He Paid for the Wrong Heart Chapter 04

He Paid for the Wrong Heart Chapter 04

For a while after that, Hayes stopped contacting me altogether.

After Serena came back from St. Catherine Medical Center, she video-called Hayes every night.

Our other two roommates would occasionally drift into the frame or say something from the side.

Only I stayed far away every time.

And I never made a sound.

He used to call me like that, too. Back then, I had foolishly believed we actually had a future.

Then one night, Serena was in the shower, and her phone was sitting outside.

It rang for a long time.

From the bathroom, she called out, “Can you answer that for me?”

[I glanced at the screen and saw his name flashing.

It was his fourth missed call; he was clearly paranoid that she had relapsed.

After a brief hesitation, I swiped to answer.

Hayes’s voice came through the speaker, gentle and soft.

“Serena?”

My chest tightened. I pressed my lips together and said, “She’s in the shower.”

When he heard my voice, Hayes went quiet for a moment before speaking with quiet certainty.

“It’s you.”

There was no reason he wouldn’t recognize my voice.

I gave a soft hum in response.

With the message delivered, I was just about to hang up when he suddenly spoke up again.

“I didn’t mean to snap at you that day.”

I held the phone in my hand.

For a moment, I had no idea what to say.

After a long pause, I finally managed two words.

“It’s fine.”

He seemed not to have expected that after waiting so long, all he would get was that.

Then he let out a quiet laugh.

“Yeah.”

That night, Hayes’s name appeared in my messages again.

It almost felt like we had called a truce.

Hayes: [Thanks for what happened last time.]

Hayes treated Serena with almost unbearable attentiveness.

He sent her so many gifts.

Flowers, designer bags, jewelry.

So many that her closet was almost too full to close.

But Serena still seemed restless.

“He’s so good to me,” she said.

“But I don’t know why, it’s been over a month and he still hasn’t asked me to be his girlfriend. Am I supposed to make the first move?”

Our other two roommates asked curiously, “Have you two kissed? Hugged?”

Serena shook her head.

“No.”

After a brief hesitation, she added, “We haven’t even held hands yet.”

I sat there listening quietly without saying a word.

In the silence, one of our roommates finally spoke.

“I heard Hayes has never dated anyone before. And with his background, girls have always chased him, not the other way around. Before you, he never made the first move on anyone.”

She nudged Serena playfully.

“You should try harder. Lock it down before someone else does.”

But I remembered that winter break.

Hayes had confessed to me after we had only been connecting for half a month.

I guessed maybe after what happened with me, he had learned his lesson.

Maybe this time, he wanted to take things slowly.

Still.

No matter what.

They would probably be together soon.

What I never expected was that I would see Hayes the very next night.