Chapter 3
2 weeks had passed since the disastrous meeting at Clare’s parents’ house, and she had managed to keep Theo Ashford exactly where she wanted him: at a safe distance, far from the heart that still beat irregularly every time she thought about those blue eyes.
She was at her favorite place to work, a hidden downtown coffee shop very few people knew she frequented. Her laptop was open in front of her, showing the designs she was developing for an important client, and the coffee beside her was still steaming. Perfect, peaceful, exactly the kind of productive morning she needed.
Then a deeply familiar voice cut through her concentration like a sharp blade.
“What an incredible coincidence running into you here.”
Clare looked up slowly, already knowing who she would see before she fully raised her eyes.
Theo stood there with a charming smile on his face, wearing an impeccable suit even though it was only 9:00 in the morning, holding a coffee cup as if he had really arrived there by chance.
“My brother told you where I work, didn’t he?” she asked without hesitation, closing her laptop because she knew she would no longer be able to concentrate with him there.
“Maybe.”
His smile became slightly guilty but remained absurdly handsome in a way that irritated her more than she liked to admit.
“Stalker.”
She started putting her things into her bag with deliberately calm movements.
“I need to work, Theodore. I have a tight deadline to deliver this project.”
“One coffee with me.”
He approached the table and pulled out the chair in front of her as if she had invited him.
“Just a quick coffee. 15 minutes tops. I promise.”
“I also have a client meeting in half an hour.”
She stood, throwing her bag over her shoulder and grabbing her still half-full cup.
“I need to go.”
She left before he could argue, feeling those blue eyes fixed on her back as she walked away.
His first attempt. Her first block.
1–0 for Clare Montgomery.
The art gallery was packed for the group exhibition where 3 of Clare’s pieces were on display. She had spent weeks preparing for the night, choosing the perfect black dress, elegant without being pretentious, and practicing how to talk about her work without sounding arrogant or insecure.
The night was going perfectly until she turned and came face to face with Theodore Ashford standing in front of one of her designs.
She approached from behind, her heels making deliberate noise on the wooden floor to announce her presence.
“You’re following me?” she whispered irritably when she got close enough for only him to hear.
He turned, and that annoyingly beautiful smile formed on his lips.
“I came to support your work. Owen invited me. He said you were displaying incredible pieces here.”
Of course, it was Owen.
Clare rolled her eyes, but before she could walk away, Theo turned back to the piece on the wall, studying the details with genuine attention that caught her by surprise.
“Your work is incredible, Clare. You were always creative. You always had this unique eye for design and art.”
His voice was serious, without a trace of provocation or calculated charm. Just pure honesty.
It disarmed her for a second before she remembered to defend herself.
“You didn’t even remember I existed when we were kids. How can you know if I was always creative?”
“I did remember you.”
He looked directly at her, and there was something intense in his blue gaze.
“I teased you precisely because I paid attention to everything you did.”
“What idiotic teenage logic.”
She crossed her arms but could not stop the small smile that insisted on appearing.
Theo laughed, and the sound was genuine, a little loud.
“It was idiotic. You’re absolutely right. Sorry for that. For all the times I was cruel without realizing it.”
Before Clare could respond, familiar arms wrapped around her from behind in an affectionate hug that made her relax instantly.
It was Lucas.
“You look beautiful tonight. The dress looks perfect on you.”
Lucas spoke close to her ear before releasing her, but he kept one hand on her waist in a clearly possessive and intimate way.
Clare saw Theo’s jaw lock. His eyes fixed on Lucas’s hand at her waist with an intensity she could almost physically feel.
“Thanks for coming to support me, Lucas,” Clare said. “It means a lot.”
She smiled at him, genuinely happy he was there, and Lucas responded by kissing her cheek in a slow and deliberate way.
Theo watched every second. Clare saw something dark and dangerous pass through his eyes before being carefully controlled.
“I didn’t know you had a boyfriend,” Theo said, the words tenser than he probably intended. He directed them at Clare, but his eyes stayed on Lucas.
“I don’t have a boyfriend,” she replied calmly, adjusting the strap of her purse on her shoulder. “But I have a serious suitor who respects me and treats me well.”
“And I wouldn’t respect you?”
The question came quickly, almost defensive, loaded with something that seemed genuinely hurt.
Clare looked directly at him, letting every painful childhood memory show in her voice.
“You called me Matchstick and Glasses Pest constantly. You made me feel ugly and invisible every day. So you tell me, Theodore. Did that seem like respect to you?”
She left the question hanging between them, heavy and cutting, before taking Lucas’s hand and walking away.
“Come on. I want to introduce you to some artist colleagues.”
Theo found Owen outside the gallery, smoking a cigarette he had probably gotten from someone, because Owen did not smoke regularly. His friend looked at him with an expression that mixed amusement and exasperation.
