Yasmin moved slowly toward the edge, coming alongside Defne as the ship approached.

“It makes you feel tiny, doesn’t it?” Defne shouted to be heard over the noise of the incoming ship.

Yasmin nodded and watched the dark swirling water several feet below the dock as it sloshed against the pilings underneath from the force of the ship’s propellors.

“Do you suppose this is the last thing Caria saw before she died? The massive front of a ship and the raging water?” Defne yelled the words in Yasmin’s ear, her voice excited, her eyes taking on a feverish look.

Yasmin tried to step back, a prickle of awareness creeping through her and setting her hair on end. Why would Defne bring her out here and start talking about her brother’s dead wife? It made Yasmin uncomfortable. Defne caught her arm in a surprisingly forceful grip.

“I want you to see,” she said, her expression twisting with malice. “I want you to see what she saw.”

Yasmin shook her head and tried to step back, looking around for Henry. The big bodyguard was staring back at them, his brows pulled down in a frown. When Yasmin caught his gaze, he shook his head and beckoned her to move away from the edge of the dock.

She tried to pull her arm from Defne’s grip, but she refused to let go. “You’re just like her.”

“Let me go,” Yasmin shouted. “I want to go find Volkan.”

At Volkan’s name, Defne’s face transformed once again, this time into a mask of pure hatred.

“You can’t have him,” she said in a voice that Yasmin barely recognized. In fact, she didn’t recognize anything about the sweet and flighty girl. The Defne she’d gotten to know over the past several months was no longer there, if she ever existed. In her place was a woman whose face reflected grim determination.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she tried pleading with Defne while keeping Henry in her peripheral.

“He’s mine!” Defne shouted, digging her nails into Yasmin’s arm with enough force to cut. “He’ll never be yours!”

Yasmin cried out and twisted around, shouting, “Henry!”

Without pause, Henry responded to the panic in his mistress’s voice, sprinting toward them. He wasn’t close enough, though.

Defne looked at something past Yasmin’s shoulder. “I’m sorry you have to see this, mother.”

Yasmin turned her head, catching sight of Narin who was standing several feet behind the two women, her purse clutched in her hands, a stricken expression on her face.

Yasmin tried to fight the inevitable. She shoved Defne and tried to hurl her body toward Henry as he approached, but he was too late and her efforts weren’t effective. Defne dug her fingers into Yasmin’s shoulders and shoved her toward the edge of the dock.