Page 99 of The Lost and the Found

Logan

I paced upand down the corridor of the empty apartment, feeling way too fucking restless to do anything else.

I hadn’t been able to focus on anything at work today, and finally, around three, perhaps because they were tired of how distracted I was, both Mason and Gage had told me to go home. I only went because I had felt so fucking useless there.

Though I wished I hadn’t, because since I’d been home, I hadn’t been able to do much of anything except for thinking about Hayden.

I knew I should probably leave her alone. Give her some time to think, but I didn’t want to.

I didn’t want her to think about walking away from me, I didn’t want her to be consumed by Clarissa’s appearance and try to guess what it might mean, and I didn’t want her so far away from me, period.

I needed her close by.

I was fucking obsessed.

And she needed her space… didn’t she?

I didn’t know anymore. In my thirty-four years of life, I had never felt as lost as I did now, not even when I had been a homeless teenager with a sister who depended on me. Or perhaps it was because I had Veena depending on me that I couldn’t afford to be lost, but I was now, and I didn’t know what the right call was.

Should I go see her or give her the space she asked for? I didn’t know. But it was close to midnight now, and I was nowhere tired enough to go to bed. I doubted I would be able to get any sleep tonight, not when all I could think about was Hayden in her apartment alone, unprotected.

When I first found her, I had felt protective toward her right away. But it had more to do with me wanting to protect Mathew’s daughter than anything else.

Now, I needed to protect her, to care for her, because I loved her.

I was in love with Hayden Bishop, and fuck me if she didn’t know it. Did she think I acted like this with every woman I dated before her? Because I was losing my goddamn mind over loving her.

And she didn’t make it easy.

Or perhaps it was too fucking easy, and when she fought my hold on her every step of the way, I didn’t know what to do about it.

I loved her, but God help me, I didn’t know how to hold onto her, and that was fucking scary as hell.

“Fuck it,” I muttered to myself in the silent room, grabbing my key.

I didn’t notice the chilly air on my walk out to from the elevator to my car. I didn’t even notice empty streets, or the late hour, or anything, for that matter. I made it to her apartment by the time one o’clock rolled around.

Her neighbor, Kenny, was outside when I walked inside the building. He was just sitting on a lawn chair he had placed outside his door in the hallway, and he was sipping a beer.

He watched me warily as I passed him, but I didn’t care what he did, as long as he left my girl alone.

I got to the front door and knocked on the tattered wood, taking in the apartment number on her door, hanging upside down due to a missing screw at the top of it.

Five minutes passed and no one answered. I called her phone, but when it got to the third ring, I knew she wasn’t going to pick up. I hung up when I got her voicemail.

My heart pinched in worry and I turned to Kenny. “Is she here?” I asked. Where else could she go? She didn’t have work tonight, and Hayden didn’t like to go anywhere unless she really had to.

He nodded. “She was here earlier when I stopped by for some sugar.”

I frowned at that and took a step toward him. “Sugar?” That better not be his way of asking her for sex. If he so much as disrespected her again…

He raised both of his hands up and moved back in the chair. “Woah, man. I mean sugar. Me and my girl were baking cookies earlier when we realized we didn’t have any sugar. I dropped by to ask Hayden and she gave us some, that’s all.”

“That’s all?”

Even from where I stood, I could see his hard swallow. “That’s all, I swear.”

I didn’t say anymore. I turned back to the door, but his words stopped me in my tracks. “She looked sad today.”

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