“Is Lucas really serious about her?” Theo asked without hesitation, dispensing with any pretense of casual conversation.
“Very serious. Treats my sister like a queen. Is always present. Never makes her feel less than she is.”
Owen took a long drag before continuing.
“Why are you jealous?”
“Did I treat her badly when we were kids?” Theo asked, ignoring the question because he needed the truth, even if it hurt to hear.
“Dude, you teased her all the time. Matchstick, Glasses, Pest, all those cruel nicknames. She cried several times because of you. Locked herself in her room because you’d been cruel to her again.”
Owen threw the cigarette on the ground and stepped on it to put it out.
“Did you really not know that?”
Theo felt something heavy settle in his chest. Guilt mixed with regret.
“I didn’t know it hurt that much. I was just an idiot who didn’t know how to show attention properly.”
“Because you were a self-centered, spoiled teenager who didn’t think about the consequences of your words.”
Owen put a hand on his friend’s shoulder, squeezing lightly.
“And now she doesn’t need you, Theodore. She has options. Very good options that don’t come with baggage of years of hurt.”
3 days later, Clare was at her apartment when the doorbell rang. She opened it expecting the food delivery she had ordered, but instead found a delivery guy holding the biggest bouquet of red roses she had ever seen.
“Clare Montgomery?” he asked, checking his clipboard.
“That’s me.”
She took the attached card while he handed over the flowers and immediately recognized the elegant handwriting.
“Sorry isn’t enough, but it’s a start. Theo.”
Clare looked at the flowers for a long moment, feeling something contract in her chest. They were beautiful, expensive, clearly chosen with care.
But flowers did not erase years of hurt. They did not heal the wounds he had left.
She grabbed her phone and called the nearest hospital.
“Hello. I’d like to donate a bouquet of flowers to brighten the day of some patient who needs it.”
Lucas met Clare for coffee at the end of the week, and from the serious expression on his face, she knew what was coming.
“Clare, I gave you time to think about my request,” he began as soon as they sat down. No beating around the bush. “So, have you thought about it?”
“Lucas, you’re an incredible man, and I really like you.”
She began, and by the way his shoulders fell slightly, she saw the moment he understood where this was going.
“But,” he completed for her, his voice resigned but not bitter.
“But I still need more time. There’s someone from the past who came back, and I need to completely close that out in my head before starting something serious with you. You deserve someone who is 100% present, not someone with unresolved ghosts.”
“Theo.”
It was not really a question.
Clare sighed, tired of lying or pretending.
“Yes.”
“I’ll wait for you, Clare.”
Lucas took her hand on the table and squeezed it gently.
“But not forever. I can’t keep waiting indefinitely while you work out feelings for someone else.”
“That’s more than fair.”
She squeezed his hand back, grateful for his honesty.
“Thank you for understanding.”
During the following weeks, Theo tried everything. Dinner invitations she politely declined by text. More flowers, which she donated to nursing homes and hospitals. Constant messages that she answered in a courteous but distant way, maintaining the carefully built wall between them.
“She won’t give me a single chance,” Theo exploded to Owen during another night at the bar, frustration finally overflowing after weeks of gentle but firm rejections.
Owen took a sip of beer, completely unmoved.
“Welcome to what she felt for years, man. Years of following you, wanting your attention, begging for crumbs. Now you’re the one on the other side, and it isn’t nice, is it?”
The family dinner was inevitable. Clare’s mother had insisted so much that Clare eventually gave in, knowing that putting it off would only make things worse. The Montgomery and Ashford families gathered at Clare’s parents’ house for a night that promised to be long and uncomfortable.
Theo arrived with his parents, and their eyes met across the crowded room. He was handsome as always, but there was something different in his expression. Something more serious. More determined.
After dinner, while everyone was having coffee in the living room, Clare managed to escape to the back porch, needing fresh air and a moment of peace away from curious looks and invasive questions.
It did not take even 5 minutes before she heard the glass door slide open behind her.
“Can we talk?”
Theo’s voice cut through the night’s silence, low and careful.
Clare turned to face him, resting her hands on the porch railing.
“About what exactly?”
“About everything. About the past. About why you hate me so much now.”
He moved closer but kept a respectful distance, hands in his pockets, as if forcing himself not to reach for her.
“I don’t hate you, Theodore.”
And it was true, though Clare sometimes wished it were not.
“But you avoid me like I have some deadly contagious disease.”
The words exploded from her before she could contain them, years of hurt finally finding a voice.
“Because I spent years liking you while you teased me and made me feel ugly and invisible. You called me Pest, Matchstick, laughed at my appearance, treated me like I was an annoying nuisance you tolerated out of obligation.”
Theo’s voice came out shocked, as if each word she said had been a punch directly to his stomach.
