Incapable (Love Triumphs Book 3)

by Ainslie Paton

  “He stopped loving me, and he started blaming me for what happened to him.”

  “I don’t understand how you survived this.” Damon’s voice was edge and point, all his smoothness roughed over by shock. He knew the worst of it now. She could afford to look at his handsome face without his expression triggering tears.

  “Jeffrey once tried to teach me Chaos Theory. I didn’t get it until after that night.”

  “The butterfly effect. A small change in one state that results in a larger one in another.”

  “That’s right. I was the butterfly. I was the party organiser and the cheer squad leader. I was the friend collector and the chief mischief-maker and the fixer of things. Jeffrey was the chaos. Did you know butterflies don’t live very long?”

  Damon nodded. “A few days, a month.”

  “Jeffrey didn’t stab me but he took my confidence, he taught me to doubt myself, to be fearful, to hesitate. He changed my outlook, my personality, my whole life, because of what he didn’t do to me, and what he did to Hamish because of me. I’m not a butterfly anymore. I don’t have the grace and ease I once had and I never will again.”

  “Jesus, Georgia.” Damon flattened both hands on the table in front of him. The hands that’d made her feel alive and young again last night and beautiful this morning, because they’d touched her with desire. She wanted that feeling again. But not at the expense of the truth, and she didn’t think he’d want her when he knew what her disability was.

  “I came home to make a fresh start, to learn who I am when I’m not the woman who trusted Jeffrey, who got Hamish hurt. Who stayed too long in a loveless marriage out of obligation. You weren’t supposed to happen.”

  She laid her hand alongside Damon’s. She didn’t dare touch him because if he rejected her, the sting might last forever. “I wasn’t supposed to meet a man like you, feel so much for you so quickly.”

  “You tried to send me packing.”

  She nodded. “I did.” Irresistible was as much a part of Damon’s nature as indecisive was hers, post-Jeffrey, post-Hamish.

  “And now?”

  “I had to tell you because I needed you to know why I run hot and cold when I’m with you. It has nothing to do with you being blind and everything to do with me being uncertain. I should never have married Hamish. That’s not what either of us needed. His parents tried to talk us out of it, but he needed me and I needed to work through my guilt. We were the perfect wrong fit. When he refused counselling, when he got abusive, I should’ve left him, but I thought I deserved his anger. I know that’s twisted.”

  “You didn’t deserve any of this fucked up shit.” Damon scrubbed his face. “Sorry, but I don’t have more eloquent words to give you.”

  “I don’t know what it’s like to be in a normal relationship. I don’t know how to love a man without being his nurse and his punching bag. You being blind made alarm bells ring in my head.”

  He dropped his hands from his face. “Are they still ringing?”

  Yes, but for an entirely different reason. Bells could ring for joy as well as to signal danger.

  “You don’t have to be my nurse. You don’t have to love me. We can enjoy each other’s company as friends.”

  Could she be his friend and deny how much she wanted his kisses? “Is that what you want?”

  “I don’t want to push you into a corner. I don’t want to scare you, rush you or manipulate you, and I’m guilty of all that. I get I’m not who you need.”

  “I thought I knew what I needed, and then I met you.”

  “You need someone to love you, not for who you once were, not for who you’d like to be, but for who you are right now: shy and sexy, capable and tentative and so very brave. Did you know butterflies can see colour; red, green and yellow?”

  Was he offering to love her, to be what she needed? “I didn’t know that. Are you making that up, like sexing a goldfish?” She hoped that might make him smile, but he shook his head as if her attempt at humour was at odds with the whole world.

  “It’s true, butterflies see colour like I see you, Georgia.”

  He’d see her in blurred fragments that didn’t jigsaw together cleanly because that’s how she saw herself.

  “I see the red of your courage, the yellow of your pain. I see the green of your fresh start.”

