Incapable (Love Triumphs 3)

“His cousin?”

“Yeah, that was the worst. She was a Star Wars fan and wanted me to do Darth Vader all night.” Damon breathed a couple of Darth Vader breaths and the cabbie’s eyes came up in the rear-view.

Georgia laughed. “I don’t have any cousins so you’re safe with me.” His hand was on the seat close to her thigh. It would be easy to put hers over his and tell him she’d never leave him on a rooftop or waiting for help that didn’t come. But she shouldn’t be thinking like that. Not only did she not need that in her life, neither did he.

“He forgets.” Damon laughed, talking about Sam again. He looked towards the front of the taxi. “It’s like the fact I’m blind continually surprises him. He always feels bad when he screws up, but it’s safer for me if I avoid his help.”

“I could screw up tonight.”

“Yeah, so could I.”

“I mean, I’m not sure how to be your eyes.”

“You tell me what you see, what you think I need to know. Anything else I need I’ll ask.”

“There has to be a trick to it. What if I babble a whole lot of unimportant stuff?”

His head flicked around. “You babble. That’s funny. I had to threaten a stop work to get you to tell me your favourite colour.”

“I’m serious.” She was also several shades of pink from the heat in her cheeks to the ugly salmon colour spreading across her chest.

“The only trick is not being self-conscious about it.”

She sighed, and that was like vinegar on hot potato chips, a burst of flavour Damon knew how to interpret.

“Nothing you can say would be wrong, Georgia.”

She looked him dead in the eyes and her heart was thumping so hard it was a wonder he couldn’t interpret that too. It was one thing to watch him from another room with a slab of glass between them; it was a lot more affecting to be alone with him and able to see the ring of darker blue in his near sightless eyes and the heavy fan of his lashes.

He had a slim scar over one brow not quite covered by a fall of his hair and another nick of jagged mended skin on his jaw. They took nothing away from his masculine beauty. If there was still glass between them she could trace those scars, put her fingers to his inky hair. In the back of the taxi all she could do was stare.

He moved his fingers across the seat till they brushed her thigh, and she jumped, her hand going out to catch his. He flipped his palm and they clasped. “Where’ve you gone?” he said.

“I’m right here.”

“I don’t think so. Tell me what’s worrying you and don’t tell me it’s none of my business. I’m asking. I want to know.”

She slipped her hand from his. “I get self-conscious about a lot of things, a lot of the time.”

He turned his head away. “We’ll be in the dark, no one will see us.”

Oh no, stupid mouth. She’d done it again. Made it sound like she was ashamed of being seen with him, rejecting him. She was self-conscious about being with him, and instead of making it easier, the fact he could barely see her made it harder. There was no logic for that, except from somewhere deep inside she wanted desperately for this man to see her and want to know her.

She put her hand down over his where it rested on the seat. “It’s not about you. I wasn’t always so awkward. I never used to be socially anxious. I want to be here with you.”

His eyes were down on their hands. He brought his head up. “You do?”

“I really do.”

He frowned. “Then I should level with you.”

Her first thought accompanying the way her stomach contracted was he’d tell her this was a joke; the equivalent of being locked on a rooftop in a raging storm. There was no experimental theatre performance, there was no need to help him out, it was all a trick, a put-up by the Avocado crew.

“I can’t pay you for tonight. It would be wrong.”

Her second thought was to stop the taxi and get out. She unclipped her seat belt and shifted forward to speak with the driver.

“I didn’t think you’d agree to come. I, ah. I. I was. Jesus, Georgia. I’m a shit. Please put your belt back on.”