Page 94 of Blindsided
“Bullshit,” I growl, my lip curling in disgust. “You couldn’t have moved on. What we had was too special. You’re mine, and I’m yours. I’ll never give up on us.”
Her chin trembles, and her lips part as she croaks out the words I never expected to hear. “I’ve slept with someone else.”
And with that punishing blow, she pulls out of my embrace and walks away, leaving me shattered.
“I should have never come to Scotland,” I groan, my head bowed into my hands as my elbows rest on top of the sticky bar of the pub. I stare down into the tumbler of whisky between my elbows as I add, “The transfer I made was wrong. Even my grandad could see that. If I could get in a time machine, I’d go back right fucking now and never step foot into Santino’s slimy office.”
I reach down and grab my drink, taking a small sip, and letting the burn sit on my tongue for a moment before swallowing. “And now, Freya is fucking someone else.” A chill runs up my spine over the thought of another man’s hands on her body. The image makes me physically ill.
Or maybe that’s the ninth whisky I’m currently drinking.
Roan sighs heavily beside me and grabs the glass out of my hands. “You didn’t expect her to wait for you, did you?”
I turn glazed eyes to him. “Whose side are you on?”
“Yours, man. Always yours.” He faces forward and swallows my whisky in one gulp. Thief. “But you can’t really blame her after everything that happened.”
I do my best to focus on my friend, but there are currently two of him. Roan and I have been drinking at the pub around the corner from my parents’ house for the past three hours since Freya ran away from me like I’m a bad habit she’s trying to break free of.
“You seriously won’t tell me where Freya and Allie are?” I ask him for the eighteenth time.
He shakes his head without even looking at me. “I made a promise to my wife, and I’m not starting our first year of marriage with broken promises, Mac. No matter how pathetic you look right now.”
I groan and rake my fingers through my hair, mussing it and then tossing my fists out in anger. “I must be an idiot to think that saying three words could make things go back to normal.”
Roan side-eyes me. “You told her you loved her?” He says the words slowly, as if I might miss the question.
I turn my head to him. “Yeah, pal. I told her, and she couldn’t give a shite.”
Roan blinks back his surprise. “I didn’t know you said you loved her.”
“I did, and it didn’t fucking matter. She’s the first woman I’ve ever loved, and she looks at me like I’m fucking dirt. Christ, I’m an idiot.”
I bury my head into my folded arms on the bar, and Roan jerks me out of my wallowing. “Why did you tell her you loved her?”
I frown over at him, trying to make him into one person. “What do you mean?”
“Why did you say it?”
“Because I love her!” I state again, agitated by his ignorant question. “Christ, get your ears checked, you annoying bawbag.”
Roan purses his lips. “You didn’t give her any reasons for why you love her?”
My face crumples up as I look over at him. “No…what reasons?”
Roan huffs out an annoyed noise and turns me to face him on my stool, nearly tipping me off of it in the process. “You can’t break a girl’s heart like you did and expect to just drop an I Love You. Ag, you have to make her believe it, man.”
“She doesn’t want to believe it!” I argue, my muscles turning to mush with every passing minute. “She’s moved on. She’s fucking someone else, and she hates my guts.”
Roan shakes his head from side to side. “If you can look at that girl’s eyes and not see the heartbreak all over her face when she looks at you, then you don’t know her at all.”
A flash of anger shoots through me, and I sit up and grab him by the collar of his shirt. “Don’t tell me I don’t know Freya Cook. I fucking know Freya better than anybody in this entire world.” I release him with a shove and stare forward broodingly. “I know her favourite Netflix programs and that she prefers Indian takeaway over Chinese, but if I say something sweet to her, she’ll always get us Chinese. I know that she’d have more cats in her flat if she wasn’t terrified of Hercules getting the shits over it. I know that I can’t kill a spider in front of her, but she still wants him dead in the end. I know how she takes her coffee and that she hates shop-bought blankets. I know that she says she hates arguing with me, but deep down, I can tell it makes her feel alive and fuck if it doesn’t do the same to me. And I know that her greatest desire in life is just to be seen by someone, even though she acts like she needs no one.”
I turn to face Roan, my hands shaking as realisation dawns on me. “I saw her the moment we stepped into that shop last year, man. I think maybe I’ve loved her since I first met her.”
Roan nods, his mouth tipping into a sad smile. “That’s why you have to fight harder to win her back, you idiot.” He grabs my arm and shakes me. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself and wallowing over this move to Glasgow and make her see that you don’t just love her because you miss her. You love her because she’s your entire world, and you’re willing to do anything to be with her.”
“Fuck me,” I grumble, my heart pumping like a maniac. “I’m a damn fool.”
