Page 17

JENNA

I stretch like a satisfied cat in a patch of afternoon sun, except I’m basking in the wonder of this, the warm afterglow of Geordie and me. It’s not only the sex, which left me trembling and breathless with its damn near perfection.

There’s a connection with this man, and a sense I’m standing on the edge of something exciting, about to throw myself off a great height. It’s not the same as the time I actually did that—poised on a bungee platform, anticipating the terror and exhilaration of free fall. Rachel insisted we do a jump when we went on a girls’ holiday to New Zealand and damn if it wasn’t a thrill, but right now I sense I’m one small step away from a thrill of a different kind.

More like I’m on the side of a pool on a stinking hot day, and having dipped my toes into the deliciously cool water, it’s inviting me to plunge in. I want to, knowing it’s exactly what I need.

Geordie is what I need—he’s kind and funny; and he’s caring. He acts like I’m precious to him. I feel as if he wants to look after me, and while the outside world might find it surprising, I like it. I’m tired of being the person worrying about everyone else. I might appear hard on the outside—I’ve had to be in this job—but inside I’m just a girl like any other who wants to be loved and is soft enough to be hurt.

The question remains—what does Geordie want? And am I it?

I need to know. I wasted too many years with Adam, thinking I was what he wanted, although I never asked him outright. We met through work, struck up a friendship, and it morphed into more. It was easy. Too easy. We never laid it on the line, ever, not even when we got engaged.

Just like we did with everything else in our relationship, Adam and I simply fell into an engagement. Everyone else around us seemed to be doing it—why not us? And so, one night, sitting in his car outside a restaurant where he’d taken me for my birthday, he said, “I suppose we should get married then,” the words matter-of-fact. I accepted his sort-of proposal as evidence I was what he wanted for the rest of his life. I was so wrong.

While Adam leaving me a week before our wedding almost broke me, it taught me, too. In the painful weeks of soul-searching afterwards, I vowed I’d never go beyond something casual unless I had some surety. I’m too old to waste time investing my heart in a relationship where there’s no possibility of it becoming something long-term.

As I hear the soft approach of Geordie’s feet, I know we need to talk about this. I’d rather the short, sharp heartbreak now; him telling me this was just an enjoyable one-night stand, a bit of fun, rather than carry on, my hopes raised, blissfully ignorant that I’m not end-game material for him.

Even so, I can’t broach the subject right away. The demanding Geordie of earlier barking commands at me, telling me exactly what he’s going to do to me, and ordering me to do things to him in return, is gone. I liked that Geordie very much, and I want to see some more of him. He’s uncovered a new side of me in the bedroom tonight. But this man, sliding under the sheets beside me, is the other Geordie, the soft one. It feels wrong to confront this gentle, smiling man with hard questions.

He lies back on the pillow and I instinctively curl towards him, nuzzling in beside his long body, laying my head against his broad chest, and bathe in the soothing feel of his fingers as they move to stroke my hair, and the steadying rise and fall of his breathing. It’s so addictive. I don’t want to break the spell, but I must.

I swallow down my fears and prepare myself, although I don’t move, staying exactly where I am. I can’t look at him, not brave enough to read his response.

Damn it, I should be, but I can’t face seeing hesitation in his eyes, or worse still, a lie. Despite my resolve—I told myself I could handle rejection—still, part of me wants something real with Geordie; wants it so badly I’d rather live with the illusion. I speak calmly, although my throat is so tight it hurts.

“So, where do we go from here?”

His quiet laughter rumbles beneath my ear.

“How about nowhere? We stay here like this. Miss the bus home. Take up residence in the hotel. Live on great sex and room service.”

I can’t help but chuckle back. It’s a tempting proposition.

“Might need a few more condoms. Does that come with room service?”

“Absolutely,” he laughs, and then groans. “Please don’t ask me how I know that.”

I don’t need to. It’s certainly not just his natural ability that allowed him to play my body as skilfully as he plays the piano. His lovemaking speaks of experience. That he’s practised in the art of pleasure is no surprise. An attractive young single man, travelling the world; of course there’ve been women before me. Probably a lot of women.

