"Yeah, well." I laughed, and it sounded bitter even to my own ears. “It’s also about me. Who I was. Every woman I didn’t call back, every hookup I forgot the next morning. I built this, Brian. I made myself into exactly the guy she thinks I am."
Brian was quiet for a moment. "You're not that guy anymore."
I knew that. I did.
But knowing didn’t matter if I couldn’t make Maya believe it.
I tried everything.
Calls went straight to voicemail. Texts showed as delivered but never read. I drove to her apartment three more times. Knocked until my knuckles ached. She never answered.
By the third day, I realized she’d blocked my number.
I sat in my truck outside her building, engine idling, watching the light in her window. She was home. Twenty feet away, and she might as well have been on another planet.
Just a few days ago, I'd been up there. In her kitchen, making breakfast. In her bed, waking up to the smell of her shampoo. Watching her call for Zoe while I kissed the back of her neck.
I wanted to go up there now. Take the stairs two at a time, pound on the door until she opens it. Pull her into my arms and make her listen. Make her see that the photo was nothing. That Natalie was nothing. That she was the only thing that mattered.
But that wasn’t the man I wanted to be.
Forcing my way back into her life wouldn't prove I was different from every man who'd hurt her before. It would prove I was exactly the same.
So I sat there. Watched her window. Memorized the shape of the light behind her curtains like it was all I'd ever have of her.
Then I drove home. Alone.
The first thing in the morning of my next shift, I went to Captain Rodriguez in his office.
"I need to be pulled from the protective detail," I said. "Fully. Conflict of interest."
Rodriguez leaned back in his chair, studying me. He didn't ask what happened. He didn't have to. The whole station had probably heard by now.
He nodded. "Okay, Shane."
"Thank you, Cap."
I walked out before he could see my face crack.
But I couldn't stay away completely.
I drove past Maya’s school every evening when I wasn’t on shift.
I parked down the block, far enough that she wouldn't notice, close enough that I could see the entrance. I watched the lights in her classroom and made sure she got to her car safely.
She stayed late most nights. Grading papers, probably. Drowning herself in work, the way I was drowning myself in patrols and equipment checks and anything that kept me from thinking about her.
She never knew I was there.
Maybe she’d hate me if she found out. Or call it stalking, obsession—proof that I couldn't let go.
But I couldn't stop.
She'd pushed me away. She'd broken my heart.
So I kept showing up.
Kept watching.
