Rob stepped closer, both of them looking out the window at the ocean, so close their cheeks were nearly touching. “You deserve thanks for loving me in the first place. For showing me what love was, for teaching me about desire and what it means to feel connected to someone else so profoundly. I mean it. Even if I never saw you again, even if you never wanted to speak to me again, I would be grateful that you made me feel that way.”

Emily turned toward him.

Then he turned, too, the air between them electric. But Emily remembered how she’d fallen apart last time their lips met. How guilty she’d felt. It seemed he remembered it, too.

“Want to go for a boat ride?” he asked, his breath warm on her cheek. “We have about an hour and a half to kill.”

“Sure,” she answered, fearing that if they spent more time together, alone in this villa, they would end up doing something she would regret. “Which room’s mine?”

Rob pointed across the living room. “I took the one upstairs, so the one down here’s yours. Just through that hallway.”

“I’ll be out in a minute,” Emily said, and went to change.

The room was beautiful—just as perfectly decorated as the room in the Gregory Hotel she and Ezra didn’t spend the night in together. The sheets felt like silk, and there was a towel in the shape of a bird sitting on the bed. Emily pulled out her phone and turned it on. She saw a new text from Ari. Did you make it to Mexico? Are you okay? And then saw that there were seventeen more. Instead of reading them or listening to Ari’s voice mail, she gave her sister a call.

“What’s going on?” Ari said the minute she picked up the phone. “Are you leaving Ezra?”

Emily took a breath. “No,” she said. “I’m not leaving Ezra.”

“So what are you doing in Mexico?” Ari asked. “Are you at a yoga retreat or something?”

“I’m with Rob,” Emily answered quietly, cringing, waiting for her sister’s disapproval.

“You’re what?!” Ari said. “So you’re not leaving Ezra, but you’re having an affair?”

“No!” Emily said. What could she say to make her sister understand? “I’m performing. When I saw Rob, when I played on stage, it was like I finally became my whole self again. And Ezra basically said he doesn’t want me to change. So when Rob invited me to play with him, I came to see if pursuing music was worth potentially giving up my husband. If it really would feel like I imagined.”

Ari was quiet for a while. “I want you to be happy, Em. But . . . are you sure this is the way to figure this out?”