“No.” The word surprises me as much as him. “No, you’re going to listen to me first. I am not your responsibility or your obligation or your… whatever you think I am. I’m a grown woman. I’ve been voting for seven years. I have a university degree. Well... nearly. Three-quarters. But still! I pay taxes. I can operate heavy machinery—okay, laptops, but they’re complex—and outside my contractual working hours, I can see whoever I damn well please!”
He glares down at me, carved from Yorkshire stone and barely contained frustration, which only makes words tumble out faster. If I stop, I’ll lose whatever half-baked point I’m making.
“I could line up every farmer, fisherman, and lighthouse keeper on this island for a reverse harem! I could drink my way to Edinburgh and back, shag my way through the ferry staff, and none of it has a damn thing to do with you.”
His brows pull together into that thunderous scowl that usually makes me want to hide under desks.
“I genuinely don’t understand what you want from me, Patrick. I really don’t.” My hands shake—probably the cocktails, definitely the confrontation. “Because I’m a programmer. I deal in logic and facts. And the facts are: you kissed me. I kissed you back. Other things happened that we’re apparently never discussing. You told me not to get any romantic notions in my head, and fine. Message received. But all I wanted was for you to treat me like an equal with some respect.”
His jaw clenches but he doesn’t interrupt.
“I did everything you wanted! Followed your chain of command like a good little girl who knows her place.” My voice climbs higher. “And then you show up tonight, on mydate, and try to drag me home.”
The words tumble out of me in a messy rush, miles from the feminist mic drop I’m hoping for. “Do you know how hard it is for me to evengoon a date? I’m twenty-five years old. And dare I say it—although clearly you don’t believe it—I’m a competent adult and a halfway decent employee of your company. And I’m sick of men like you thinking you know better than I do about my own life.”
My chest heaves. The street spins slightly.
We stand there, the night air crackling between us.
“Men like me?” His voice has gone dangerously quiet.
“Yes. Men who—” I fling my hands out, nearly smacking him in his massive chest. “Men who think they own everything. The distillery, the island, the people, the bloody air we breathe—”
“I don’t think I own everything.”
“You literally ordered me home! Like I’m your property. So yes, men like you. Men who make me feel stupid and small and incapable of basic decision-making without supervision.”
His shoulders rise with a long inhale, chest expanding like he’s summoning patience from the depths of his soul.
This is how it goes,I think bitterly.I finally find my voice and it’s slurred, pathetic, and will probably get me fired tomorrow.
“Finished?” he says at last.
I sniff. Not finished. But my dignity’s already in pieces on the pavement.
Let’s see what a man like Patrick goes for.You’re being childish, Georgie. You’ll regret this tantrum in the morning when you’ve sobered up and can see that I’m right.
“Fuck.” He yanks off his baseball cap, and rakes his fingers through his hair until it stands in wild spikes.
Then he steps in closer, so close the heat of him rolls over me, his breath stirring my hair. “I wasn’t trying to make you feel stupid. If that’s how it came across, then I fucked up.”
I blink at him, pulse hammering. “What?”
His hand rises halfway toward my face. I watch it hover there, fingers curling into a fist before dropping back to his side. “I’m sorry. For upsetting you.”
“You’re... apologizing?”
This isn’t how it goes. Men like Patrick don’t apologize to women like me. They explain why we misunderstood. Why we’re overreacting.
His grimace deepens. “I handled tonight badly. Not just tonight. Where you’re concerned, I’ve been handling everything badly.”
I squint at him suspiciously, the cocktails making everything fuzzy. “Are you worried I’ll file a complaint with HR or something?”
“No. Though you should if you want to. This is me telling you I crossed the line. Multiple lines. And it wasn’t about making you feel small. It’s that I have no idea what to do about this… situation.”
“What situation?”
His eyes lock onto mine. “The situation where I can’t get what happened on that boat out of my head. Not for a single fucking day.”
