I Stopped Chasing Him—and He Panicked

I chased Ambrose Vance for three months. Today I read four words on his phone. He's twentyseven. Single for all twentyseven of them.

My best friend swears the man is basically a monk. I didn't buy it.

I got clingy on purpose, whined at him, hung off him, said things out loud that most people wouldn't put in a text. He stayed cold.

I told myself he just didn't know how to flirt back. Then I happened to see what his friend had sent him. [She's so clingy.

Doesn't that get annoying?] Ambrose answered in four words. [Yeah. A little bit.] I set his phone down. For the first time in three months, I was the one who backed away.

His hand closed around my wrist. "Your stomach. Do you want me to rub it?" Chapter 1 I let the silence sit. Then I pulled my hand out of his. "I think I'm better.

Probably just something I ate." His hand stayed open in the air where mine had been. Then his eyes came up to my face, like he was checking the story for holes.

I rubbed the back of my neck and made myself look tired. "You know my stomach. I went out for latenight wings with Emmett and everybody yesterday, so…" Emmett is Ambrose's nephew.

He's also married to my best friend. Ambrose didn't buy all of it. He paused. His voice came out flat. "You're sure it stopped?

Don't tough it out." I shook my head. "It really stopped. Mr. Vance." Silence. His breath caught. Something moved behind his eyes and didn't come back out.

His brows pulled in. "What did you just call me?" Since the day I decided I wanted him, it had been baby, babe, hubby, handsome. On a restrained day I used his full name. Mr.

Vance was new. Three months of climbing all over this man, and today I dropped him a rank. I smiled at him with my whole face. "You're Emmett's uncle.

Emmett's married to my best friend. Calling you Mr. Vance is just me being respectful for once." I had not been respectful in a very long time.

Something moved in his eyes and settled. He sat down in the chair behind his desk. I couldn't read his voice at all. "Suit yourself." I found an excuse and left.

The elevator was three steps away when I realized my lipstick was still on his desk. I pushed the door back open. His hand was hovering over it. Not touching it.

Stopped an inch above, like the thing was hot. His mouth was pressed into a hard line. I crossed the room and slid the lipstick out from under his fingers. "Forgot this. Bye, Mr.

Vance." He didn't answer. I looked back once before I shut the door. He hadn't moved.

His hand was still up in the air, and there was something on that cold face I had not seen in three months of trying. I didn't let myself think about it. I pulled the door closed.

Outside the building I pressed a hand flat over my chest. My heart kept clamping down on itself. Yeah. A little bit. Four words, sitting there like a brand that wouldn't cool.

He's the kind of man who can take a glass of red wine down the front of his shirt and tell the room it's fine. And I got four words out of him. So I'm really something.

I tipped my head back at a sky turning gray. Maybe he'd thought I was annoying for a long time. Three months. I sent one, he sent one back. Not once did he go first.

I thought that was slowburn. Turns out it was patience. I met Ambrose at Frankie's wedding. Frankie hadn't wanted a big one, but Emmett threw enough of a fit to get it.

She didn't make me a bridesmaid because she was worried it would wear me out. She seated me at the head table instead. I sat down, looked up, and there was a man walking toward me.

Plain, easy clothes, and none of it hid the proportions. The Vcut. Lean muscle. Above that, a face that looked rendered.

Cold eyes, a straight nose, a small mole at the corner of one of them, and a pale pink mouth that looked extremely kissable. That, I thought, is my future boyfriend.

And then he sat down in the seat right next to mine. It took me a while to understand. The man who sat down beside me at that wedding was not my future boyfriend.

He was three solid months of wanting something I was never going to get. Chapter 2 I turned to him with the full smile and asked for his name, his age, and whether he was single.

He looked a little lost. He answered every single question anyway. "Ambrose Vance. Twentyseven.

Single…" Once I had confirmed he was single in every form the word takes, my phone was already out. "What a coincidence. So am I.

Give me your number, handsome." Ambrose opened his mouth, closed it, and put his number in anyway.

Frankie and Emmett came back from working the room table by table, and that's when I heard what Emmett called him. Uncle. Huh.

I turned and said, very quietly, "Nieceinlaw." Frankie said nothing. She looked at Ambrose. Then at me.

She's my numberone rideordie, and after this many years she didn't need it spelled out. But she didn't play wingman the way she always did.

She got serious on me. "Emmett says his uncle runs cold, and that he isn't really interested in… that. Twentyseven years single.

The man is basically a—" She stopped. "Are you sure about this?" A monk? That makes it more interesting, not less.

For the rest of the reception I talked at Ambrose without stopping, and kept accidentally touching the back of his hand, his palm, his arm.

When it ended, I whined until he drove me home. The second I got through my door, I started texting. Me: [Handsome, I'm dizzy.

Can you stop walking around inside my head?] Him: [a photo] Him: [Ordered you something for the hangover.] Me: [Handsome, my whole body is hot. Are you cold?

Can I hold you?] Him: [Might be a fever. Take something for it.] Me: [Baby, I think I've gone deaf. Can you call me?] He sent a voice note. Two words. "I can't." Cold voice.

It did not stop my brain from going anywhere it wanted. I played it back a few times, and I could not get my face to stop doing the thing.

Even when Ambrose got buried at work and took forever to answer, I didn't care. As long as I was enjoying myself. Thinking about it now, he was slow because I was a lot.