  He stared at her, his hands spread on the table, tension cording his neck. If he could see her he’d know he’d made her tear up with his tender talk of butterflies. She squeezed her eyes shut to stop them falling, to send the tide back out, taking the memories with it like garbage left on the shore.

  “I’d like to give you more colours, all the colours there are, if you’ll let me.”

  She opened her eyes. There was a whole half circle seat between them, a thousand reasons why they were a bad choice for each other, a thousand more to walk away now, when they were a half-formed notion with little more than frenzied kisses and a fish to bind them. But he sat, steady, when he might have twitched to separate, offering her a bright new spectrum of life.

  “How do I do that, Georgia?”

  “You guys all right?”

  She blinked at Angus. His eyes switched from her to Damon. He took in the cold coffee, ignored cake.

  Damon answered. “We’re good.”

  “Dame?” Angus frowned at him, then fixed Georgia with a look that said everything she needed to know about how important Damon was to him and what he’d do to protect the man.

  Damon moved a hand, held it out to her and she took it, their arms stretched full-length in the space between them. “We’re good,” he said again.

  Angus rubbed a hand over his eyes, pulled a key from his pocket. He slid it across the table towards Damon. “Lock up when you’re done. Turn the rest of the lights off. Shove the key under the door.” He collected the crockery and went back towards the kitchen, calling, “Don’t forget the alarm.”

  The minute he was out of sight, Georgia shifted around the curve of the bench to Damon’s side. He exhaled hard and gathered her close. She had to stop herself crawling in his lap.

  “Will you wear the dress? Will you let me hold you, dance with you, be with you, light and dark, pale and vibrant, whatever colour you feel like being?”

  She pressed her lips together hard, flattening them to stop a sob from rising. He was entirely the wrong man for her at entirely the wrong time and everything she wanted. “You still want to do that?”

  He was a comfort blanketing her troubles, smothering them out. “So much.”

  She gave herself over to the strength of him, the heady scent of him, part citrus, part sweat. A lone tear tripped off her lower eyelid and fell on her shirt. “After everything I’ve told you about my disability.”

  “It’s not a disability in my eyes.”

  She looked up into his face, the sight-impaired eyes that saw so much. “You weren’t supposed to happen.”

  He pushed his fingers through her hair and anchored her. “But I have and you haven’t chased me off.”

  “I’m not going to be easy.” A benign sounding warning, so everyday against the ripped from the news headline history she’d just given him. His cheek against the side of her face. He’d feel her tears.

  He put his lips against the wetness. “Neither am I.”

  But he was too easy to be with. “It’s been too long since someone was interested in me. I’m falling for you, Damon, and it’s way too soon.”

  He drew back, the gentlest smiles. “Yeah it is, but I’ll take it, because I’m falling for you too.”

  She bracketed his face in her hands. If she embraced him she was stepping up to a new life, less alone, less lonely. He couldn’t glue her fragments together, but if he was willing to love her just a little, for just a while, she might have enough confidence to ram them back together herself.

  She pressed dry lips to his, but before either of them could make it a proper kiss, she said, “I’m keeping the dress.”

  15: Naked<
br />
  Holy fuck. It was possible she wasn’t wearing underwear. Damon ran his hand from Georgia’s shoulder to her hip and all he felt was slippery silk. No ridges, no bumps, no edges. She was wearing the grey dress all right, but all he could think about was what she wasn’t wearing.

  Her hands were pressed flat on his chest. “You look amazing.”

  He cleared his throat, clogged with too many thoughts of ditching the awards night and getting inside that invisible zip. “You feel amazing.”

  “It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever worn. I feel like a Disney Princess.”

  He shook his head. His thoughts more pornographic than Mickey Mouse Club. If they didn’t leave her doorstep now, Georgia might not get the full princess effect of the hire car, the red carpet and the night of stars no one outside the recording industry had ever heard of.

  He took a step back and executed a sweeping bow. “Your chariot awaits, my lady.”

