“Since that night?” Logan’s voice barely made it past his lips, thick with disbelief, with something dangerously close to hope. His throat tightened, his heart pounding erratically in his chest. “You mean… no one since me?”
Adrian swallowed, his gaze never wavering, his hands curling against Logan’s skin like an anchor.
“No one,” he whispered.
And Logan felt something inside himbreak—something deep, something he hadn’t even known he was holding onto. “But… why?”
Adrian nodded, just slightly, as if confirming it was a good question; it was a movement so small it might have been missed if Logan weren’t watching him with the kind of wide-eyed shock that stole the breath from his lungs.
“I thought about it myself…” Adrian began. “There were the weeks I waited for you there… in Australia,” his voice was low, quiet, raw. “Then your wedding happened, and the months that followed… I wasn’t really into dating. I couldn’t even bear the thought of someone else touching me. It made me sick just thinking about it. Like my body didn’t know how to belong to anyone else. Like my skin had memorized only your touch, and anything else—anyone else—felt wrong, feltvile.”
His voice trembled on that last word, as if even saying it left a bitter taste in his mouth. Logan swallowed, unable to speak, unable to move, unable to do anything but listen as Adrian continued.
“During university, I tried.” He exhaled a soft, almost hollow laugh. “Dean pushed me into it. He signed me up for so many dating apps and practically forced me to go on dates. He even dragged me to a gay bar once.”
That should have been funny. The image of Dean in a gay bar—Dean of all people—was something Logan would have loved to tease him about. But right now, it was nothing more than background noise to the only thing that mattered.
“And?” Logan asked, his voice almost a whisper as he gently caressed Adrian’s face with his palm.
“And… nothing.” Adrian’s gaze met his. “I wasn’t ready.”
Logan felt his heart squeeze in his chest.
“I was too broken to start something new. And you know me… I don’t really do the whole one-night stands, it’s not for me… I need an emotional connection to be with someone, I need to feel something for them, or sex is just… hollow for me. But I couldn’t form it; I couldn’t… even look at a guy after you. And the few guys I did go on dates with, well… they just weren’t it.”
Logan blinked, his throat constricted, his hand tightening over Adrian’s face while he clenched the sheet with his other fist, trying to hold himself together as he felt himself being unmade from the inside out.
Adrian’s voice softened, his words laced with something achingly bittersweet, something that tasted like longing and old wounds still healing.
“They were nice, even great guys, actually. But…” He inhaled, and the breath he let out was fragile, like seafoam dissolving into sand. “None of them had gray eyes that turned storm-dark when they were angry, or softened like silver under the sun. None of them had sand-colored hair that the ocean kissed gold. None of them were reckless enough to jump off cliffs like it was nothing, or dangle over a ravine just to prove a point, just because they could.”
Logan let out a small, wet laugh, shaking his head as he remembered exactly what Adrian was talking about.
“None of them were moody enough to throw a scene at me for talking to another guy at a party, nor were they possessive enough to make any other guy that looked at me run away with one glare,” Adrian continued, smirking faintly. “Or were about to leave me altogether when I spent an hour with my friends instead of being with you.”
Logan groaned, covering his face for a moment, and Adrian’s laugh was soft, but full of something real.
“None of them made me laugh loud and honest, to the point where it hurt to laugh. None of them had that ridiculous smirk of yours, or the wild look in their eyes when they came up with some insane, reckless, yet somehow brilliant idea. None of them said my name the way you did, with that thick, hot American accent, that low, strong, sexy voice that made me shiver every damn time.”
Logan swallowed thickly, his hands trembling as he listened, as Adrian’s words stripped him down, leaving him bare and vulnerable.
“None of them made me feel like myself, not the way you did.”
Adrian’s gaze burned into him then, something unshaken, something final. He reached out, cupping Logan’s face in his hands, his thumbs brushing softly over his cheeks, grounding him in the moment.
“None of them were you, Logan.”
The words hit like a wave breaking over him, like the current pulling him under, like every breath he had ever lost since the moment he walked away from Adrian.
“And I only ever looked for you,” Adrian confessed. “So, to be honest, none of them ever had a chance. Every word they spoke, every touch they offered, every love they tried to give, every moment they tried to make special, it was always measured against you. Against us. And it paled in comparison. It was unfair of me to make them fail before they even began, so eventually, I just… stopped.”
Logan’s breath caught, his throat tightening as if constricted by a tangle of unspoken words, lingering regrets, and countless I love yous he had been trembling to voice when it mattered most.
Adrian exhaled, and the weight of it settled deep in Logan’s chest.
“I don’t take words lightly,” he whispered. “When I told you I loved you that night, I meant it. And I had loved you for a long time before I ever said it out loud.” Adrian ran his fingers through Logan’s hair. “So when my wounds finally started to heal, when I finally thought that maybe—just maybe—I could move on… and I convinced myself to give guys a true chance, to be them and not search you in every guy I meet,” Adrian’s voice broke just slightly, and he took a breath before finishing, “I got diagnosed. And suddenly, nothing mattered. Everything felt meaningless.”
Logan’s world tilted.
