Page 68 of The Painter and His Poet

He wouldn’t.

Itcan’tbe…

But he’s the only one who knows my pseudonym. He said he searched for me, is it so inconceivable that he searched for me on social media sites, that he found my account?

I wait for long agonising seconds for another message. Another message that will prove it isn’t Sterling who is sending me these messages. That whoever it is, is someone I don’t even know. That it’s just some stranger who has no idea who I am. And yet…

Another message doesn’t come.

Nothing.

I watch Sterling get closer and closer, willing my stalker to send me a message so that I know it can’t possibly be Sterling.It can’t be the man who made me feel so wanted, so seen, so adored, so desired.

But there’s nothing.

My finger hovers over the phone. If I message back now, and I see him answer that will tell me all I need to know, right?

I debate for all of two seconds, hoping to God I’m wrong. That the person who’s sending me these messages, isn’t the man walking towards me now.

I have to know.

I have to.

With shaking fingers, I type out a response.

Leave me alone.

Then I click send, holding my breath.

Sterling is almost at the kitchen door. My heart stops. My whole body stiffens as I wait for him to reach into his pocket to retrieve his phone. Seconds tick by as his hand rests on the handle to the door, his gaze meeting mine.

My heart is in my throat as I glance at my phone screen, a sick feeling rising up my chest as I place my phone on the counter, then flick my gaze up to his once more.

He frowns, but he doesn’t reach for his phone, instead he opens the kitchen door.

“Harlow?” he asks, concern flickering across his face.

I look back at my phone. My stalker doesn’t answer, and Sterling steps inside the room.

“Are you okay?” he asks, pulling the door shut behind him. “You look…”

“I’m fine,” I bite out, not knowing what to do, what to say, as I snatch up my phone and pocket it.

It can’t be him. It isn’t him. Please, don’t be him.

“What’s wrong, you’re shaking,” he points out, his gaze following my movements.

“Nothing. I’m fine.”

“Harlow,” he warns. “What is it? You look…upset,” he whispers that word, and it only makes me feel even more wary of him, as though he knows something.

There’s a weird kind of tension between us, and not the sexual kind of tension we’ve shared before. Is he afraid that he’s been caught? Did he not respond to the message just because he saw me sitting in here holding my phone? Is everything I thought about him untrue? Is he hiding the real person he is from me, the person who would send gross messages about forcing himself upon a woman? Who would send dick pics?

It can’t be him, can it?

I should confront him. I should confront him right now.

“I should go,” I say instead, pushing back from the counter, the stool scraping across the tiled floor. I’m shaking so violently that my teeth start to chatter.

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