I think WaitElement should be the right method for your case.
It will return a stub object that has only the Exists attribute and its set to false by default.
https://support.smartbear.com/testcomplete/docs/reference/test-objects/members/page/waitelement-method-page-object.html
If this still does return Exists == true then your object probably exists but is not visible.
What you can try is to check for exists and if its true you need to verify that it is not visible.
Or you have to specify your xpath so it will not find the element when its not visible.