Page 44 of Blindsided By You

The emotion lingers in the air, as if both of us contemplate the greater loss of the woman who will never sit in this space, whose hands will never again caress the keys of the instrument she loved.

The moment Geordie’s lids flicker open, he knows. He turns towards me with wary eyes, his face draining of colour. His hands fall to his knees as if hiding them away.

“Jenna, I’m sorry. I should have asked, but—” He bites at his lower lip, chin dipped, and I see a swallow ripple down his throat.

“No, no, it’s fine.” I swipe at my damp cheeks with the back of each hand. I must look a wreck, with blotchy heat still in my face, and my hair, stale with sweat, matted to my scalp.

“You don’t look fine.”

There’s both a question and concern in his eyes. Self-conscious, I swipe back a greasy strand of hair, tucking it behind my ear. Geordie’s seen me in disarray, but not by the brutal light of day. Unravelled in a sexy way, not this ugly, wrung out mess. Not with a sour-smelling body, unwashed for three days. The last time I showered was in an Edinburgh hotel room, where I reluctantly erased the scent of him from my skin.

“Migraine.”

“Since Sunday night?” He shifts on the piano stool, brows drawing downwards.

“Yes,” I confirm. “Tackled me hard this time.”

“So that’s why.” Even in my half-dazed state, I see the small exhale of relief as his frown clears. “I tried to text you. Every day.”

“Sorry, once the drugs take me under, I’m gone.” I offer a weak smile. “But I’m back now.”

His face relaxes, and he stands, moving towards me, undeterred by my dishevelled state. Part of me wants to retreat—god knows I reek, and I feel every one of my thirty-four years etched on my weary face—but I don’t, sensing he needs me to allow him in close, reassurance that my silence wasn’t a deliberate attempt to shut him out, or put distance between us after Edinburgh.

“That’s good.” He wraps soft arms around me, cradling me, as if understanding how fragile I am right now. As if he knows that having struggled upwards to surface in the real world, I couldso easily slip back under. He’s holding me here, keeping my head above water with his quiet strength.

“Anything I can do?” He murmurs against my ear, a flutter of breath that sends a little tremor of warmth through my veins.

“Make me a coffee?”

“That I can do.”

He drops his hands to my arms, places a whisper of a kiss on my forehead and takes me by the hand, leading me to the kitchen as if this is his house, not mine, and settles me on a high chair at the worktop.

“No Andy?” he asks, jamming a pod into the coffee machine, while casting a nervous glance towards the empty dog bed by the French doors, as if expecting the black demon to suddenly appear, snapping at his ankles.

“Still at Skylar’s. By the time we got home off the bus, I knew the headache was on the way. I asked her to keep him there and work from home.”

“Can’t say I’m missing him.”

It feels so right to have Geordie here, in our kitchen, but winning over Andy—and Dad—to the idea may take time.

“Me neither,” I grin. Andy’s prickly personality hasn’t exactly endeared him to me. “But don’t let him know. He might decide to add me to his hit list.”

“Does this happen often? The migraines?” His blonde brows dip in query.

“Well, no.” I try to think back. It’s been a while. “Hadn’t had a headache for six months until last weekend. After the party. And then again this Sunday evening. I’m not sure why they’ve come back now.” His mouth twists into a wry smile. “No—it wasn’t alcohol.”There’s a world of difference between a hangover and a migraine. I’ve had enough of both to know.

“It’s not that,” he says. “I hoped it wasn’t me giving you a headache.”

I can hear the doubt in his voice. Even confronted by the evidence of why I haven’t responded to his texts sitting across from him, me in all my ugly, smelly post-migraine state, he’s unsure. Either that, or gentleman that he is, he’s giving me an out, a chance to back out of our arrangement gracefully.

There’s no way in hell I want that. Having him here this morning, wrapping his tender concern around me, seeing how unfazed he is by the state I’m in, makes him even more alluring.

“The only headache you’ve given me, Geordie MacDonald, is how to keep seeing you without Dad finding out.”

I take a swallow of coffee, savouring the delicious anticipation of the caffeine hit as it slides down my throat. I study Geordie for a moment, measuring his reaction.

There’s a shy downward tilt of his chin, and his mouth curves in a smile. When he looks up at me under those pretty lashes, I read relief in his blue-grey eyes.

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