  She laughed and there was nothing girly about it. He straightened up and grinned. He must’ve had desire for her splashed all over his face. It was an expression he’d been wearing all week, put there by her increasing ease with him.

  Since the night at Moon Blink they’d been tentative with each other; kinder, as though they were meeting for the first time again with no expectations, but a depth of understanding that smoothed the tricky corners. It was sweet. They’d been for a walk on the beach, had dinner twice, joked and laughed and debated, but their kisses had been gentle and restrained, their earlier passion banked against Georgia’s caution and his own want not to scare her away.

  But now he’d had quite enough of sweet and if she really was naked under the dress, he figured she might’ve too.

  She laughed again when she saw the limo, putting a hand to his cheek.

  “You thought I was joking.”

  “Madam. Sir,” said the driver. He opened the car door.

  “I don’t know what to think about you.” Her sentence started on the kerb and ended inside the car. He put his hand to the roof, ducked his head and followed her in, reaching for the seat. She was there to guide him.

  “I’m not that hard to figure out.”

  There was no deep mystery to him. He wasn’t prone to brooding like Angus, or secretive like Jamie. He wasn’t anxious like Heather or angry like Taylor. He didn’t play the class clown like Sam. Other than any confusion he created trying to navigate his failing sight, he was what you see is what you get. And he spoke plainly, no fudging around. With one sense short-changed, there was zero use in misleading with another.

  Georgia settled beside him, a tiny tinkling sound. He put a hand up to her ear. Dangling earrings.

  “They’re fake. Supposed to be crystal, but they suit the dress.”

  He’d have bought her real crystals, expensive fakes if she’d have let him, but he’d pushed it with the shoes. “What can’t you figure out about me?”

  “Why you’re not partnered up, married, off the market.”

  So nothing to do with the overspend on the limo. “I was engaged once.” She was entitled to know. He knew so much about her.

  “What happened?”

  Good question. The glib answer was that he was a blind guy and Candace hadn’t loved him enough to see past that. It was the truth but not all of it. He’d bought her a ring, they’d lived together, but he’d never thought about a wedding or what kind of growing old they’d do. He’d never let her set a date, or stopped her trying to cure him. There was always another job to voice, another plane to catch, another remedy to humour her with. He’d loved her, but the same way she’d loved him—enough to be hurt by the failure of the relationship, but not enough to avoid it.

  “We weren’t meant to be.” Georgia’s hand on his. He brought it to his lips and nibbled her knuckle.

  “Can’t say I’m sorry.”

  “Cruel woman.”

  “Greedy woman. I like having you to myself.”

  The driver was a long way away, there was classical music. He could ask about the underwear. He could wreck the romance in two seconds flat. He turned her hand over and kissed her palm. She smelled of something floral, not her usual scent, but at least it didn’t make him sneeze. He hadn’t been able to shake the notion a head cold had it in for him, though it hadn’t developed into anything.

  He was putting her to bed tonight. Whether she let him stay after he tucked her in or not was up to her, but he wasn’t pashing on the doorstep and stumbling home alone to lie awake on edge half the night without pressing his advantage, not tonight, not after tuxedos and limos and nakedness under silk.

  They walked the red carpet. An event organiser’s trimming. It had no function other than to mark the entrance to the venue. There was no one to gawk or take photos. Georgia stopped in the foyer. A good thing. Time for a quick briefing. It could get messy inside. He was admired and despised in equal measure by this crowd. There were friends, colleagues, and there were rivals, but there were also those who assumed he’d won the career war not because he had talent and he worked hard, but because he got the sympathy vote.

  It was hard not to hate those sods or the unreality of their thinking. It was difficult to pick them out from the ordinary jealous rivals, but they did his reputation more damage with their gossip and innuendo. He didn’t need to give them any ammunition by looking like a disabled guy, but he’d long learned he didn’t have to—they’d make it up.

