I’m barefoot and dressed in a bikini with a plush robe on top. My closet has been unlocked. If anyone happens to come upon me, I will let them know I am going to use the pool. Again, doctor’s orders.

The first place I go to search is the kitchen hoping one of the housekeepers left their cell phone there. I’ve seen them use their phones around the house, both the ones who live on-site and the others.

The lamp over the stove is on and between that and the filtered light coming in through the large window from the garden I go through each of the drawers, check every possible place but find nothing. I go into the living room. Check there. I never searched for one before, so it’s possible there’s a landline I just haven’t come across. I look in the armoire, the drawers of the antique side tables, pause to take in the ornate gilded piano that I’ve never heard anyone play.

I leave that room behind, my gaze moving toward the corridor that leads to the library, to his study. I hadn’t seen a phone there and if he catches me in there again, he’ll kill me. I search the other downstairs rooms and the dining room, the smaller sitting room and the large one I had been in with the doctor but find nothing.

I walk back into the center of the large hall and turn a circle to see if there is any place I’ve missed. The bedrooms upstairs are locked and if any are open, they’re not in use. I went through every unlocked room when I first had permission to roam.

I walk into the dining room and remember the night we ate in here. I stand at the window in exactly the place he’d stood, where he’d looked so solemn, so lost in thought staring out into the garden. I wonder now if it was his own reflection he had been studying in the glass and not the garden at all.

Walking to the liquor cabinet, I open the doors and move bottles around, not even sure what I’m hoping to find anymore. When I see his brand of scotch, I open it, sniff the contents. This scent lingers in his office, too.

I put it back then bend to open the drawer.

“What are you doing?”

I jump hitting my head on the shelf above before straightening and spinning to face Santiago. How did I not hear him?

“I…nothing.” I close the drawer then the doors of the cabinet before hiding my hands behind my back as if to hide my guilt. I struggle to hold his gaze.

Tell him the truth. Tell him now.

His gaze moves to the cabinet. I notice the drops of rain on his hair, his shoulders. He must have just gotten home.