-rose scent that had followed him around the villa all day. "And all men are lying."
He laughed. It was a low, surprised sound, and it felt strange in his throat, like a muscle that had atrophied from disuse. He looked at the woman, at her bold, smiling eyes, and for a moment, he allowed himself to consider it. Just a dance. Just a few drinks. Just one night where he didn't have to be the husband, the father, the wounded party.
"One drink," he said. "That's all."
The woman's smile widened. "One drink. And then we see."
She took his hand—her skin warm, her grip confident—and pulled him into the throng. The crowd parted for him, naturally, effortlessly, the way it always did. He had spent his adult life being looked at, being wanted, and yet it never failed to unsettle him, the way people's eyes snagged on his face and lingered. The way they smiled, hoping to catch his attention, hoping to be the one to crack his careful composure.
He accepted a glass of something cold and citrusy from a boy with a tray, and the auburn woman introduced herself as Chiara. She was a model, she told him, from Milan. She had been on the cover of Vogue Italia twice. She was here with friends, celebrating a shoot that had gone well, a contract signed, a future that glittered like the sequins on her dress.
Leonid listened, nodded, laughed at the right moments. He let her hand rest on his arm, let her lean in close when she spoke, let her read his silence as mystery rather than fatigue. For an hour, maybe two, he let himself be someone else. Someone unburdened. Someone who wasn't carrying the weight of a broken marriage on his shoulders like a stone he couldn't put down.
"Your smile is sad," Chiara observed at one point, her head tilted, studying him with the precision of someone trained to read faces. "Even when you laugh, your eyes stay sad."
Leonid's smile faltered. He looked down at his glass, swirling the liquid, watching the lantern light fracture through it. "I have a lot on my mind."
"Then let me take it off your mind." She stepped closer, her hand moving to his chest, her fingers tracing the line of his collarbone. "Just for tonight. Let me make you forget."
The invitation was clear. The offer was there, shimmering in the space between them like heat haze. It would be so easy. One night of oblivion, of feeling something other than this gnawing, hollow ache. She was beautiful, and she wanted him, and for a dizzying, dangerous moment, he thought about saying yes.
And then he thought about Minho. About his son's dark eyes and his giggles and the way he reached for Leonid with such absolute trust. About Jennie, standing in the doorway of the nursery that morning, her hands wrapped around herself as if she were holding herself together by sheer force of will.
He stepped back, gently disengaging himself from Chiara's touch. "I can't."
"Can't, or won't?"
"Both." He gave her a small, apologetic smile. "Thank you. For the company. For the dance. But I have to go."
She pouted, a theatrical expression that didn't quite hide the flicker of interest in her eyes. "You're married."
"Yes."
"Unhappily?"
Leonid paused. The question hung in the air between them, weighted with implication. "Complicatedly," he said at last.
Chiara laughed, a rich, knowing sound. "Aren't they all." She reached up and pressed a kiss to his cheek, her lips lingering just a moment longer than necessary. "If you change your mind, I'll be here until sunrise."
He nodded, turned, and walked away from the party. The music faded behind him as he climbed the stone steps, replaced by the sound of the waves and the distant cry of gulls. He felt lighter, somehow, as if the brief brush with temptation had burned away some of the stagnation that had settled in his chest. He hadn't taken what she offered, but he had remembered that he could. He had remembered that he was still a man, still desirable, still capable of being wanted for more than his pain.
It was a dangerous thought. He knew it was dangerous. But as he reached the top of the cliff path and saw the lights of the villa glowing warm in the darkness, he couldn't bring himself to regret it.
The villa was quiet when he let himself in. Mina had left a note on the kitchen counter, telling him that Minho had gone down without trouble and Jennie had retired to the master bedroom. Leonid glanced at the note, then at the closed door at the end of the hall, and felt the familiar tightening in his chest.
He didn't go to her. He went to the balcony instead, lighting another cigarette and staring out at the dark sea, the memory of Chiara's kiss still burning faintly on his cheek.
He didn't notice the shadow in the garden below. The small, still figure standing among the lemon trees, wrapped in a white robe, her dark hair loose and wild around her shoulders. He didn't see the tears tracking down her face, or the way her hands were clenched into fists at her sides.
But Jennie saw him. She had followed him to the party, hidden among the rocks at the edge of the beach, watching as he laughed and danced and let another woman touch him. She had watched him lean in close to Chiara, had seen the moment of temptation flicker across his face, and her heart had cracked open anew with a pain that felt almost physical.
She had deserved it. She knew she had deserved it. She had betrayed him, and now he was free to do the same, to find comfort in another woman's arms, to forget her the way she had forgotten him for one terrible, drunken night.
But knowing she deserved it didn't make it hurt any less. It didn't stop the tears from falling, or the rage from building in her chest, or the desperate, clawing need to march up those stairs and confront him, to scream and cry and demand that he explain himself.
She didn't. She stayed in the shadows, trembling, watching the orange tip of his cigarette flare and fade as he smoked, and she tried to remember who she had been before she had destroyed everything.
She couldn't remember. The woman she had been felt like a stranger now, a ghost she could almost see but never touch.
When Leonid finally stubbed out his cigarette and went inside, she stayed in the garden for a long time, letting the night air cool her flushed skin. The moon was high overhead, casting silver light across the lemon trees, and somewhere in the distance, the party still thrummed its relentless heartbeat.
She thought about going to him. She thought about climbing the stairs, slipping into bed beside him, pressing her body against his back and begging him, wordlessly, to hold her. She thought about the way he had looked at her this morning, when they had been standing in the water with Minho between them, and the brief, fragile flicker of hope that had passed through his eyes.
She wanted that. She wanted it more than she had ever wanted anything.
But she had lost the right to want things. She had thrown that away on their anniversary night, when she had let her jealousy and her anger and her stupid, self-destructive impulses turn her into someone she didn't recognize.
She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, took a shaky breath, and went back inside. The villa swallowed her up, silent and dark, and she climbed the stairs to the bedroom she shared with a man who no longer looked at her the way he used to.
He was asleep when she slipped in. His breathing was slow and even, his dark lashes fanned against his cheeks, his lips slightly parted. He looked peaceful in a way he never did when he was awake, and she stood by the bed for a long moment, just watching him, her heart aching with a love so fierce and so broken it felt like a physical wound.
She climbed into bed, keeping to her side of the mattress, and lay on her back, staring at the ceiling. The silence stretched between them, vast and heavy, and she could feel the ghost of another woman's kiss on his cheek like a brand she couldn't see.
She didn't sleep. She lay awake for hours, listening to the waves and the wind, and she made a decision.
She was going to find a way to fix this. She was going to fight for him, for their marriage, for the family they had built. She didn't know how, and she didn't know if she deserved it, but she was going to try.
Even if it killed her.