CELESTE’S POV
Even now, the memory was sharp enough to make my stomach twist.
Catherine’s villa in the Maldives had always carried a strange kind of quiet. It wasn’t peaceful. It was the sort of quiet that felt deliberate, like the walls themselves were listening.
The air smelled faintly of salt, drifting in from the ocean cliffs below. In the distance, waves crashed rhythmically against the rocks, the sound muffled through the villa’s thick glass windows.
Inside, everything was immaculate and controlled—polished marble floors, pale stone walls, and long corridors that echoed faintly with every step.
For the past several days, I had been weighing the same thought over and over in my mind.
Leaving.
Catherine’s project had stalled. Weeks of examinations and “energy readings” had produced nothing she seemed satisfied with.
