“I think it did,” Henry scoffed. “I mean, look at me abiding by my mother’s rules.”

“Not entirely,” I chipped in. “You aren’t entirely like Troy.”

There was a wash of silence between us now. I feared I had triggered an unpleasant memory for Henry.

Henry clicked his tongue. “What about you?” he asked.

“What is it about me that you don’t know already?”

Henry laughed. “Did you love any sport as a kid?” Henry cut in before I could spill. “Let me guess, you were a cheerleader!”

My eyes widened because I was a cheerleader as a high schooler, and I buried my love of cheerleading when I entered medical school.

“Did my mother tell you about my obsession with cheerleading?”

Henry shook his head. “It isn't stereotypical, but you look like a woman obsessed with cheerleading as a child; maybe you were one while a sorority in college."

I rolled my eyes; it felt like Henry could see right through my childhood. "You are right," I replied. "I loved those gatherings, and I'm not even ashamed about it."

“Your mom said the same,”

I laughed hard at Henry's confession. He'd spoken to my mother; I knew she'd told him those things about me.

“I do not judge you, trust me.” Henry kissed my head again.

Of course, I knew he didn't judge me. He was the man I loved the most in the world.

“You barely speak about your dad.” Henry raised an observation that turned out to be true.

I was not ready to talk about my reservations about my father. He'd been the best father to my siblings and me, but he'd also been a busy businessman who was never around for his family. As a kid, I barely saw my father twice in a month, and his absence strained our relationship.

While growing up, I realized that my father slowly retracted from his kids; it felt like his mind was elsewhere. I was glad the suite's bell rang to interrupt me while talking about my father. Henry raised my head as he went to answer the door.

I walked behind him and sat on the sofa facing the matte green wall. Henry returned to the suite with a butler pushing a food cart into the dining room. Henry and I watched as the butler set out our dinner meal. Henry motioned for me to take his hand, telling me we'll return to our conversation about my father soon.

Henry's phone buzzed before we started the meal. The caller was his mother, who seemed displeased about Troy's secret marriage to Camille.

“Mom, Troy can take care of himself,” Henry defended his brother. “I thought you’ve always loved Camille? Something about Camille looking like you when you were younger?”

Henry’s mother expressed her displeasure to Henry because he had kept such a great secret from her.

Henry hung up the call and casually dismissed his mother's concerns. "Mother will come around eventually."

I could see that Henry didn't believe she would come around. She had held a grudge against her children for as long as possible. Henry's phone rang again during our quiet dinner, and the shocking expression on his face gave him up. The caller wasn’t Troy or Mrs. Robinson. The caller was someone too important for him to pick up the call near me. Henry excused himself from the table and went to the balcony to talk on his phone.

I tried not to notice the tension his body released during the call, but I couldn't help it. Henry looked tense, trying hard to hide it by pacing the balcony and turning his back to me.

Finally, when the call was off, Henry returned to sit beside me. "Who was that?"

"My manager." Henry's eyes told me otherwise. I nodded, hoping not to overthink it. I hoped I wouldn't be forced to check his phone.

I didn't suspect him cheating. He wouldn’t do that to me on our honeymoon. I also didn't suspect it was Julia: I wanted to believe he doesn't talk to her anymore. I feared a situation that predated his breakup with Julia. Then I feared he had knocked her up and was trying to keep the news away from me until we left the Maldives. I feared that Julia would blackmail him as a punishment for dumping her. I feared for the worst.

We ate dinner silently, as Henry failed to start a conversation. His head was not in the suite anymore. It felt like I was in the room with a shadow of Henry. Now, I was more curious than ever. I wanted to get to the bottom of whatever could ruin my honeymoon. I tried make Henry open up his worries, but my attempts had failed.

After dinner, he’d gone to the bathroom when his phone buzzed tirelessly on the nightstand. I took a peek at the caller, but they were unknown. I swiped his phone's screen and found a document that revealed that someone was blackmailing Henry. A journalist.

I held Henry's phone up when he returned from the bathroom. “Since when has this been going on?”