It fucking needs to be.
I still haven’t sent Robert a text. My thumb’s hovering over the blue circle with the white arrow. Sucking in a strong breath doesn’t make anything feel better.
Rhiannon: Hey, fancy dinner together?
Three dots appear, then stop, then start again.
My stomach dips. Bollocks. I really should have given more thought to being a raging cunt before it slipped out of my mouth.
Robert: Sure, what are you thinking? La Mar?
I smile, my insides relaxing a little at the fact he didn’t tell me to eat shit. We at least need to be able to put on a united public appearance while we’re wading through this political maelstrom.
La Mar is the hotel’s restaurant, and I’m bursting to try it. They’re known for their Mediterranean dishes, and they are reported to have an extensive local wine list. Seafood, wine, and a handsome man who isn’t completely awful company when I pretend he’s not the journalist that upset the apple cart in the world of rugby… and my personal life?
Hell yes.
Relieved I didn’t fuck up my chance for a lovely evening, I tell him that sounds great, and that I’m hopping in the shower.
Robert: Don’t use all the hot water, I need one before tea too, or you’ll be thrown out of La Mar because your date smells rotten.
Even though I was unkind to him earlier, he makes me smile, and while I’m lathering up under the streaming hot jets, I can’t help but think about our conversation from earlier. What’s he going to tell me in a couple of weeks that I don’t already know?
Is he trying to get me to give him the benefit of the doubt so he’s not being held accountable? Like, what else could there have been to make him do what he did? Fame and money—aren’t they the two greatest motivators in the world?
He’s probably trying to buy a few months peace from the whole thing, and heaving out a sigh as I wash under my boobs, I can’t say that I blame him. The weight that lifted the minutewe got off the plane here in Croatia is astounding. I hadn’t realized just how much pressure I was under until I stepped out of my everyday shoes for a minute and slipped my holiday flip-flops on instead.
When I step out of the shower, I slide on the wet tiles and almost go on my hole. My fingers claw at the edge of the bathroom counter as my legs glide in opposite directions. Somehow, I manage to right myself, but I might have to stretch out my thighs a little more before bed. That’s all I need, to get injured right before the new season starts. Talk about adding scandalous insult to sunny holiday injury.
As I’m wrapping my hair in a towel, something prickles in my brain. The floor being so slippery is hazard enough for me, never mind Robert. I’m torn between letting him figure things out for himself because he’s a grown man who knows his limits and making his life just a little easier where I can.
He doesn’t seem like the kind of man who wants a fanfare made about the fact he’s disabled. But I almost went on my face with two legs. I should give him something of a fighting chance, right? I didn’t know about his leg when I first met him. And it would be easy for me to make some small changes or help him out a little… but I also don’t want to be a dick and accidentally upset him somehow.
I should talk to him. He probably has a process for how to talk about it, maybe it helps him. Or will he think I’m overstepping? I did snap his face off earlier. I’m going in circles while I dry myself. The emotional whiplash is real. I may want to stab him sometimes, but I don’t want him to slip and fall on a wet bathroom floor.
I wrap myself in a towel because I was so focused on getting the suncream off me that I forgot to bring clean knickers into the bathroom.
“Robert? Are you back?”
I walk out of the bathroom and into a solid wall of man.
“Yeah?”
I squeal, one hand darting for the towel on my head, and the other going for the towel already sliding down my body. One of his hands drops his crutch as he grabs to help save my dignity, but instead of pressing the towel to my body, his palm cups my now supremely naked breast.
“Fuck. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. I’m trying to get… Fuck. Fuck.” The more he swears, the harder I fight the silent laugh shaking my shoulders. The more I try to cover my body, the more epically I fail because by the time we pull ourselves apart, my towel is gripped between my knees, and poor Robert’s face is so red he could identify as a lobster.
Of course, we both bend down at the same time to pick up our things and end up bumping heads. Pain radiates through my skull. “Ow! Sorry. You go first, I’m already naked.”
“I’d cover my eyes so as not to look, but then I’d not know where I’m reaching for. Or I’d grab the wrong thing again.” There’s so much tension, genuine, apologetic pain in his voice I can’t help laughing again.
“What are you doing here?” I try not to sound accusatory, but he was awfully close to the bathroom door for it to be coincidence.
“Having an out-of-body experience, apparently.”
My face heats at the compliment. He’s avoiding looking at me, but from the way his jaw ticks, it’s taking some serious self-control. “You mean an out-of-bounds one.”
“You’re assuming I’d call that foul.”