“Clare—”
But now that she had started, she could not stop.
“And I still liked you because I was an idiotic, lovesick teenager. Then that day at the pool, you were going to kiss me. Then you ran away to London for 9 whole years without looking back.”
“I ran away because I was completely confused.”
Theo took a step forward, his hands still in his pockets, but his entire body tense.
“You were 15. I was 19. It was wrong, Clare. It was wrong, and I didn’t know how to deal with it. With what I was feeling for you.”
“And now?”
Her voice trembled despite her efforts to keep it steady.
“You come back 9 years later, all handsome and charming and powerful, expecting me to fall at your feet like nothing happened.”
“No.”
The word came out strong, definitive, desperate.
“I came back wanting to truly apologize. I was a cruel idiot without even realizing how much I was hurting you. I hurt you deeply, and I can’t go back in time, but I can try to do things differently now.”
The tears Clare had been holding back for weeks finally escaped, running hot down her cheeks.
“You did hurt me. You hurt me so much that I spent years trying to get over it, trying to convince myself it didn’t matter anymore.”
Theo approached slowly, carefully, as if dealing with something fragile that could break at any moment.
“Will you forgive me? Give me a chance to do it right this time? To show you I’ve grown. That I’ve changed.”
“Why should I?”
Clare wiped the tears with the back of her hand, trying to regain control.
“You’re famous for being a player, Theodore. How long until you get tired of me? Weeks? Days?”
“I’ve changed, Clare.”
The intensity in his voice caught her off guard.
“I took a break from all that months ago because nothing satisfied me anymore. And do you know why?”
He paused, staring at her with those blue eyes full of something that looked like raw truth.
“Because none of them were you. None of them had your laugh, your intelligence, your fire. They were all pale shadows of something I let slip away 9 years ago.”
“That’s not fair.”
Her voice came out broken, vulnerable in a way she hated.
Theo raised his hand slowly, giving her time to pull away if she wanted. When she did not step back, his fingers touched her face gently, wiping the tears that kept falling.
“I know it’s not fair. I know I don’t even deserve to be here asking this. But I’m asking you for a chance to prove I’ve changed. That I really see you now. Not as the annoying pest, but as the incredible woman you’ve become.”
“And Lucas?”
The question came out almost as a whisper.
“He’s good to me. He treats me well. He wants something serious and doesn’t come with baggage of years of hurt.”
Something painful passed through Theo’s eyes, but his voice remained steady.
“If you choose him, I’ll respect your decision. I’ll get out of your life if that’s what you want. But before you decide, let me try. One date. One day. A single chance to show you who I am now.”
The silence between them became heavy, loaded with possibilities, fears, and hopes Clare was not ready to name.
“One date,” she said. “Just one. Then I’ll decide.”
The relief that passed over his face was so intense it was almost palpable.
“Thank you. I won’t mess this up. I promise.”
The next day came faster than Clare was prepared for. Theo had texted early saying he would pick her up at 7:00 that evening, and she had spent the last 3 hours changing clothes and trying to convince her stomach to stop doing nervous somersaults.
When the doorbell finally rang, she took 3 deep breaths before opening the door.
Theo stood there in dark jeans and a casual shirt that made him look less like a powerful billionaire and more like just a handsome man coming to pick up a girl for a date.
“You look beautiful,” he said simply.
The way he looked at her made her heart treacherously race.
“Thanks. Where are we going?”
She grabbed her purse, curious because he had been mysterious about the plans.
“You’ll see.”
His smile held a touch of nervousness that Clare found strangely comforting.
20 minutes later, the car stopped in front of a small, cozy pizzeria on the old side of town. Clare looked at the place, and memories immediately flooded her mind.
“Luigi’s? You remembered Luigi’s?”
“You always said it was the best pizza in the city when we were kids.”
Theo turned off the car and looked at her attentively.
“I figured you still liked this place.”
Something warm and dangerous settled in Clare’s chest.
He had remembered. He had really paid attention.
“I still love this place.”
Dinner was surprisingly easy. They talked about everything and nothing. They laughed at old memories that did not hurt anymore when said aloud. When Theo specifically apologized for calling her Matchstick in front of his friends at school, something inside Clare began to soften.
“There’s one more thing after this,” he said when they finished eating, and the nervousness returned to his voice.
“More?”
Clare could not hold back the smile.
“Movies. There’s a film you mentioned wanting to see a few weeks ago in a casual conversation.”
He avoided her gaze, clearly embarrassed to admit he had paid that much attention.
“You remembered all that?”
The question came out full of genuine surprise and something that felt dangerously like hope.
May you like
Theo finally looked at her, and the intensity in his blue eyes was devastating.
“I started really paying attention to everything you say. Everything you like. Who you really are. I don’t want to be the idiot who saw you but didn’t see you anymore.”
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