Page 118 of Blindly Yours

I look past her shoulder, avoiding her gaze. “It’s clear I’m not wanted there, anyway.”

She forces out a loud exhale. “Fine, Nate, don’t come.”

It stings. But it only fuels the fire. “Fine. I’ll call you on Monday.” I catch her shocked gaze for just a second more before I slip through the door and leave her alone in the stairwell.

TWENTY-SEVEN

Rose

Iwalk numbly to my bedroom, ignoring Daisy’s purrs as she winds between my legs. And as soon as my knees hit the edge of the bed, I collapse onto my stomach and sob.

Nate completely overreacted to something that meant nothing, and now the man who has always been so calm and collected when faced with conflict is refusing to work through this one with me.

Because he doesn’t trust me.

Where did we go off the rails?

I wipe heavy tears from my cheeks and roll onto my back, blinking at the ceiling. He can’t really believe anything is going on between Malcolm and me. He knows me better than that. Right?

Just yesterday, we were tangled together in this very bed. It was my lunch break, Kara was at school, and Nate showed up at my office with a burning fire in those cool blue eyes. So, we came back to my place and filled every minute of that hour.

There’d been no hesitation there. No reason to think he doubted me. So, is this the single thing he’s hung up on? Just finding me in the car with Malcolm?

With his hand on my thigh?

God, it probably did look pretty bad.I try to imagine how I might feel if I found him in the same position with another woman and my heart drops.

But that doesn’t mean he can just choose to ignore my attempt to explain. Trust should be the foundation of our relationship, and it completely failed us today.

I grit my teeth and glare at the glass light fixture above me. How dare he blame me for this? How dare hedraw a lineon who I can and cannot spend time with?

He needs to know how not ok that is, so I pull out my phone and poise my fingers to begin a text to him, but in the same moment, there’s a knock on my door. I wipe my cheeks again as I rise quickly from my bed and head down the hall. Maybe he came to his senses and changed his mind.

With a deep breath, I peer through the peephole, but it isn’t Nate. It’s George. I run my hand through my hair, clear my throat, and pull the door open.

“Sorry for stopping by unannounced,” he says. “But I wanted to drop these off.” He’s smiling at first, but his face quickly falls when he sees me. “Wait, have you been crying?”

I shake my head and wipe my face again as I step back to let him in.

“Yes, you have,” he insists, sliding a stack of files onto the counter and eyeing me cautiously. “What happened?”

I press my lips together and try to hold it in, but when I squeeze my eyes shut, another tear escapes.

“Is it Nate?”

When I open my eyes, George is staring at me with a furrowed brow, like he’s ready to completely annihilate whoever hurt me.

I sigh. “Yeah, and Malcolm…both of them.”

He peels off his suit jacket and takes me by the arm into the living room. “Sit. Maybe I can help.”

I sink down onto the sofa and drop my head to my hands. “It’s a mess. Malcolm won’t leave me alone, and now Nate doesn’t trust me. I don’t know what to do…”

“Start at the beginning,” George instructs.

So, I relay as much information as I can. I tell him about the day Malcolm brought lunch to my office and the way Nate reacted so unaffected by that. I tell him about the anxiety I had over introducing him to our parents. I tell him about what happened today.

When I’m finished, George is massaging his chin like he’s analyzing a math problem. “Well, first of all, stay away from Malcolm. Please. I don’t like that he’s still trying to push his way in when he knows you’re seeing someone else. Guy has creep written all over him.”

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