He said “Stop messaging me” but still looks at me every single day

I have a crush on this colleague in the office and he knows that I like him because I indirectly confessed to him last year. I took the courage to approach him and we had dinner (see my other post here on Reddit). My affection started when I noticed that we would frequently catch each other’s gaze. With the way he looks at me I could feel he’s closet gay but afraid to show it, maybe because of his circle of guy friends in the officeI emailed him last March asking if he’s interested to hang out. He said he respects me but he’s totally not into guys and that I stop messaging him before “it gets weird”. So I decided to move on and not bother him anymore. But after that event, there’s no work day that he won’t look at my direction. It’s more frequent nowadays. I often catch him craning towards my workstation, or staring it me as I pass by his desk on my way to the pantry. We always have eye contact. Every. Single. Day. But none of us dared to chat or SMS.There was this time when I went on leave for one week. When I returned to the office, I made eye contact with him and it’s one of the longest gaze we ever had. Like 2-3 seconds. He’s the first one who broke the eye contact though. But I felt that he missed me (or is it just me?)Although I’m enjoying the fun of this silent flirting, I somehow feel that we can bring this to another level. But I’m still unsure if he’s really into me, considering the last email I got from him..What now?