Page 123 of The Matchmaker
It is not okay.Iam not okay.
My heart slams against my rib cage, the blood moving around my body too fast, making my vision blur and my chest tighten. I can’t do this.Whydid I think I could do this?
“Just give me one second,” I say to Granny, even though I’m not sure I’m speaking out loud. I can’t even take my hands off the steering wheel. I can’t even move. And if Granny responds, I don’t hear it, I don’t hear anything but a faint banging sound that pulls at the corners of my panic.
Eventually, I realize it’s someone knocking on my window, and my head feels like it’s rusted to my neck as I force myself to turn only to see Jack Doyle scowling at me.
At least, I think it’s Jack.
He doesn’t really look like Jack. He looks like a before photo of Jack. Clothes rumpled, hair uncombed. There are patches of stubble on his jaw and bags under his eyes.
He knocks again, his expression impatient as he gestures for me to open the door.
“Are you okay?” he asks. Behind him, I can see his sleek black Jeep parked on the other side of the road. It’s not the one that came at me, but it wasn’t here before either, meaning he drove up without me even realizing, which only terrifies me further. How long have I been sitting here? “Katie.”
My name snaps me back to the present. “Granny fell,” I say, and, for the first time, he glances into the back, his eyes widening when he sees her. “I’m taking her to the hospital, but I’m not…I’m not good at driving and they were speeding and…”
He stares at me for a long moment, his expression unreadable, before he turns and goes back to his own car. He returns in a matter of seconds, locking the Jeep behind him and throwing a smart leather bag into my passenger seat.
I can only sit there as he slams the door shut and moves around the front to my side.
“Move over.”
“What?”
“Move.” He flaps a hand at me, almost hitting my arm as he forces me to scramble over the gearshift. “Mrs. Collins? You alright back there?”
Granny doesn’t answer, but when I twist around, she’s breathing normally. I tell myself she’s just resting.
“I’ll drive you to the hospital,” he says, and I just nod because I figured that was happening.
“Thank you,” I say woodenly, and he adjusts the seat and the mirrors, frowning when the engine makes the noise it usually makes (probably not a healthy one).
“You should call ahead,” he says. “Let them know we’re coming.”
I do. They’re not happy that I moved her and that makes me feel more guilty, but I know waiting for an ambulance might have taken hours, especially if there were more accidents with the electricity down.
We talk through what I need to do before I arrive, and I’ve barely hung up the call when Nush rings me back. It’s only then I realize a lot of people will have had a lot of missed calls from me and be thinking the worst, but Nush sounds incredibly calm when I tell her what happened, as though knowing any other reaction would just set me off. I decide to leave out the part about Jack, who keeps his gaze studiously to the front while pretending not to listen, and Nush agrees to let everyone else know, so I won’t have to.
There is one person I should tell about Jack, though. One person who might not be too happy about the turn of events, but when I go to call Callum, my fingers freeze over the screen. I don’t even know where to begin.
“There’s a charger in the console,” Jack tells me, mistaking my hesitation.
“Thanks,” I say, plugging it in.
He grunts in response. “This happen a lot?”
“No. I don’t…” I clear my throat. “My parents—”
“You don’t have to explain yourself.” I can’t tell if he meansyou don’t have to talk about itorI don’t care, but I’m grateful not to have to do so anyway. So grateful that my throat gets tight with it.
“I feel useless,” I admit.
“You’re not.” His tone is dismissive, even if his words are not. “If I hadn’t stopped, you would have gotten over it. You would have kept going.”
But he did stop. And though I want to ask why, I’m too exhausted for that kind of conversation now, so instead twist in my seat and hold Granny’s hand, trusting this man not as Jack Doyle but as Callum’s brother to get us safely where we need to go.
CHAPTER THIRTY
