“Yes. And that’s where I found them. Standing on the beach, Hannah was squaring off, fists at her side, taunting Parker for thinking that he would ever really have a chance with someone like her. She yelled at him, ‘I’m going to be famous! Do you really think I’d end up with someone who sells cars for a living?’”

“Wait. You were there? I thought you were asleep in your tent?”

“I woke up when Hannah left. I was still half asleep and probably more than a little drunk. I didn’t see her walk away from the campsite, but I did see Parker stand up and head off. I think on some level, I knew then. That there was something going on between them. So, I followed him.”

“And you found them on the beach,” I said.

“Yes. Hannah was half-dressed. When we’d gone to bed, she’d been sleeping in one of my t-shirts, and she’d taken that off. So when I got there, she was half-naked, wearing only her underwear.”

“Yelling at Parker.”

“Yes.” James inhaled deeply, raggedly. “And of course, I immediately knew. Parker had always been better with women than I was. He knew how to play the game. How to keep them on the line, always coming back for more. But with Hannah, he’d really met his match. She knew how to play games, too. And she never lost.”

I stared at my husband. His handsome features looked even more sharply drawn than ever. The intense eyes. The high cheekbones. The severe angle of his jawline. It was a face I knew better than my own. And I thought of Hannah. That poor, beautiful girl who had her entire life ahead of her. And now the only people left to tell her story were the two men who’d been obsessed with her. Who’d viewed her as a trophy in some sort of twisted game.

“He was calling her a bitch and a whore. He told her she’d be sorry for what she’d done to him. That I was more loyal to him than I’d ever be to her. And she just laughed at him and told him he was wrong. That she could snap her fingers, and he’d be out of my life forever. And I walked up to them, stumbled really, feeling like . . . like I was in a dream. Or a nightmare, really. I asked them what was going on.”

“What did they say?”