I Don’t Want the Reunion Voucher You Never Meant to Give Me Chapter 08

I Don’t Want the Reunion Voucher You Never Meant to Give Me Chapter 08

Adrian stayed in Cedar Harbor for two weeks.

He waited outside my office every day.

Sometimes he brought breakfast, sometimes flowers, sometimes nothing at all-just followed a

few steps behind me.

I didn’t chase him off. I didn’t engage either.

Before, I would have cried, demanded answers, wrung his sleeve in my fists until it wrinkled.

Now I treated him like someone who didn’t matter at all.

The calmer I got, the more restless he became.

On the sixteenth day, I worked until past midnight.

Walking out of the building, I found Adrian still in his car.

He’d fallen asleep against the seat, exhaustion pressing into the line between his brows, a velvet

box still in his hand.

As I got closer, his phone screen lit up.

A message from Ivy.

[Mr. Cole, I resigned like you asked. When are you coming back?]

Adrian opened his eyes, killed the screen instantly.

“Off work?”

I gave a small laugh. “Still like this, huh.”

His face changed. “There’s nothing between me and her.”

“I know.”

My tone was so calm it seemed to unsettle him more.

“I had her let go because she wasn’t a good fit for the company. Not because I couldn’t bear to lose her.”

“You don’t have to explain.”

Adrian got out of the car, stood in front of me.

“Why not?”

“Because it has nothing to do with me.”

Those words landed like a slap.

Adrian gripped my shoulders.

“Elise, you’re really going to talk to me like this?”

“How should I talk to you, then?”

“Like before.”

Once the words were out, we both went still.

I looked at him. “Like before, how?”

His fingers slowly tightened.

Before, I would have waited for him.

Left a light on when he came home.

Gotten up at midnight to make soup because he mentioned a stomachache.

Ordered him takeout the day after drawing Seven Days of Silence.

Asked him, again and again, whether he still loved me at all.

But none of that, he’d ever actually held onto.

Not until all of it disappeared did he realize the apartment had only ever felt like home because of one thing.

Because I was always there.

Adrian opened the velvet box. The old diamond, in its new setting.

“I had the band redone.”

I didn’t take it.

“No one’s worn this one. The diamond is the same one.”

His voice had gone rough.

“I know. And you should also know it isn’t my mother’s anymore.”

“Why not?”

“Because when she left it to me, she wanted me to wear it and be happy.”

I looked at the diamond.

“But every time I see it now, all I remember is you prying my fingers open, and telling me the dead

don’t die twice over a missing ring.”

The color drained from his face.

He’d almost forgotten he’d said that.

I hadn’t.

I hadn’t just remembered it-I was going to carry it through every day that came after.

“I was angry. I wasn’t thinking straight.”

“You’re always angry when you hurt me.”

“I didn’t mean it.”

“But it still hurt.”

I reached out and closed the box.

“Adrian. Give it back to me.”

Something lit up in his eyes.

“You’ll take it?”

“It’s my mother’s.”

I took the ring from his palm.

“As for you-I don’t want you anymore.”

His hand hung frozen in the air.

I turned to leave. He caught up after a few seconds, wrapping his arms around me from behind,

hard.

“I don’t accept that!”

“Elise, I know I was wrong!”

j..

“You want me to kneel? Apologize in front of everyone I know? Fine! Just don’t talk to me like this.”

His voice had never sounded this unsteady before.

“Yell at me. Hit me. Whatever you want.”

“Just don’t let go of me.”

I closed my eyes.

I’d waited seven years for that sentence.

Now that I finally had it, all that was left inside me was a grief that had arrived far too late.

“Adrian.”

“You’re not this wrecked right now because you love me so much.

“You’re this wrecked because for the first time, you’ve realized I’m really not turning back.”

His arms went rigid.

I pried his hands apart.

“You didn’t lose me.”

“You lost the version of me who’d stay put and wait for you, no matter how badly you hurt her.”

“That version of me doesn’t exist anymore.”