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She glances down at the dress, gripping it tightly. “No, this has to be from last night. If she came into the room again, Diego would’ve seen it on her key card. When she came back here last night, when I left her in the hallway, she must’ve changed then. What was she wearing in the photographs Diego showed us? From the bar?”
“No. That doesn’t make sense. Why would she have changed just to go back down to the bar? It had to beafterthat. I’m telling you, this is a sign! Maybe a steward let her in.”
“No, Blake. Stop. Stop and think. What was she wearing at the bar with…” She hesitates, stopping herself from saying something else.
I don’t want to think about that. Don’t want to think that this isn’t proof she’s still alive. Still here. It’s the first piece of hope I’ve had all day. I need to believe this means she’s still here.
“She had to have changedbeforeshe went down to the bar last night. When Diego said she used her key card to enter the room,” Florence says finally.
“No.” I shake my head. “No.” I can’t picture it. Can’t imagine her slipping into the room, past my sleeping form, changing, and leaving again. Can’t believe she could look at me and still go through with her plan to sneak to the bar alone, to potentially meet another man.
Maybe she was in here today.
Maybe while I was searching all over the port of Cozumel for her. Or while I was nearly getting arrested in the casino.
As I replay my day, hope is replaced by anger in my chest.How could she do this to me?
“We have to tell Diego,” she says, her voice barely above a whisper. “He has to know that we found this. We have to ask him what she was wearing in that video. Now that I’m thinking about it, we only saw shots of her face. I couldn’t see what she was wearing. Getting that answer will help us narrow downwhenshe was here.”
I almost agree, but stop myself, worry pooling in my gut. “I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”
“What are you talking about?” She looks up at me.
“What will it look like if we tell him about this?” I think through the words as I say them, more convinced than ever that I’m right. “He’ll assume the same thing you did. This dress being here makes me look guilty, even to you. You know me, Florence. You know how much I love her. You know I wouldn’t do this, and you still questioned it. But he doesn’t. He already thinks I’m guilty. Maybe the entire crew does. He already thinks we had marital problems. That I hurt her or she left me. Either way, if we show this to him, it’ll just make things worse.”
She twists her lips in thought, and I silently will her to agree with me, to hear what I’m saying. “What if she left you for him, Blake?”
“She left me, yet he’s still on the boat? I saw him earlier, Florence,” I remind her, though I know she still thinks I hallucinated the whole thing. “They didn’t leave together. He’s still here.”
“What will you do?” she presses, her voice firm and slow.
“What can I do?” I ask with a groan. “At this point, there’s nothing to be done if that’s what she wants. Will it absolutely destroy me? Yes. But at the end of the day, I just want to know that she’s safe. As much as it’ll kill me, to know she’s okay would be enough for now.”
“Okay. Because I need to tell you something else.”
I feel the weight of her words as they swell and fill the room. There’s hardly any space for the two of us in here anymore.
“What?” I’m not sure I can take any more reveals.
“Do you know the name Zach Carter?” She studies my face as she asks the question.
Something about it does ring a bell, but I’m unsure of why. “It sounds familiar, maybe. Should I?”
“Possibly… He’s the man who was with Mae at the bar, the one who danced with her, who saw her across the dining room. I’m convinced he’s the man who asked me about her when we first boarded.”
“How do you know that? Why are you just now telling me? Do you know him?” I demand as the floor seems to shift underfoot. Was this another secret? Another lie?
“I just found out. And no, I don’t know him, but I knowofhim. Diego came to my room a few minutes ago to tell me they tracked him down, and I recognized the name. He swears he didn’t do anything and they searched his room, but…”
“But?”
“They used to date, Blake. They were in love, from what I know. I hadn’t heard her talk about him in years. I don’t think they were having any sort of affair. But you deserve to know the truth, so there it is.”
“There it is…” I repeat, the liquid in my stomach climbing into my throat. “I’m going to be sick again.”
CHAPTERSEVENTEEN
FLORENCE
