"Sam!"

I drove my shoulder into the heavy wood, forcing the door backward.

Ryan cursed, stumbling out of the way as I shoved past him into the living room. My sneakers skidded on the hardwood, narrowly missing a stack of flattened cardboard boxes. I ignored the mess. I ignored the tall man rubbing his shoulder behind me.

My eyes locked onto the far wall. The red string. The eight-by-ten glossy print.

"Get away from that," Ryan snapped. His heavy boots thudded against the floorboards as he crossed the room.

I reached for the photograph. The man on the dock. The wind blowing his dark hair. The exact slope of his cheekbone.

Before my fingers could brush the photo paper, a large, calloused hand clamped over my wrist.

"I said back off," Ryan warned. He pulled my arm down, stepping between me and the makeshift bulletin board. His broad chest completely blocked my view.

"Move," I demanded, pulling against his grip. "That is him. That is Sam."

"You are seeing things." Ryan released my wrist and crossed his arms. "That is a stranger. A guy standing on a pier in Nova Scotia."

"You expect me to believe that?"

"I expect you to respect my apartment." He pointed a finger toward the open doorway. "That photo is B-roll reference for a documentary I shot two years ago. I do not know the guy's name. I never even spoke to him."

"You pinned a random man to your wall?"

"It is a location scout board, Della. We map out visual tones." His jaw tightened. "Now, please leave."

"No." I stepped closer, tilting my chin up to meet his dark, frustrated gaze. "You are lying to cover for him. Or you are him, playing some twisted game."

"I am not playing a game."

"Prove it." I grabbed his right forearm, flipping it palm up.

Ryan tried to yank back, but I dug my nails into his skin, holding fast. I dragged my thumb across the center of his wrist, searching for the jagged, raised skin where a rogue fishing hook had torn Sam's flesh four years ago.

Smooth skin met my touch. A faint network of blue veins. No scar.

I dropped his arm. My chest tightened.

"How do you take your coffee?" I asked, my voice dropping to a rapid, frantic whisper.

Ryan massaged his wrist where my nails had dug in. "What?"

"Answer the question. How do you take your coffee?"

"With almond milk and two packets of sugar," he said, his tone flat and unyielding.

"Sam drinks it black." I stared at his unmarked wrist. "He hates sugar. He says it ruins the roast."

"Then I am definitely not Sam."

I looked back up at his face. The identical jawline. The exact same cheekbones. But the eyes were wrong. Sam's eyes crinkled when he was annoyed. Ryan's eyes just looked tired.

A heavy, suffocating weight pressed down on my lungs. The frantic energy that carried me across the hallway evaporated, leaving me hollow. My knees trembled. I wrapped my arms around my stomach, fighting the sudden, sharp sting behind my eyes.

I failed. He was not Sam. The photo was a coincidence. The face was a cruel trick of genetics.

I waited for the lecture. I braced myself for the pitying sigh, the fake smile, the inevitable phone call to my mother to come collect her crazy daughter.

Instead, Ryan turned his back on me.

He walked into the small kitchenette. The faucet squeaked as he turned the handle. Water splashed into a glass.

I stood frozen by the documentary board, struggling to swallow the lump in my throat. I squeezed my eyes shut, refusing to let the tears fall.

Footsteps approached.

"Here."

I opened my eyes. Ryan stood two feet away, holding out a clear glass. Condensation beaded along the sides.

"I do not need pills," I whispered, backing away.

"It is just warm water." He pressed the glass into my hand, wrapping my numb fingers around the smooth surface. "Drink it. It helps with the shock."

I stared down at the water. No forced smiles. No frantic dialing of a hired boyfriend. No shouting about ghosts and delusions.

Just a glass of water.

"You are not calling my mother?" I asked, my voice cracking on the final syllable.

"You are an adult," Ryan said. He leaned against the kitchen counter, giving me plenty of space. "If you want to stand in my living room and cry, that is your business. Just do not break any more of my mugs."

