Chapter 11
Ghosts of the Ocean
The sun, the sand, and the flowing streams of water remembered.
The relentless current pulling Logan back could no longer be tamed, prompting him to gather what remained of his crumbled heart, his shattered bones, and his soulless existence as he sought to rediscover the breath in his lungs, the wind in his hair, and the whisky hue of his eyes.
Logan’s fingers tapped a restless rhythm on the staircase railing, his phone pressed tightly to his ear. He stared out the window, watching the world outside move at its usual pace, a cruel contrast to the turmoil raging inside him.
“Mr. Vaughn,” the voice on the other end greeted, calm and professional. Logan wasn’t surprised that the investigator recognized his number. He’d called too often these past few days for his number to be unknown to the man; he was probably saved in his contact list under an absurd name.
“Well?” Logan’s voice was clipped, his patience razor-thin.
“Not yet,” Mr. Boyed replied, his tone measured. “Look, Mr. Vaughn, we’ve only been on this case for three days. I assure you, our team is among the best, and—”
“No, you listen to me, Mr. Boyed,” Logan interrupted, his voice hard, unsettled. “You have two more days to find him.”
“Mr. Vaughn, we are exhausting every possible resource to locate the person you’re looking for. There’s no need to call twice a day or make threats.”
“No threats,” Logan snapped. “Just informing you. I pay you enough to expect results, yet you haven’t found him. Two days, Mr. Boyed. If you fail, my money and I will take my business elsewhere.” Without waiting for a response, Logan ended the call.
Shoving the phone into his pocket, Logan hurried back to his room. It had been three days since Sandy had moved out, and three days since his meeting with Mr. Boyed, the head of one of the most reputable private investigation firms in the area. Three days since he’d hired them to track down Adrian.
His chest tightened as he threw clothes into a suitcase, the empty house echoing with every movement.
There wasn’t much to pack. This house, a gilded cage bought by his father, had never felt like his.
And now, with Sandy gone, it was easier to abandon it altogether.
Logan had already met with a real estate agent and secured an apartment, a far cry from the opulence his family insisted on.
He didn’t care. He wanted small, simple, and his.
His father was away, sparing Logan the onslaught of questions that would inevitably come.
His mother had already called, her voice dripping with concern.
His sisters, too, had tried to pry, but Logan brushed them all off with vague reassurances.
He couldn’t explain now, not when his mind was consumed with one thing: finding Adrian.
By the next morning, he was back at his desk when the phone rang.
“Found him,” Mr. Boyed said without a preamble. “I’ve just sent you photos. Please confirm if this is the man you’re searching for.”
Logan’s fingers shook as he opened his laptop, quickly navigating to his inbox. He clicked on the email, downloading the attached photos, and as the first image appeared on his screen, his breath caught in his throat.
Adrian.
He stood upon the sunlit shore, his hair—still long, as Logan recalled, though now a deeper shade of brown than golden—waved gracefully in the gentle breeze.
His broad, familiar frame appeared etched by the sun and caressed by the sea.
The sight hit Logan like a fault line giving way beneath him, sudden, violent, impossible to brace for.
His heart clenched and soared simultaneously, tears gathering in his eyes, igniting as his heart brimmed with the vision of Adrian.
After so long, after everything, there he was.
For what felt like an eternity, or perhaps just a fleeting moment, Logan sat transfixed at the screen, his heart melting. The heavy weight he had borne for so long was finally lifted, allowing a breath of fresh air to fill his lungs.
There he was—the love of his life, his soulmate—still by the waves, still listening to their song, still gazing at the horizon.
“Yes,” Logan managed, his voice cracking. “That’s him.”
“Excellent,” Mr. Boyed said. “I’ll send his address, phone number, and additional details shortly. Would you like us to investigate further?”
“No, that’s fine,” Logan replied, barely finding the words as he stared at the photo. “Just the address and number. Thank you, Mr. Boyed. I’ll take care of the payment.”
“Pleasure doing business with you, Mr. Vaughn,” Mr. Boyed said before hanging up.
