Blindsided By The Boss

42 - Callum

"You still haven't heard from her?" Aaron asked, waving at a waitress walking by.

Looking at the glass my hand clutched, I shook my head. "No. I think she blocked my number because all my text messages return to me as undeliverable, and all phone calls are redirected. I get no voicemail, no nothing. And the same goes for emails. No response, which means she blocked that too—or had them sent to her spam folder."

"It's been three weeks. You'd think you would have heard or seen her by now."

"One would think. But not me."

"What about Isabelle? Hasn't she heard from her?"

I shot him a look of what do you think? She's her best friend. So, of course, she's heard from her. And she was most likely told not to tell me anything about Eloise's whereabouts or anything about her.

"Nevermind. That was an idiotic question. Of course, she's heard from her. But what has she said?"

"That I'm an asshole."

"From her mouth or Eloise's?"

"Eloise. The thing is, I didn't do anything fucking wrong. What she saw was nothing her mind told her she was seeing."

I understand what she saw didn't look good on my part. But I was completely innocent. And for Eloise not to give me a chance to explain and defend myself pisses me off. When I told her I was a changed man, I fucking meant it. When I told her I was tired of going from one woman to the next, I meant that too. And when I told her I was ready to settle down and look to the future—with her—I meant that as well.

I meant all of it.

I know I screwed up with Eloise for canceling our lunch date so I could meet with Arnie, Skye, Ian, and Tawny that day, and what she came across may have looked bad. Something I'm sure I would have reacted about also, but instead of her jumping the gun and assuming I canceled our plans so I could have a groupie, she should have confronted me and asked me what the fuck was going on rather than running away and hiding from me.

"The rest of the group are here," Aaron warned, sliding his chair closer to me to allow the group to fit in at our table.

The amber-colored drink stared me in the face; I wanted to slam it down my throat instead of sipping it. And I wanted to tell the waitress to keep em' coming or just to leave the bottle at the table so I could drown in my sorrows and continue telling my drunken self, this is why I don't do relationships, but I don't. I just do what I always do—relish my drink by sipping it.

But as I sit here, stewing about Eloise assuming the worse, the more I want to throw my drink across the bar.

Isabelle sat next to me, resting her hand on my thigh. "She's probably going to kill me for telling you this, but I can't take this shit anymore. I spoke to Eloise this afternoon." My head whipped in her direction. "She's back from Washington."

"Washington? What was she doing there?"

She bit her bottom lip with an apologetic look in her eye. Mason... she was visiting Mason.

"Visiting a friend, I guess."

"Mason," I muttered, my heart letting me know it was on the verge of breaking.

"Yeah," she said quietly. "But don't worry," she added, patting my leg, assuring me all was good. "She didn't go there to become Mason's girlfriend. Eloise said she went there to escape everything here so she could think straight." Isabelle looked me in the eye with sincerity. "She also admitted she went there to talk to him about you. She felt she couldn't talk to her sister or us about you because we were close. She wanted someone else's perspective on things, someone that knew you but wasn't close to you."