A small, broken exhale escaped my lips. The heat from the glass seeped into my icy palms. I took a slow sip. The warm liquid coated my dry throat, easing the tight knot in my chest.

He watched me drink, his dark eyes entirely neutral. He did not judge me. He just waited.

"I am sorry," I said, staring at the floorboards. "I should not have barged in here."

"No, you should not have."

"My mother hired a man to pretend to be my boyfriend today." I tightened my grip on the glass. "She wants me to forget. But I cannot. Sam is out there."

Ryan did not offer a comforting lie. He simply nodded once, acknowledging the statement without endorsing it.

I set the empty glass on his folding table. The laptop screen beside it was dark, reflecting my pale, exhausted face.

"I will leave you to your unpacking," I told him, turning toward the door.

My hand found the brass knob. The cool metal felt grounding after the chaos of the afternoon. I pulled the door open, ready to face the empty hallway and the closed door of my own apartment.

"Della."

I paused, looking over my shoulder.

Ryan stood by the makeshift bulletin board, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his dark jeans. He stared at the photograph of the man on the dock.

"That Sam you mentioned earlier," Ryan asked, his rough baritone slicing through the quiet room. "Is his last name Beckett?"

Ryan Vance's POV

Della froze with her hand on the brass doorknob.

"What did you just say?" she asked. Her voice dropped to a harsh, scraping whisper.

She turned around slowly. Her knuckles were stark white where she gripped the silver pocket watch. The exhaustion that had drained her face seconds ago vanished completely. A feverish, desperate energy replaced it.

"I asked a question," I said, keeping my tone perfectly level. "Is his last name Beckett?"

"Why would you ask that?" She let go of the doorknob. She took a slow, measured step back into my living room. "How do you know that name?"

I did not answer her right away. I needed to verify what I thought I remembered. I walked past her, heading toward the small oak desk pushed against the far wall. My heavy boots thudded against the floorboards.

"Answer me," Della demanded. She trailed right behind me, her sneakers silent on the wood.

"Give me a second," I told her.

I reached the desk and pulled open the top drawer. A mess of old receipts, loose batteries, and folded documents filled the cramped space. I dug past the junk, pushing aside a tangled mess of charging cables. My fingers brushed against a yellowed file folder.

Three years ago, I shot a maritime logistics documentary off the coast of Nova Scotia. The production company handed me a thick communications roster on the first day. Halfway through the shoot, a severe squall hit the area. A surveying vessel went down in the storm.

I pulled the folder out and flipped it open.

My thumb traced the edge of the printed spreadsheet. I scanned the columns. Crew names. Radio frequencies. Emergency contacts.

And at the very bottom, under a section marked Unaccounted For.

Beckett, Samuel. Deck Engineer.

I stared at the black ink. My chest tightened. I remembered the absolute chaos on the radio that night. I remembered the Coast Guard cutters slicing through the freezing rain, their spotlights cutting through the dark water. I never met the guy. I just pinned up a piece of B-roll reference footage on my wall to match the visual tone of the project. A random guy standing on a dock.

"Ryan," Della said.

I looked up. She stood two feet away. Her eyes were wide and bloodshot. She looked like a stiff breeze would snap her in half. Her mother was paying actors to pretend to be her boyfriend. Her family treated her like a mental patient. She was clinging to a pocket watch like it was a life raft.

If I told her the truth right now, she would break. If I handed her a piece of paper confirming her fiancé was on a missing persons list from a wreck I documented, she would not just cry. She would shatter into a million pieces right here on my floor.

"Where is the paper?" she asked. She stretched her neck, trying to look over my forearm.

I snapped the folder shut.

"Nowhere," I said.

I shoved the folder back into the drawer and slammed it closed. The wood rattled loudly against the desk frame.

"You found something," Della insisted. She reached for the drawer handle.

I stepped in front of her, blocking the desk entirely with my body. "I made a mistake."

"Do not lie to me." She shoved her hands against my chest. Her palms felt cold through my cotton shirt. "You just said his name!"

"I worked with a sound technician named Beckett last year," I lied. I kept my voice flat and unyielding. "I got my wires crossed. I thought maybe I heard you mention the name in the hallway the other day."