  “You know how in Dystopian Conflict, Vox has to fight his way through a nest of winged vipers?” He angled his head towards the hubbub of noise from the ballroom. “Could get like that in there tonight. Especially if I win.”

  She squeezed his hand. “You didn’t tell me you were up for an award.”

  He was up for several. He shrugged. “It’s not like it’s a big deal.”

  Her arms moved around his neck. She pressed her potentially nearly naked self against his tux and he had to fight not to palm her butt, flattening his hands more socially acceptably on her ribs. “You’re a big deal to me.”

  He was putting her to bed and he was staying there with her unless a winged viper tore his heart out first.

  “Whatever happens in there, don’t let go of me. The vipers are intimated by Disney Princesses.”

  She straightened his bowtie. She offered her arm and then she lent him her eyes. She described the room, the sea of men as penguins, the glamour of the women. The heavy chandelier and the candelabra table decorations. The large print stills lifted from movies and animations around the walls and flashing on a central screen.

  They weren’t in the room more than a few minutes and he was having his back slapped, his cheek kissed, his body touched by people he knew well and not so well. He should’ve warned Georgia about that. She stiffened at his side, confronted by the attention he was getting.

  It got easier once they took their seats at a table of friends and their partners. He introduced Georgia and she joined in the conversation, swapping the fish that got put in front of her for the steak that got put in front of him. With the main meal down he could claim her attention again. “Are you doing okay?”

  “You’re up for three awards.”

  She sounded put out. Unless there was an upset, he’d win two. “Yeah.” Where was the eloquence of a script when you needed it?

  She scooted closer. “Do you have any idea how exciting that is for me?”

  And didn’t that make him want to haul her into his lap and find out for sure about the underwear. He couldn’t give a shit about the awards, or the meal, or the few people he wanted to catch up with. He wanted to call the limo and make out with her all the way home to her Hello Kitty pjs.

  He was planning on kissing her in an X-rated way and damn the watching eyes, when he felt a hard slap across his shoulders. Fuckers who did that, touched him without speaking, without making him aware of who they were, deserved to get slapped back. He turned his head. Black blob, women didn’t tend to slap, this was some guy he knew or who wanted to
know him.

  He kept his voice even. “You have to help me out, buddy.”

  “The great Captain Vox doesn’t know his own friends.”

  No friend. Isaac Groone. A leech, a misogynist who managed to stay employed despite a heavy drinking problem. They’d worked on game software, playing soldiers together. Six weeks of gritting his teeth and pounding a bag daily at the gym to get through the experience. He’d had his fill of Groone four hours after meeting him and hearing him brag about his conquest of a woman half his age. That was four years ago, but not long enough ago to forget how Groone had denigrated the woman, calling her a whore and a slut and getting annoyed when Damon shut him down in front of the production crew. Since then the parasite had tried to trade off their association to build his own career.

  Another slap. “Good to see you again, mate.” Said loudly to reinforce their non-existent relationship. “Who’s the lovely lady? Did you finally put a ring on it?”

  Damon turned to Georgia. “Please excuse me.” He pushed out from the table and stood up, got in close to Groone, hand to his coat, bunching it in his fist, not to steady himself, to threaten.

  “I’ve only got to be near you to be reminded how lucky I was to lose my sight and not my decency. You and I are not mates. If you come near me again, if you insult anyone I call friend, I will find a way to make sure the only work you can get is voicing dog food commercials in hell.”

  Groone laughed loudly, throwing his voice to make it look like this was a gag, but there was a nervous hitch to his laughter. “Ah mate, you’re a card.”

  Half the room was probably watching them. Damon stepped in closer, his knee knocking against Groone’s leg, more of the man’s coat in his fist. He’d like to have seen his eyes. Like to have known for sure he’d rattled the bastard. He pushed Groone hard enough that he staggered back with a shout. He couldn’t make a joke out of that. He felt Georgia’s hand on the back of his and he regretted the aggression immediately. Not much romance in a head-butting contest.