CHAPTER 3
“Now you’re just being stubborn.”
“If I were a man, you’d call it assertiveness,” Mackenzie said, but it was clear that Brody wasn’t buying it.
Nope, Brody and his weird Spidey sense were zeroing in on the embarrassing fact that the only thing Mackenzie was being was a big fat chicken. She was one question away from sprouting wings and taking flight, but she was okay with that. Everyone was allowed a fear or two.
Mackenzie’s was facing her past.
And by past she meant anyone who knew herbefore. And, okay, by anyone she specifically meant Hunter Kane. Admitting one’s problem was the first step in overcoming it, and she was in no rush to take the second step. “I need more time.”
“How much more time are we talking?” Brody asked.
“Maybe a few more months.” Or never. Never worked for her.
“I can bring it up in a few months, or you’ll be ready in a few months?” Brody asked, anddamn, he was catching on to her strategy. “I only ask because a few months ago, you said you needed a few more months. And, well, here we are.”
“Now you’re just being pushy,” Mackenzie said.
“If I were a woman, you’d call it communicating,” he said and had a point.
Mackenzie had clearly communicated her wishes when it came to Hunter. Although her answer remained the same, Brody felt the need to readdress the situation, in case hell had finally frozen over. There might be a few snowflakes on the distant horizon, but they wouldn’t stick long enough to change her mind. Not right then anyway.
The only reason she was still sitting in his office was because Brody was the closest friend she had left, and she’d promised to hear him out before disappointing him—yet again.
And damn, if that wasn’t her second greatest fear.
“You can’t avoid him forever.”
“I’m not avoiding him,” she pointed out. “I just don’t see the need to rush into an awkward face-to-face.”
Brody’s tone turned gentle, sympathetic enough to have Mackenzie shifting in her seat. “It’s been a year since the divorce. Three since disappearing.”
Nashville was a big city. Surely, she could make it another few years. If she were really determined, she could make it a full decade. Because it had also been three years since the doctor visit that had derailed her life.
Since she’d learned that her mother’s blindness was also hereditary. And since Mackenzie’s life had spiraled out of control. She had been a rising writer in the music industry, creating songs that were paving her way toward success. Then the vision loss Mackenzie had experienced in her right eye became permanent and, over the following year, moved to the left, forever blurring her path.
“I finished rehab eleven months ago. I need more time to adjust.”
“You walked out of rehab eleven months ago,” Brody corrected.
“Right.”There is that,she thought, reaching down to pet Muttley.
She didn’t have to reach far, because Muttley was ninety-five pounds of poodle-mastiff mix who preferred to be on Mackenzie’s lap. Notthe typical behavior for a Seeing Eye dog. Then again, nothing about Muttley was typical. He was the size of a bear, hated loud noises, and was a three-time guide-dog-school failure. But he had heart, and that’s what mattered.
“I can barely remember how many steps it is to the bathroom,” she added. “I don’t need to tell you how meeting with Hunter before I’m ready would set me back.”
“Or maybe it will be the thing you need to move forward,” Brody said. “I know the weight it will take off my chest to come clean.”
“I never meant for you to be stuck in the middle.”
“But I am.”
“I know.” And she hated that but didn’t know any other way. While Mackenzie wished things could be different, her music was the only thing she dared share with Hunter right now. Anything more had the potential to take her under.
With a heavy exhale, she ruffled Muttley’s ears. The sound of his wagging tail thumping the floor echoed, cutting through the ever-growing silence.
Putting her best friend in an uncomfortable position was the exact reason she’d thought long and hard before reaching out to Brody in the first place. She’d needed an agent, and he was the best. She would never want to come between family but didn’t know who else to go to. It wasn’t as if there were job listings for blind musician-songwriters.
