Chapter 2

I always assumed ghosts couldn't feel physical pain, but watching them together sent sharp, searing aches straight through my chest.

I remembered the time Logan kicked me out of his car in the pouring rain just so he could rush to the airport to pick up Chloe. By the time I managed to hail a cab and get home, I was soaked to the bone and burning up with a dangerously high fever.

Martha had spent half the night dabbing my forehead with damp towels and trying to get medicine into me until Logan finally came home.

Martha handed him the fever reducer, frantic. "Mrs. Vance is unconscious, and she won't swallow the pills."

And what had Logan said?

"If she won't swallow them, leave her alone. What am I supposed to do about it?"

"It's just a fever. Nobody dies from a simple cold."

He complained that my body smelled like sweat and turned around, walking into the guest room to sleep.

If I had let my heart die that night and walked away from him, would I still be alive right now?

Sadly, there were no second chances.

Logan patiently fed Chloe the entire bowl of soup, coaxed her to sleep, and only then sat at the nearby desk to open his laptop.

He was actually going to stay by her side all night.

A hollow laugh escaped me. My marriage had been an absolute joke, and I was the biggest fool of all.

Logan never allowed me to disrupt his work. He never tolerated me asking him to stay with me just because I felt sick.

He always said he wasn't a doctor. If I was sick, I should go to a hospital instead of calling him, because his presence wouldn't make the pain go away.

Yet here he was, working from Chloe's bedroom just because she twisted her ankle.

My nose stung, and cold, phantom tears slid down my cheeks. I had always known he didn't love me.

I had just refused to believe it.

Now, death had finally forced me to face reality.

Chloe's sleep was restless. She began tossing and turning, mumbling under her breath.

Logan closed his laptop and hurried to her bedside. Chloe suddenly turned and clung tightly to his arm.

"No... please, don't! Stop!"

"Chloe? Chloe?" Logan gently patted her shoulder, trying to wake her.

Her brow knit together tightly, fine beads of sweat forming across her forehead as if she were in agony.

With a sharp gasp, she jerked awake.

"Logan!" Seeing him right beside her, she threw her arms around him, burying her face into his chest.

"I had a nightmare... I dreamed about Elena pushing me. It was terrifying! If the ground hadn't been flat right there, she would have shoved me straight off the cliff!"

"I... I swear I never wanted to take you away from her! I just... I just wanted us to be friends..." She burst into sobs.

Logan stroked her hair gently. "Shh, it's okay. It was just a dream. It's over."

"You're safe. You just twisted your ankle, and I already punished her for what she did."

"Don't cry. I'll call her right now and make her come here to apologize to you."

After comforting the trembling girl in his arms, Logan grabbed his phone from the nightstand and dialed my number again.

The same automated voice replied that the phone was turned off. Logan clicked off the call in disgust.

"Elena is completely out of line. Shoving you was bad enough, and now she refuses to even answer my calls! I've spoiled her rotten!"

Chloe looked at him with reddened eyes. "Logan, maybe Elena is just upset that you left her on the mountain. Girls are afraid of the dark, and you took her flashlight away."

Logan sneered. "I didn't take her phone, did I? Phones have flashlights. Is she too stupid to use her own screen?"

What Logan didn't know was that on a pitch-black mountain trail, a tiny phone flashlight couldn't illuminate the path at all.

Worse, my battery had been almost completely drained.

Chloe had suddenly called us that night, demanding to watch the sunrise. I didn't want to go, but Logan called me a buzzkill.

He insisted that since Chloe wanted to go, we had to accompany her. After all, it wasn't an everyday thing—just this once.

He even claimed that bringing me along was to give me peace of mind, proving there was nothing inappropriate between him and Chloe.