Nausea threatened to choke him.
She met his gaze and her blue-eyed anguish flayed him more effectively than any big stick ever could.
‘The way I present myself is my defence against the world. It is my attempt to regain a portion of control over my life.’ Her eyes told him she’d been to hell and back. ‘It is my way of trying to get my life back to normal. That means people treating me the way they did before I got sick. The only way I can make that happen is to look as normal as I can—to look the way I used to before …’
She hiccupped. His heart slumped to his knees, but he forced himself to straighten. ‘Are you sure you’re well enough to be getting back to normal?’
‘Oh!’ Her lip curled. ‘Not that you’ve just proved my point or anything! Did that thought occur to you when you were abusing me earlier?’
‘No, but …’ A person could pull off a hell of a show with hair and make-up.
‘You didn’t think I was weak and feeble then. And I bet all the tea in China that you wouldn’t have yelled at me if hadn’t been wearing my wig!’
The Chinese tea was all hers. But … ‘You want to be yelled at?’
‘I want to be treated like normal. The way I really look makes people treat me like I’m an invalid and that makes me feel like a freak.’
He’d made her feel like a freak.
‘And I’m tired of pity.’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘I want my life back.’
He admired her quiet dignity. He admired her courage.
He hated himself.
‘Blair, I shouldn’t have made the assumptions I did. I shouldn’t have said what I did. I’m sorry. I wish—’
He wished he could take back all those things he’d said. He wished he could turn the clock back. He wished he could wave a magic wand so that she’d never been sick.
She straightened. ‘I want to be judged for myself, not by my illness. And not because I used to be a model once upon a time.’
One thing he would never do again was judge someone on their looks, or the fact that they were or had been a model. But before he could tell her that, she rose. So formal. All their former teasing and banter, the digs and challenges, the traded insults were a distant memory. That suddenly felt like such a loss.
‘Tell Stevie I’ll look forward to seeing her on Thursday evening.’
She wanted to be away from him as soon as she could. And he had no one to blame but himself.
Blair forced one foot in front of the other. She ordered herself not to look back to see if Nick watched her.
The prickling and burning at the back of her neck told her he did.
The look on his face when—
Well done, you idiot! Revealing the reason she wore a wig had been supposed to teach him a lesson. Teach him to not jump to conclusions. But …
What had she been thinking? Now all Nick would see whenever he looked at her was her illness.
She tried to banish his look of horror from her mind. She counted her footsteps instead, all the way around the corner and halfway down the next street, where she promptly forgot what number she was up to. She halted and went to grind her palms against her eyes—before remembering her false eyelashes and all her carefully applied eye make-up. She gripped her hands in front of her.
The look on his face!
Horror, that was what he’d felt, and it had reminded her of Adam’s horror. The thought of her appearance had horrified Adam. Appalled Adam. Repelled Adam.
She forced her feet forward, swallowed the lump in her throat, and lifted her chin. Well, Nick Conway didn’t have to worry, because she’d make sure that from now on they’d barely clap eyes on each other.
She did her best to put him out of her mind as she stomped the rest of the way home. It was pointless regretting what she looked like. It was pointless caring what someone like Nick thought of her. For heaven’s sake, she’d survived breast cancer. She should be grateful and count her blessings.
She let herself in at the back door and was immediately greeted with the scent of toasted cheese sandwiches. On cue her mouth watered, the scent transporting her back in time to when she’d been a schoolgirl.
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