“I’m not judging,” I giggle against his chest. “Just pleased all those embarrassing high school classes about safe sex got through to you.”

“Fuck,” he laughs. “They were god awful, made worse by…”

“Mrs Sutherland,” we say at the same time, bursting into laughter at the memory of poor long-suffering Mrs Sutherland, the biology teacher who drew the short straw, nominated to teach sex-ed to the students of Cluanie District High School.

“In your year, did she always use a pointer for diagrams?” he asks. “Like she didn’t want to touch a penis with her finger, even if it was just a picture?”

“Yes,” I choke out. “And she’d write the anatomical terms in extra tiny writing like they’d be less noticeable.”

“Oh man,” he laughs. “And we were stupidly immature about it.”

“Now, class, let’s be mature about this.”

We chorus the words in perfect imitation of her. The poor woman must have said them at least ten times in every lesson.

Our laughter trickles away in tiny bubbles, until we lie in silence. I try again, this time propping myself up on one elbow to face him, the comfortable ease of shared memories between us encouraging me to be brave.

“Geordie, I need to know where you see this going. Us.” I find a snippet of courage and take one step further. “I really like you Geordie, but… ”

He presses a finger to my lips, hushing me. “And I really like you, too,” he says, as if my hesitation was simply seeking confirmation that this could be more for him, too. I take another step.

“Look, Geordie, I don’t want to pressure you, but what happened between us tonight, it can’t happen again unless there’s…”

I fumble for the words. I’m not expecting a lifetime commitment here, but I need more than the promise of a quick tumble between the sheets if we’re feeling horny. I’ve got a couple of very nice vibrators to solve that problem and Geordie’s got a pair of strong hands that I’m sure can capably relieve his needs. Neither of those options will leave us with a broken heart.

“Some feelings involved?” He says it carefully.

“I’m too old to just mess around, Geordie. I’m not looking for casual hookups.”

“You’re looking for more.” His eyes search my face, but they are unnervingly unreadable.

“Yes—well, no, I don’t think I was even looking. Moving back home, I’d kind of resigned myself to not finding someone. Just throw myself into my business for a while. Focus on making a success of at least one part of my life.” I pause; one heartbeat, two. “And then came you.”

His mouth curves in the sweetest smile, and I want to kiss it. One large arm wraps across me, pulling me down towards him. He leans forward, pressing his lips against my forehead. When he speaks, his voice is hushed.

“And you,” he breathes, the lightest brush of air whispering away my worries. We sit in stillness, taking in the magic of the moment, that this thing could really be happening. Between us. My friend’s little brother. Not so little now, with that big strong arm curling around me protectively.

He breaks the embrace, but we stay close. I lie beside him, the two of us like parallel lines, headed in the same direction off into infinity.

“It’s the same for me,” he says. “All of it. Really, I have no idea why I came back to Cluanie. A whole lot of reasons, I suppose.”

“You didn’t enjoy your work?”

“Yeah, I did, but I was tired of the rigs. The heat. The close conditions. God, what it’s like to have your own room, space, privacy. The money was no longer enough for me.” He pauses, thoughtful. “Perhaps it was ego. Come back here and let everyone see that Geordie MacDonald, who barely scraped through school, wasn’t stupid after all.”

“I never thought you were stupid. You always seemed such a bright, lively kid.”

Oops, there it is—the word slipping out without thought, emphasising the six years between us. The age gap has evaporated in these last few days, and I’m sorry for bringing it up, but he doesn’t pick up on it.

“Thanks.” His eyes are grateful. “You weren’t there for the worst of it.” A swallow bobs past his Adam’s apple as he deliberates. “I struggled at primary school, but mostly I could bluff my way through. Memorised whole books so it looked like I could actually read them aloud. Made sure I had plenty to say in class discussions so the teachers thought I knew what I was talking about. Threw sickies whenever there was something written I wanted to avoid.”

