I sat back on the lounger, watching them splash and play and laugh in the sparkling water of the infinity pool, the ball thrown back and forth as if none of them had a care in the world. Just an evening swim, an escape from the cloying heat, a refreshing dip in between drinks, Sean standing in the deep end, trying to catch my eye, trying to give me his smile, that smile, the one that had made my stomach do somersaults back when we first met. His charming, twinkling smile that felt as though we were sharing a private joke just between the two of us. A secret club that no one else could join.

Not any more, though. Now his smile just made me feel a plunging heartbreak so deep, so dark, that I couldn’t see the bottom. I knew, as surely as I’d ever known anything, that he had been on the point of confessing in the kitchen half an hour ago. He was about to tell me everything but had pulled back at the last moment. Why? Why waste time? Why not just get it over with? Perhaps he didn’t want to do it while we were away, in front of all our friends. That was it; he wanted to be on home turf, on familiar ground.

His words rang in my head.

I’m sorry.

At least the fact that he was here in front of me, in the pool with our daughter, meant that he couldn’t be with her. With Izzy. I wondered what their plan was, how they would do it. Was I supposed to just wait until he decided to tell me, until I found more of their secret messages, until they were caught in the act? Was I supposed to just sit and wait until I was told my marriage was over?

No. That wasn’t going to happen. If Sean didn’t have the guts to tell me, then I would force the issue – confront Izzy and make her admit it, get it out there in the open. Tonight. When she returned from whatever it was she was doing.