I'd barely gotten out of the Uber when Frankie called. "I want a divorce!" I put a hand over my eyes. "What is it this time?" "He doesn't love me anymore." That made three divorces since the wedding.

The reasons were always very… lookhowinloveweare. "The man is attached to you like a barnacle.

He kisses you, hugs you, and says the worst lines I have ever heard out loud, all day long. How is that not love?" Frankie wasn't hearing it. "I don't care. Come over.

Or I'll come to you. Actually, forget it. Let's go to the bar." She could have led with that. I got to the bar and found out Frankie was not alone. People from college.

Some from our year, some from the years around us, and the man who was allegedly about to be divorced, Emmett, sitting right there. So I'd been played. I didn't love bars.

Frankie did, and she loved dragging me into them. She'd worked hard on that lie to get me out of the house. I found a corner and stayed in it, watching the whole room go feral.

Last time I was at a bar, Ambrose was there too. I hadn't planned on going. Then Frankie said if I came, she'd make Emmett drag his uncle out. So obviously I said yes.

I put together a slip dress that was going to knock him flat, and then knock him flat again. That night, he did look at me.

Unfortunately, the first thing he did afterward was lift one finger. Chapter 3 The second I spotted Ambrose I locked on like a heatseeking missile. "Handsome.

What a coincidence." He glanced at me, took a drink, and made a small sound. "Mm." I beamed, pushed my hair back, wrapped both hands around his arm, and tipped my face up at him. "Why so cold?

Is there some other girl living in your head?" "No." "Handsome, I went to the doctor yesterday." For once he actually looked me over.

His brows drew together. "You're sick?" I nodded so hard it hurt. "Yes! I can't sleep lately. My doctor recommends sleeping in your arms.

Is that okay?" He looked at me a second longer than he needed to. Then he put one finger against my forehead and pushed me back. "My arms are uncomfortable.

I recommend a bed." No matter how I poked at him, the man was a glacier. Nothing moved.

Back then I was so busy with my own agenda that I never once looked at what the target was feeling, or noticed how carefully he was keeping the distance. Is a monk really unfixable?

Something pulled tight under my ribs. I picked up the drink in front of me and swallowed some of it. Maybe he'd already been sick of me by then.

Maybe I was already the annoying one. The party got louder instead of winding down, and my head started to swim. My phone buzzed in my pocket. I pulled it out. A text.

The contact name said Mr. Vance. I'd changed it that afternoon, to remind myself that this man was for looking at, not for losing my mind over.

In three months, it was the first time he had ever texted first. Him: [Delphine. Are you home?] I pressed a thumb into my temple and typed back. Me: [I'm home.

Why?] The typing dots ran for a full minute. Him: [Aren't you afraid of the dark?] There was a power outage at my place last month.

I pretended to be terrified, called and texted and whined until Ambrose came over and stayed the night.

The man paid zero attention to how little I was wearing or how sweet I made my voice. He tucked me into bed with no expression whatsoever and read me bedtime stories for two hours.

Me: [I am. That's why the nightlight you gave me stays on.] The typing dots ran for two minutes. Him: [Then why is your room dark?] I sat straight up.

Out of the private room upstairs, phone in hand, onto the quieter balcony on the second floor that looked down at the intersection. I called him.

He picked up on the first ring. "Why are you at my apartment?" There was a strange little pocket of quiet on his end. "I was passing by." I let that sit.

Did he drive a full loop around the city and accidentally pass my building?

Ambrose must have heard how ridiculous it sounded, because he kept going. "Your stomach was bothering you. I brought you some things. Where are you?" Oh, hell.

If he found out I was at a bar, he'd know the stomachache was fake. And then he really would think I'd been messing with him on purpose. I couldn't admit it. "I'm a lot better.

I'm out shopping with friends." "…Why is it so loud where you are?" I laughed, thin. "It— it is. So don't worry about it, Mr. Vance. I'm really fine." He was quiet for a long time.

Right when I thought he was about to hang up, he said it. "Are you angry?" "What?" "The meeting today ran a little long. You were still in pain, waiting on me.

That's why you're saying it stopped." Wait. It's true that when his meetings used to run long, I'd blow up his phone with increasingly pathetic messages.

But that meeting lasted ten minutes. Ten minutes, and he'd filed it under a little long.

And I was standing on a secondfloor balcony, directly above the street he'd just told me he was passing by. Chapter 4 "I'm not angry. Work matters more than I do.

I understand that much." I couldn't do what I used to do, which was say yes I'm angry, so kiss me, and then get turned down in that flat voice.

Until he stopped finding me annoying, I was going to be good. "Mr. Vance, it's late. Get some rest.

I've got dinner with friends, so, okay, that's it, bye…" "Bring me." I froze. "What?" His voice stayed even. "I'll come to dinner. Together." I laughed it off fast. "Mr.

Vance, you're standing outside my building right now, and you're not with us, so you—" "Who told you I was still outside your building?" My brain shut down.

That cold, familiar voice came through the speaker. "Look down." I looked before I could stop myself. Across the street, under the streetlight, a black car.

Ambrose alone, leaning against it, phone at his ear. His head was tipped back.

Those dark eyes were locked on me up on the second floor, and the weight of them pinned me where I stood. "Are you coming down, or am I coming up?" I didn't move.

My heels might as well have grown into the concrete