"I never said his last name in the hallway."

"Then I guessed," I said. "It is a common name."

"You do not just guess a name like that!" she yelled. Her voice cracked on the final word, echoing off the bare walls of my apartment.

"I remembered it wrong, Della." I crossed my arms over my chest. I forced myself to look down into her frantic eyes without flinching. "I am sorry. I do not know your fiancé. I do not know what happened to him. I just remembered a guy from a sound crew."

She stared at me. Her chest heaved with rapid, shallow breaths. She searched my face for any sign of deception. She watched the corners of my eyes. She tracked the steady rise and fall of my shoulders.

I gave her nothing. I kept my jaw relaxed and my eyes dull. I gave her the same exhausted, unbothered look I gave producers when a shoot ran twelve hours overtime.

"You are hiding something," she whispered. Her voice trembled.

"I am unpacking boxes," I replied. "And you are trespassing."

She looked past me. She stared at the closed drawer for a long, heavy moment. Then she looked at the corkboard on the wall. She stared at the photograph of the man on the dock.

"He is out there," she said. It was not a plea this time. It was a promise.

"Then you should go find him," I told her. "Because he is not in my apartment."

Della backed away. She did not break eye contact until she reached the threshold. She stepped out into the hallway and pulled the heavy door shut behind her.

The brass latch clicked into place.

Silence flooded the room.

I let out a harsh exhale and ran a hand over my face. My muscles ached from the tension. I turned away from the desk and walked over to the front door. I pressed my shoulder against the solid wood, listening for any sound in the corridor. I heard the faint, heavy thud of her apartment door closing across the hall.

I stayed by the door for a long time.

My eyes drifted back to the wall. The red string. The eight-by-ten glossy print hanging in the center of the chaos.

The man on the dock faced the ocean. The wind whipped his dark hair. The camera angle caught the sharp line of his jaw.

I rubbed the back of my neck, feeling the rigid cords of muscle. The resemblance was uncanny. I shot that footage from a moving ferry. The guy was just a shape in the distance, a nameless extra in a documentary about shipping lanes. But the roster in my desk proved he was real. And he was missing.

I needed to check the dates on that spreadsheet. If the squall hit before she lost contact with him, the timeline did not make sense. I needed the exact dates.

I pushed off the door and walked back to the desk.

I reached down and grabbed the brass handle of the top drawer. I pulled it open.

The yellowed file folder was gone.

I froze. I stared into the cluttered space. Receipts. Loose batteries. A tangled phone charger.

The communications roster was missing.

Sitting precisely where the folder had been just five minutes ago was a smooth, gold-plated metal tube.

I reached in and picked it up. The casing felt heavy and cold against my palm. I pulled the cap off.

A stick of bright, glossy crimson lipstick twisted up from the base.

Della wore no makeup. Her lips were pale and chapped. She had not come anywhere near this drawer while I was blocking it.

And this color was brand new.

I shoved my key into the deadbolt of apartment 11A. The brass lock turned with a heavy clunk. I pushed the door open, expecting to find my mother still standing in the foyer, writing a check to the actor she hired to play my boyfriend.

The entryway was completely empty. The apartment was dead quiet.

Then a voice drifted from the living room.

"You always did leave your keys in the lock, Dell."

I froze. My fingers tightened around the silver pocket watch still resting in my palm.

Vivienne sat on my beige sofa, her legs crossed at the knee. She wore a tailored crimson blazer and a perfectly practiced smile. A porcelain teacup rested on her lap.

"What are you doing in my apartment?" I demanded, staying near the front door.

"Marilyn let me in on her way out," Vivienne said. She set the teacup on the glass coffee table. "She looked terribly upset. She told me you had another one of your episodes. I came to see if you were feeling better."

I stepped fully into the room.

That was when the smell hit me.

Heavy jasmine mixed with crushed vanilla.

