Chapter 11
Chapter 11
Avery stopped and raised her head. When she saw Jace, the warmth that had once filled her eyes was gone. All that was left was indifference.
She acted as if she hadn’t heard a word he said. She didn’t even glance at the bouquet. Her gaze passed straight through Jace, and she kept walking.
Jace froze, then scrambled to block her path. “Ave? I’m talking to you! I know you’re mad. You can hit me or scold me, but don’t ignore me like this!”
She finally looked at him, but her eyes had no feeling, only distance and refusal. She stepped around him and walked away.
Jace stood frozen with the roses, his grin falling away.
No one had ever ignored him so completely. His charm and family background meant nothing to Avery-nothing more than a joke.
It made him taste failure for the first time.
“Avery!” he shouted after her, anger roughening his voice. “The colder you get, the more I want you! Just wait!”
Back in the country, Julian and Tessa were the perfect couple in everyone’s eyes. But Julian kept checking his phone.
The people he sent to keep tabs on Jace and Avery reported back regularly.
“Jace showed up outside Avery’s building again, but she ignored him.”
“Jace tried to block her on campus, but Avery changed routes.’
“Jace sent her a jewelry set worth millions, but she sent it back without opening it.”
“Jace staged a ‘romantic coincidence’ at a restaurant, but Avery left the moment she saw him.”
Every update pricked at Julian like a needle under the skin.
He drifted through lectures and couldn’t stop thinking of Avery’s cold eyes at meals. Even when he was with Tessa, he couldn’t stay focused.
Every time he heard that Jace had failed, a guilty flicker of satisfaction came first, only to twist into sharper irritation laced with an unease he couldn’t name.
The way Jace hounded Avery gnawed at Julian, keeping him wide awake at night.
Chanter 11
Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Avery’s cold, disappointed look before she walked away for good.
When he finally managed to fall asleep, he jolted awake from feverish dreams of Avery and Jace tangled up overseas. He’d sit up drenched in sweat, his heartbeat pounding.
He couldn’t rest even in daylight. His mind kept circling back to the details he’d brushed aside -Avery’s quiet focus as she ladled soup for him, the way she dabbed at her eyes when he was sick, and the pure joy on her face when she came running with news of her scholarship.
He’d once dismissed those moments as dull, but they were now seared in his mind.
The loss of control made him restless.
One night, Julian returned to the empty apartment, drunk after a business dinner. The ache in his chest pushed him past the line. He pulled out a spare phone, dialed the overseas number etched into his memory, and pressed call.
The ringtone dragged on, each ring sinking his stomach lower. Just as he thought it would end, the line clicked.
“Hello?” Avery’s voice was cool and distant, laced with the impatience of being disturbed.
Julian’s heart clenched as if an invisible hand had grabbed it. The alcohol cleared from his head in an instant. A dozen words crowded his throat-apologies, accusations, and demands for her to come back-but not one slipped out.
Silence stretched across the line. Then, as if realizing who it was, Avery hung up immediately.