Logan leaned back in his chair, his hands trembling as his eyes stayed fixed on the photo of Adrian. His heart ached with longing, each beat echoing like thunder in his chest. But beneath the pain, something else stirred—hope. A spark reignited, spreading warmth through him.
He closed his laptop, the image of Adrian still burned into his cornea, as if the light itself had branded him upon his sight.
Logan’s tears came then, soundless as they spilled in a mix of grief, relief, and the overwhelming realization that he had found him.
Finally. Logan sat suspended in time, running Adrian’s photos in his mind again and again, in endless orbit, daring to hold him not as memory, but as living presence.
He drew out his phone and composed a brief message to his father; his fingers hovered, trembling above the keys, before he pressed ‘send.’
Taking a leave of absence. Don’t know when I’ll be back.
Logan shot upright, the chair scraping back, breath trapped somewhere between chest and throat. His pulse hammered against the side of his neck, loud, insistent, as if that organ itself wanted to claw its way out.
He staggered toward the door, stopped, turned back, paced.
The office seemed to shrink around him, walls closing in, light swelling too sharp at the edges, too bright, as if the world had tilted.
His fingers refused stillness—drumming the desk, twisting the hem of his shirt, clawing at the chain of his watch. He couldn’t anchor himself.
Scenarios collided in his head, a thousand different versions of what would come next, each rising, crashing, burning out before the next began. What would Adrian say? What if he turned away? What if he never forgave him?
He pressed his palm flat against the cold glass of the floor-to-ceiling window. The city stretched below, indifferent. Cars moved like blood cells through veins. None of it could hold him.
His chest heaved. His body wanted to run before his mind caught up.
The truth fell heavy and undeniable, cutting through the storm inside him.
I found him. I’m going to him.
His pulse reverberated in his ears, a drumroll of anticipation. Yes. He was on his way to Adrian.
He tapped the pane with his knuckles, once, twice, again—too much energy with nowhere to go.
His breath fogged the glass, then vanished, then returned, quick and shallow.
He stood enveloped in a storm of thoughts and fears; yet above all, a more potent force surged within him: excitement.
An overpowering need consumed him, the need to possess knowledge, to uncover the truth.
He bolted back to his office chair and opened his laptop; it didn’t matter that he could access it from his phone.
Logic was a foreign concept to him, as his deepest desire grew from a faint hope whispered into an empty room and deaf ears, into a tangible reality he could hold as the most secret longing of his heart blossomed and expanded.
Opening the new email from Mr. Boyed, Logan carefully committed the nuances of the address to memory, his gaze lingering on the photographs and the mosaic of pixels that composed them.
His fingers hovered over the screen, yearning to trace the contours of Adrian’s skin, to feel the softness of his hair, the roughness of his stubble.
Logan grabbed his belongings and left his office without a second thought.
“Ada Mae,” Logan said as he strode past his assistant’s desk. She looked up, startled, her bright red hair falling over her shoulders as she tilted her head in question.
“Look,” Logan started, a faint smile tugging at his lips. “I’m leaving. I have no idea when I’ll be back. If my father is upset with you, just leave. Cancel everything I have on my schedule for at least two weeks. I’ll contact you when I can.”
Ada Mae blinked, her expression shifting from confusion to concern. “You can’t just cancel, Mr. Vaughn,” she tried to reason with him, standing. “You have—”
“I know,” Logan interrupted, shaking his head. “Trust me, I know. But I need you to do this. And one more thing, please book me the first flight to Israel. And don’t tell my dad where I’m going.”
Her eyes widened. “Israel? Logan, what’s going on?”
“A lot of things, Ada Mae,” he said with a deep exhale, his tone softening. “Please, just book the flight. I’ll transfer the money to Mr. Boyed now. And take the rest of the week off, okay? You’ve earned it.”
Before she could respond, Logan was already turning toward the elevator. “I’ll call you,” he called over his shoulder as the doors slid open, the words a promise left hanging in the air.