My chest seized. A sudden, violent thumping started behind my ribs. My palms turned instantly slick with cold sweat. I backed up a step, my spine hitting the hard wood of the doorframe. I did not know why the scent made my throat close. I just knew I needed to get away from it.

"Open a window," I choked out.

Vivienne raised a perfectly arched eyebrow. "Excuse me?"

"The perfume. It is suffocating."

She stood up, smoothing the front of her blazer. "It is imported, Della. You used to compliment it."

"I want you to leave."

She ignored my demand. She walked toward me, her leather flats silent on the rug. The jasmine scent grew stronger, wrapping around my neck like physical hands. My lungs burned. A phantom ache flared at the base of my skull, sharp and blinding.

"You look exhausted," Vivienne murmured. She stopped less than a foot away.

I pressed harder against the doorframe. "Do not touch me."

She reached out anyway. Her manicured fingers brushed against my temple, tucking a stray piece of hair behind my ear. Her sharp nails scraped my skin.

"You really should take better care of yourself. People are talking."

I swatted her hand away. "I do not care what people say."

"You should. Marilyn is at her wit's end." Vivienne tilted her head, studying my face with a look of mock pity. "She told me about the hired boyfriend. A bit extreme, maybe, but can you blame her? You are setting plates for a ghost."

"Sam is not a ghost."

"He is gone, Dell."

"Get out of my house, Vivienne."

She sighed, a soft, condescending sound. She took a step back, giving me a fraction of breathing room. The phantom ache in my skull dulled, but the rapid beating of my heart refused to slow.

"I just worry about you," she said, picking her leather purse up from the armchair. "Especially with you acting so erratic lately. Chasing strangers around the building."

I stiffened.

"That new neighbor next door sure looks a lot like Sam, doesn't he?" she asked, adjusting the strap on her shoulder.

The air in the room went completely still.

I stared at her glossy lips. My grip on the pocket watch became painful. The jagged edges of the silver casing dug into my palm.

Marilyn did not know what Ryan Vance looked like. She only knew I ran into a man in the hallway. I never told my mother about the identical jawline. I never told her about the cheekbones.

And I definitely never told Vivienne.

"How do you know what the neighbor looks like?" I asked. My voice dropped to a flat, dangerous register.

Vivienne paused. Her smile faltered for a fraction of a second.

"Marilyn mentioned it," she recovered smoothly.

"My mother has never seen him."

"She must have caught a glimpse." Vivienne waved her hand in the air, dismissing the accusation. "Or maybe I saw him in the lobby. Does it matter? The point is, you are projecting your grief onto a random man."

"You were on the eleventh floor before today," I said, stepping away from the doorframe to block her path to the exit. "You were watching my apartment."

"Do not be paranoid, Della. It is entirely unbecoming."

"Answer the question."

"Move out of the doorway," she ordered. The fake sweetness completely vanished from her tone.

I held my ground. "Why do you know what Ryan looks like?"

"Because I have eyes," she snapped. "Because he moved in three days ago, and I happened to be visiting your mother. You are not a detective. You are a sick woman who cannot accept reality."

She shoved past my shoulder.

The heavy jasmine scent washed over me again, bringing another wave of nausea and that blinding flash of pain at the base of my neck.

I stumbled against the wall, fighting the sudden dizziness.

Vivienne reached the front door. She grabbed the brass handle and pulled it open. The cool, stale air of the corridor rushed in, cutting through the perfume. I dragged in a deep breath, steadying myself against the plaster wall.

She stepped out onto the carpeted hallway.

I watched her back, my mind racing. She lied. She was watching Ryan. She knew exactly who he was. And she knew I was getting too close.

Vivienne turned around. She stood in the threshold, her leather purse clutched tight against her side. The sweet, practiced smile returned to her face, stretching her red lips into a perfect, terrifying curve.

"Take your medication, Dell," she said softly.

I glared at her. "Do not come back here."

She ignored my warning. Her eyes drifted past my shoulder, scanning the empty apartment, before settling back on my face.

"By the way, Dell," Vivienne said, her voice dropping to a low, melodic hum. "You should be careful on the stairs lately."