I drove six hours to check into my new luxury resort, only for the front desk clerk to toss a keycard at my feet.

standing out against the dark, swirling veins of the stone.

I did not look down at it again. I kept my eyes locked entirely on Justin.

The silence in the grand lobby stretched out, pulling taut like a wire about to snap. In a room designed to soothe the senses with the distant, rhythmic crash of the Pacific Ocean and the soft crackle of the massive stone continue reading …