“But your mum’s a nurse,” I scoff. “Surely she would have known? ”

“I was a very good actor. And she wasn’t so hard to convince, not when she was coming off a night shift. She’d be too tired to argue. Just sigh, send me back to bed, and phone the school.” He chuckles to himself, like the naughty kid he was, a childish pride at conning his mother. It trickles away as he goes on, the light moment gone, as a sad seriousness creeps into his expression. “But high school got tough. I couldn’t hide it so well. As the school became more concerned, Mum became more insistent I go. Dad was on her case too.” From what I saw, Geordie’s dad was always on someone’s case. “He saw school as her responsibility. All the other stuff we had to do—the piano, tennis lessons, chess coach, Rachel’s ballet and horse riding—was at Dad’s insistence, and he made damn sure we went. He’d have shipped us off to some posh school too, but Mum argued we go to school locally. Her punishment for his agreement was she always dealt with school stuff. He held her accountable.”

I know these things. Rachel’s father was—is, I doubt he’s changed—a bastard. While her ability to navigate school successfully kept her in his good graces, from everything she’s said I know, even when he was young, Geordie bore the brunt of his father’s overbearing expectations. There’s remembered pain on his face; it’s drawn, his jaw tense.

“The school tried to help. They put me in the low stream, sent me to remedial reading, but I hated it. Gave up trying. Every year it got worse. Typical story of an undiagnosed dyslexic kid,” he shrugs.

“How did you find out you’re dyslexic?”

I know a little about it. One of the Highlanders’ players a couple of years back confided in me. While it didn’t have much impact on his job as a professional sportsman, so many things I took for granted—sitting my driving test, applying for a passport, signing a sales contract for a car—all these everyday things were a huge challenge for him. This has been Geordie’s life.

“When I was in trade school. One of the tutors—her son was dyslexic—she had me pegged from the day I walked into her class. A week later, she asked me to stay behind after the class. Got me to go get an assessment, matched me up with the right reading tutor. Saved me, really.”

“So you can read now?”

“It’s still challenging, but I manage.” He huffs out a laugh. “Hard to believe, but I even ‘read’ real books,” he says, making air quotes. “Got into it on one of the rigs. I bunked with this guy who’d sit on his bed, with a phone in his hand and headphones on, and sometimes he’d be laughing to himself. I got curious. Asked him what the hell was so funny? A movie or something? But no, he had an audiobook playing while he’d read the actual book on the phone. Fucking brilliant. So I gave it a try.”

“That’s great, Geordie. I love that for you.” My mouth tips up in a genuine smile at the thought he too has the pleasure of books available to him.

Reading has always been such an escape for me. No one in the Highlanders organisation ever suspected serious, business-like Jenna MacDonald, media manager, was reading fluffy romance novels on her phone on all those long team bus trips.

Guess I still believe in happily ever afters even though mine hasn’t come along. Or has it? I don’t want to hope for much beyond this room, but this doesn’t feel like a casual hook-up, certainly not for me, and the way he looks at me suggests Geordie’s thinking that way too .

“Anyway,” he says. “Coming back to Scotland was the best decision I’ve made in a long time.” His voice is softer, his eyes fixed on mine. The message running beneath those words is unmistakable. “Maybe it was meant to be, us back home, together, at the same time?”

In true Jenna style, I deflect; damping down the emotion threatening to swamp me.

“Not sure Dad and Rachel will be too impressed with the universe throwing us together.”

“Well, no disrespect,” he says, “but your dad and Rachel can fuck right off. We’re not kids, Jenna. I don’t care what anyone else thinks—I want to see you, be with you, work out what this is.”

The surety of his words is inescapable. They’re the ones I want to hear, but the intensity in his eyes overwhelms me and I close mine.

“Look at me Jenna,” he says, and I comply. “I’m not putting any limitations on us, and I’m sure as hell not going to let anyone else, either.” I go to drop my chin, turning away from the weight of what he’s saying, but his hand cups my jaw with a gentle but commanding pressure. “I’m not letting you walk away from me when we leave this room. And I don’t think you want me to either.”

“No, I don’t,” I whisper.

“Then whatever this is—we don’t have to put a name on it—let’s give it a chance.” His mouth seeks mine, and I dissolve, sealing our agreement with the taste of whisky and us.