Filed to story: Sedona Preston and Logan Hayes Book PDF Free
No message came through. I was staring at my phone screen, my vision becoming a bit blurry as I battled my eyelids.
“Logan?”
I turned to find Catherine standing in the terrace doorway, looking worried about me as she stepped forward, glancing around to see if I was alone.
“I didn’t know you’d be here. Are you okay? You look upset.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re clearly not fine.” She stepped closer, her hand reaching out to touch my arm. “Is this about Sedona?”
I pulled away from her touch, suddenly, acutely aware of how it would look to anyone watching. “I told you To be here. Why did you come?”
“My mother dragged me. She’s on the hospital board, and she insisted I make an appearance.” Catherine’s expression was wounded. “I wasn’t following you, if that’s what you’re implying.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But you thought it.” She crossed her arms defensively. “Logan, I’m your friend. I’m trying to be supportive here, being here for you when she clearly isn’t. But if my presence is making things worse with Sedona-“
“Everything makes things worse with Sedona right now. She is not speaking to me.”
“Maybe she needs time.”
“It’s been a week. How much time does she need?”
“Maybe she needs more time.” She suggested as she edged closer.
“Maybe you need to back off from me.” I snapped losing my cool as she froze, her eyes widened in surprise.
“I should go,” Catherine said after a few minutes passed and I had not apologized for my words, even though I knew it wasn’t fair and I shouldn’t lash out at her.
She left me alone on the terrace, and I stood there for a long time, staring out at the city lights and thinking about all the ways I’d failed my wife without even realizing it.
Logan’s POV
The package arrived at 9:47 AM on a Tuesday.
I know the exact time because I was in my home office, unable to go to my company because I was waiting for Sedona to come back. I was staring at a contract that had been open on my laptop for forty minutes without reading an entire word of the contents.
I’d been doing that a lot lately-staring at things without seeing them, moving through my days,m sluggishly like I was a man who had been put underwater for so long.
Mrs. Peterson knocked and brought it in herself, which was unusual. She normally left packages in the foyer.
“This came by courier, Mr. Hayes. The man said it was urgent and waited for me to sign for it.”
I looked up from my laptop. “Who’s it from?”
‘There’s no return address. Just your name.” She set it on the desk, gave me one of those looks she’d been giving me all week, the look that she was worried about me, that she was noticing the cracks in my marriage and Sedona’s disapperance with no valid explanataion to give her, but she didn’t say anything, just dropped it and left.
The package was small, padded envelope, my name written on the front in handwriting I didn’t immediately recognize. It wasn’t Sedona’s neat writing. Had she sent someone to write on her behalf?
My heart lifted anyway-traitorously, stupidly. Maybe she’d finally decided to respond. Maybe this was her reaching out, Maybe she was tired and was trying to come back home.
I opened the envelope.
Inside was a smaller envelope, and I took that out as well, opening it slowly as I looked inside and saw that it contained papers, folded neatly in thirds.
I unfolded them slowly, scanning the first page.
Petition for Dissolution of Marriage.
Sedona Claire Hayes, Petitioner, vs. Logan William Hayes, Respondent.
The words blurred, as I closed my eyes and cleaned them before reading it again, but the words remained the same.
She’d actually done it. She’d actually filed for divorce.
I flipped to the last page, looking for what I already suspected I’d find there. Her signature, neat and deliberate, on the signature line. Dated a week ago.
Sedona had signed her divorce papers a week ago and sent them to me without a single word of warning, without a phone call, without even a text message.
The anger came first, filling me so intensely I had to set the papers down carefully on my desk or risk crumpling them. Fury at her audacity, her coldness, her complete refusal to even discuss this like an adult. We had three years of marriage. We had a son. And she was ending it all through a courier like we didn’t matter.
I picked up my phone and called her number. I’d call her right now, tell her exactly what I thought about this little stunt, make her understand that this wasn’t over just because she’d decided it was.
The phone rang once.
Then: The number you have dialed is no longer in service. Please check the number and try again
I pulled the phone from my ear and stared at the screen. Tried again.
The number you have dialed is no longer in service. she’d canceled her phone. Changed her number. Cut off the last remaining thread of connection between
The fury transformed into something colder, something closer to panic. I stood abruptly, nearly knocking my chair over, and began pacing the office. Think. Think logically. Where would she go? Who would she contact?
Her workplace. She’d done some freelance design consulting before Nick was born, had a few professional contacts in the city. I found the number for her old employer and called, identifying myself as her husband.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Hayes,” the receptionist said. “We haven’t heard from Mrs. Hayes in over two years. She left the firm when she had her baby.”
The gym. She went to a gym near the house three times a week, had complained once that I never offered to go with her. I called them next.
“Mrs. Hayes hasn’t been in for about three weeks,” the front desk attendant told me. “Her membership has actually lapsed. She hasn’t renewed it.”
Three weeks. Since before she’d even left. As if she’d been planning this, quietly winding down her Chicago life before making her exit.
