Thunderstruck

Alistair gave the woman he had never met before, yet found strangely captivating, his phone number. Without saying a word, he quietly typed the digits into her phone and received her promise that she would call him.

His car was too badly damaged to be driven safely through the city, so David called a tow truck. A company car soon arrived to pick them up, and they headed toward the office.

But for some reason, Alistair’s heart was pounding. It was as if an inexplicable, mesmerizing fog had settled over his eyes, and all he could see was her deep, dark eyes.

The sudden ring of his phone broke Alistair’s thoughts. His heart jumped with hope, and he quickly reached for the phone, staring at the screen with excitement. But it was not an unknown Georgian number.

Instead, the words “Bonnie Assistant” flashed back at him.

Alistair felt a heavy, cold wave of disappointment sink into his stomach. He rubbed his temples, trying to force his voice to sound normal as he slid the screen to answer.

“Yes, Bonnie?”

“Mr. MacLean, good morning,” Bonnie’s crisp, perfectly organized voice echoed through the line.

"Just a reminder that the Board of Directors is assembling in precisely thirty minutes. The local corporate partners have already arrived at the headquarters, and they are setting up in the main conference room. Your presence is required to open the introductory remarks. And the new legal advisor will be arriving as well.”

“Right. The board meeting...” Alistair muttered, staring blankly out the taxi window at Tbilisi's historic, winding streets. In the chaos of towing his broken car and scrambling to find a cab, the matter had completely slipped his mind.

“I’m on my way, Bonnie. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

He hung up and tossed the phone onto the seat beside him, feeling strangely lost. He was a man who was used to clear thinking, control, and complete focus at work. Yet now, he hardly recognized himself.

He had just spent the last half-hour standing on a busy street, completely fascinated by a woman whose name he did not even know.

"Will she really call?"

The cynical, business-minded side of his brain tried to warn him.

He had given her his number, but she hadn't given him hers. To any outsider, she could easily be a clever fraudster who had whispered sweet promises of reimbursement just to escape massive financial liability and police questioning.

Yet, as Alistair recalled the sharp intensity of her dark eyes, the fierce way she had protected that child, and the genuine, breathless worry in her voice when she asked if he was hurt, he knew it wasn't an act. She wasn't a liar. He didn't care about the damaged car, the insurance paperwork, or the paycheck. The only thing that mattered was hearing her voice again.

“Hey, we're here.” David, his friend said, nudging Alistair's shoulder as the taxi pulled up to a towering, ultra-modern glass skyscraper in the commercial heart of Tbilisi.

“You still look like you've seen a ghost, Alistair. Are you absolutely sure you didn't hit your head on the steering wheel?”

“I’m fine, truly,” Alistair said, smoothing the front of his charcoal suit and straightening his tie. He forced himself to put on his usual unreadable expression, the one he always wore in the boardroom.

“Just a bit distracted. Let's go take care of business.”

They took the sleek glass elevator up to the penthouse floor, where the company headquarters offered a wide view of the Mtkvari River. Alistair took a deep breath, trying to put his confused emotions aside. He needed to become the sharp, serious Scottish businessman everyone at the company expected him to be.

Then he walked into the large boardroom.

The atmosphere was tense. Members of his own board were already seated along one side of the long rectangular table, going through thick legal files.

“Ah, Alistair! Excellent timing!” the Managing Director stood up, smiling warmly.

“Our potential Georgian partners and their legal representation just arrived a few moments ago. This international merger depends entirely on their local compliance review, so today is crucial.”

Alistair took his place at the head of the table, nodding politely to his colleagues.

“My apologies for arriving right on the line, gentlemen. There was a minor traffic incident on the avenue. Let us begin the introductions.”

“Perfect,” the Managing Director said, turning toward the heavy frosted-glass doors at the back of the room.

“Allow me to introduce the Chief Legal Counsel who’ll potentially be representing our company. She is the one who will be advocating our local operations.”

The boardroom doors clicked open. Alistair looked up carelessly, preparing to offer a standard, polite corporate nod. But the breath was instantly dragged right out of his lungs, and the silver pen in his hand froze entirely mid-air.

Walking into the room, carrying a sleek leather briefcase, was the very same woman who had been driving the silver sedan. The wild, dark hair she had worn loose during the accident was now neatly pinned back in a flawless, elegant business style.

She wore an elegant, well-fitted blazer that gave her a confident, powerful look—a sharp contrast to the frightened woman he had seen by the roadside just half-an-hour earlier.

As she stepped forward, her eyes moved across the table and suddenly stopped on Alistair. Her confident step faltered for a moment. Her dark eyes widened in shock, and her lips parted slightly as she recognized the blond-haired man with the striking green eyes—the same man she had crashed into only minutes earlier.

The Managing Director, completely unaware of the shock that had just swept through the room, smiled proudly.

“Alistair, please meet the head of the legal team, Miss Melano Baratashvili.”