The CEO Used AI To Reply While He Loved Her Chapter 07
Callan alone had called more than eighty times.
The rest were from Vanessa, Mercer relatives, and mutual friends.
Vanessa’s voice messages evolved from anger to accusations and eventually something dangerously close to tears.
“Evelyn, come back so we can talk this through.”
“Do you realize what those posts did to Callan’s reputation?”
“Brie hasn’t eaten in two days. Can’t you be the bigger person for once?”
I didn’t reply to any of them.
Scrolling farther down, I found Callan’s latest text.
Sent an hour earlier.
[Evelyn Marlowe. Pick up.]
[We need to talk.]
[Five minutes. That’s all I’m asking.]
The second I finished reading it, my phone rang again. Apparently he’d been trying nonstop.
I answered but said nothing.
After two seconds of silence, his voice came through rough and tired.
“So you finally decided to answer.”
1
I stayed quiet.
He inhaled slowly, and when he spoke again, his tone had clearly been forced softer.
“Evelyn… can we just talk calmly for once?”
“You can talk.”
He seemed surprised by how easily I agreed.
After a pause, he finally said, “I know you were angry about the post. But the way you handled it was
too extreme.”
“Everyone’s calling me. Brielle’s getting ripped apart online.”
“She’s basically my sister. Why drag her into this?”
I walked to the minibar, grabbed a bottle of water, and twisted the cap open slowly.
Then I took a sip before answering.
“Callan… do you remember that hiking trip we took with Brielle during our third year together?”
There was a brief silence while he tried to recall it.
“It started pouring halfway up the mountain. We got completely soaked.”
“My shirt was light-colored. Once it got wet, it turned almost transparent. My makeup was ruined, my hair was stuck to my face, and I looked awful.”
“Brielle pulled out her phone and took a picture of me.”
“I told her to delete it immediately. She said she would.”
I leaned against the counter.
“Then five minutes later, she uploaded it to Instagram.”
Another pause.
“I asked you to make her take it down. But you refused.”
Then slowly, clearly, I repeated his exact words from that day.
‘It’s just a picture. Brielle thought it was funny. She didn’t mean anything by it. Stop making everything such a big deal before people start laughing at you.’
The sunlight outside the hotel window felt harsh against my eyes.
I narrowed them slightly.
“You see? It’s not that you don’t understand humiliation.”
“You just never thought mine mattered.”
His breathing grew heavier on the other end.
“So this is revenge now?”
“Evelyn, after everything these past five years, haven’t I treated you well enough?”
“What have you ever asked for that I didn’t give you?”
I actually laughed.
“I asked you to come to my dress fittings. Did you?”
“I asked you to remember my shellfish allergy. Did you?”
“I asked you not to spend our wedding morning running around with another woman. Did you?”
“Callan, the only things you ever gave me were neglect, indifference, and endless variations of ‘Don’t do this right now.””
“Your love, your patience, your time-every good part of you belonged to Brielle.”
“And all I got was an auto-reply system pretending to care.”
The moment I finished speaking, something inside my chest finally loosened.
Five years of bitterness suddenly dissolved all at once.
Callan stayed silent for a very long time.
Long enough that I thought he might’ve hung up.
But eventually, he spoke again.
His voice had lowered noticeably, and underneath it was something unfamiliar.
Panic.
“Those things…” He stopped briefly. “I was wrong.”
“I can fix it, okay?”
“Delete the post. Come back. Let’s start over.”
“I swear things will be different.”
“No more AI. I’ll come home every night. I’ll do the things you want to do.”
“The morning runs… I can go with you instead. You always wanted evening walks, right? We can do that every day.”
“And the wedding-we can redo everything however you want this time. I’ll plan it myself.”
If he had said those words six months ago-I probably would’ve cried from happiness.
But now? All I felt was exhausted amusement.
“Callan,” I said quietly, “you still don’t get it.”
“I don’t want it anymore. Your promises. Your future. Any version of you.”
“I don’t want any of it.’
“The wedding isn’t happening. And I’m not coming back.”
“We’re done.”
