Chapter 4

Graham Hobbs POV:

The world blurred. The words of the Coast Guard officer were a muffled roar in my ears, indistinguishable from the thumping of my own heart.

"Mr. Hobbs? Are you hearing me?"

"No," I choked out, my voice raw, unfamiliar. "No. That's impossible. Aaren... Aaren wouldn't. She couldn't."

The officer, a grim-faced man named Miller, stepped forward. His expression was one of practiced sympathy, but it barely registered. "Mr. Hobbs, we found her sailing bag. Her identification. And this." He held out a small, waterlogged sketch pad. "It was in the cabin. The one you identified as hers."

My eyes fixed on the pad. The cover was warped, but the faint outline of a half-finished bird, its wings spread wide, was still visible. Aaren's signature style. My vision tunneled.

"The yacht was found adrift, about ten miles offshore," Miller continued, his voice monotone. "There was evidence of a struggle, a broken mast. It appears she may have gone overboard during the storm that suddenly swept through last night."

Storm? Last night? No. I had been with Elia. We had been celebrating our award, caught up in the excitement. The weather forecast had been clear.

"We initiated a full search and rescue operation at dawn," Miller stated, "but with the ocean currents and the time elapsed... the chances are, I'm afraid, extremely slim."

"No!" The word tore from my throat. "She was fine! I just spoke to her yesterday! She was going for a solo trip, for her birthday. She was looking forward to it. Why would she... why would she go out in a storm?" My mind scrambled, trying to find a logical explanation, an escape from this unthinkable reality.

"Mr. Hobbs, we tried to reach you last night," another officer interjected, his tone a little sharper. "Your emergency contact was Elia Garza. We notified her first, but your phone was unreachable for hours."

My blood ran cold. My phone. I looked down at my hand. It was in my pocket, dead. I remembered turning it off, at Elia's insistence. "Just for tonight, Graham," she'd said. "Let's just celebrate. No distractions."

"Why didn't you call me?" I roared, my gaze swinging to Elia, who stood pale and shaky a few feet away. "Why didn't you tell me sooner?"

Elia flinched, her eyes wide with what looked like genuine fear. "I... I tried, Graham. But your phone was off. And then... and then I got so worried. I didn't know what to do." Her voice trembled.

"You knew!" I snarled, taking a step towards her. "You knew she was out there! Why didn't you insist I go after her? Why didn't you make me turn on my phone?"

"How was I supposed to know?" Elia shot back, tears finally streaming down her face. "You said she wanted to be alone! You said it was her birthday wish! Maybe if you had been more present, you would have known she was actually in danger!"

Her words, meant to deflect blame, instead struck me like a physical blow. More present. The phrase echoed in my skull. I remembered Aaren's quiet demeanor at the gala, her almost desperate request for a solo trip, her insistence that I go with Elia, freeing me up for other obligations. Her "birthday wish" for solitude, her "need to clear her head." I had been so focused on my own achievements, on Elia's praise, that I had dismissed her subtle pleas.

The truth, a monstrous, suffocating thing, began to crystallize. Aaren, alone on that yacht. The storm hitting. Her desperate struggle against the elements, against the rising tide. And me, oblivious, celebrating with Elia, my phone off, unreachable.

My stomach lurched. The sheer, unadulterated horror of it. She had been out there, fighting for her life, and I had been reveling in mine. The lucky charm. The pocket watch. Forever, Elia. It beat against my temples, a relentless drum.

A wave of crushing guilt, so powerful it buckled my knees, swept over me. All those times I had ignored her, dismissed her art, prioritized Elia. Every whispered complaint, every suppressed sigh, every lonely night she had spent in our too-big house, while I chased after success and validation with my "soulmate." I had killed her. Not with my hands, but with my neglect, my indifference, my monumental selfishness.

The image of her, vibrant and gentle, flashed in my mind, then morphed into a vacant space where she once stood. The silence of her absence was deafening. The world tilted on its axis.

"Get out," I rasped, pointing a trembling finger at Elia. "Get out of my sight."

Elia stared, her face a mask of shock. "Graham, what are you talking about? We need to stick together-"

"I said GET OUT!" My voice cracked, raw with grief and rage. "You! You were always there! Always a distraction! Always pulling me away!"

She recoiled, finally understanding the depth of my fury. She turned and fled, her heels clicking rapidly on the polished floor.

I had to find her. I had to. Even if it was just her body. I had to. A desperate, frantic need clawed at my chest. I would tear the ocean apart with my bare hands if I had to. I would make things right. I would find my Aaren.

My Aaren. The words felt like a mockery. She was never truly mine. I had simply owned her, like another one of my possessions. And now, she was gone.

I swore to the empty room, to the vast, indifferent ocean, that I would find her. I would bring her home. And then, I would spend the rest of my life making amends for the unforgivable sin of taking her for granted.

Aaren Crane POV:

They believed me gone.

They searched. Futilely.

I was a ghost in the wind, a whisper in the waves.

The irony was, I had never felt more alive.

The past two years had been a canvas of quiet solitude, painted with the hues of anonymity. My existence here was a deliberate erasure, a meticulous dismantling of the person I once was. No grand gestures, no dramatic pronouncements. Just a steady, methodical rebuilding, brick by quiet brick. I had prepared for isolation, for the profound silence of a life unshared. The world believed I was lost to the sea. They were half right. I was found, but not by them.