Ada Mae stood frozen for a moment, watching the elevator close. Then she sat back down, shaking her head as she muttered, “What the hell is going on with him?” But even as she sighed, she began typing, searching for flights to Tel-Aviv.
Logan tore through the building’s underground garage like a man possessed, his chest heaving as he threw himself into the car and sped out onto the street.
His hands gripped the wheel tightly, his mind spinning faster than the tires beneath him.
On the way, he called the realtor, his voice rushed and breathless.
“I’m going away for a few weeks,” he started, barely pausing to let her respond. “Please arrange for my stuff to be moved into the new apartment. I’ll make sure you have access.”
The realtor, professional as always, agreed immediately and told him she could meet him at his house in an hour with movers. Logan thanked her, ending the call before she could ask any more questions.
When he got home, Logan headed directly to his room and retrieved a black, empty suitcase.
His movements were frantic, almost desperate, as he transferred clothes from suitcases and half-packed boxes, jamming them into the empty bag without much thought.
Shirts, pants, shoes—it didn’t matter what went in or whether it made sense.
His mind was a whirlwind, teetering on the edge of panic and hope, and he couldn’t focus on anything but the looming reality of seeing Adrian again.
Pausing for a moment, Logan sat heavily on the bed, his head dropping into his hands as he closed his eyes. His heart was pounding so hard it felt like it might burst, each beat a chaotic reminder of the fear and excitement coursing through him.
“Breathe, Logan,” he muttered under his breath, forcing himself to take slow, shallow inhales.
But even as he tried to steady himself, the thought of leaving things as they were, of not going, clawed at his chest like a physical pain.
The idea was unbearable, nauseating. No fucking way, he thought bitterly, shoving the fear aside.
He stood abruptly, his hands shaking as he resumed packing.
Even as anxiety gnawed at him, the thought of seeing Adrian again sent a flicker of warmth through him, a tentative sense of relief that soothed some of the pain still lodged deep in his chest. He didn’t know what he would say, or how Adrian would react, but the idea of being near him again—of hearing his voice, seeing his face—was enough to keep him moving.
When the realtor arrived with the movers, Logan met them at the door.
Together, they quickly loaded the few remaining items into the van.
His belongings had already dwindled to almost nothing, the house more a reminder of what he’d left behind than a home.
The realtor promised to email him once everything was set in the new apartment.
She shook his hand with a polite smile before stepping away, already answering another call as she left.
Logan didn’t linger.
The house—once a monument to everything his father wanted him to be—looked exactly the same. Perfect, polished, staged. The magazine-ready furniture his father and Sandy had chosen sat untouched, as if waiting for a version of Logan who had never existed.
Even after packing up all his things, he realized he had barely left a mark. He hadn’t touched the surfaces, hadn’t claimed the space. Nothing here had ever belonged to him.
The house no longer felt suffocating, just hollow. A relic of a life that had never truly been his.
Without a second thought, he locked the door behind him for the last time and called a cab.
The ride to the airport was a blur. His stomach churned with nerves, his thoughts flipping between dread and hope. His heart felt as fragile as glass, trembling with every possibility, every fear. But he couldn’t stop now. He had to see Adrian. He had to try.
When Ada Mae texted him his flight details, Logan couldn’t help but smile faintly.
What would I do without her? He thought.
She’d asked if he needed her to arrange a hotel, but Logan told her no.
He could handle it himself. He asked her instead to keep an eye on emails from the realtor and to arrange for someone to drive his car to the new apartment once everything was finalized.
Ada Mae, ever efficient, simply replied:
Consider it done.
As the cab glided to a halt at the airport, a tumultuous wave of terror intertwined with exhilaration surged through Logan’s veins.
He grasped his suitcase tightly, exchanging a few bills with the driver before stepping into the enveloping anticipation of the terminal.
Each footfall echoed like a heartbeat, propelling him deeper into the realm of the unknown.
His heart quivered, caught in a fierce dance between trepidation and resolute determination.
Yet, one truth shone brightly amidst the chaos; Logan was destined to find Adrian.
He had no choice but to pursue this quest.