Page 11 of Flagrant Foul
I physically ache.
Instead of touching him, I shit on him. “What the hell happened to you anyway? You look like you’ve been dragged through a bush backward.”
“Slept in my car,” he replies, shrugging as though it’s a normal occurrence.
“What do you mean you slept in your car?”
He blinks slowly, seemingly confused as to why I’m failing to understand a simple concept. “I mean, Nadia kicked me out. It was after three in the morning, and I had nowhere to go, so I slept in my car.”
I don’t like his tone, but I like what he’s saying.
Nadia is the worst. She and Sev have been on and off for the better part of two years. It’s been a tumultuous relationship, fraught with more breakups than I can count since the beginning. Of course she’s a Bulgarian supermodel, and of course she’s eye-wateringly stunning.
Of course I hate her.
My feelings toward her aren’t just a case of me being an asshole. Nate doesn’t like her either, and he’s an excellent judge of character and not prone to jealous assholism at all. He says she’s completely wrong for Sev, and thank God for that, or I’d be panicking my head off about how long she’s been around.
I hate it when Sev dates anyone for obvious reasons, but on top of that, I hate it because he has this terrifying way of drifting through life as though he has no control over what happens to him. He has a lackadaisical attitude toward relationships that stresses the fuck out of me. Relationships seem to materialize around him without his active participation. I know for a fact hemoved in with Nadia without ever willingly consenting to the arrangement.
He's one of those people to whom anything could happen at any time. And I really do mean anything.
It scares the crap out of me.
The good news is that Nate says Sev and Nadia won’t last. He says they have nothing in common, and the only reason they’ve lasted this long is because the language barrier has worked in their favor. Nate says that if either of them understood the other better, the relationship would have crashed and burned in a matter of months.
“Why didn’t you go to a hotel?” I ask mildly.
“Eh. It was late. I couldn’t be assed to check in somewhere.”
That’s a lie. Sev hates calling anywhere to make reservations. Absolutely hates it. Doctors, dentists, hairdressers, you name it. If he can’t book online, he’s not going.
I’m immensely cheered by the news of the breakup, and though I try not to show it, I can’t resist fishing for details. “So, what happened?”
He reverts to the slow blinking. “Um, I packed my shit, put it in my car, and went to sleep in the back seat.”
“No, asshat. I mean, what happened? Why did she break upwith you?”
“Oh, you know, ‘You don’t know how good you have it with me.’” He does an above-average impression of Nadia, complete with aggressive head twitching and an authoritative finger waved close to my face. “‘I know what I want in life. I know what’s important, and I know my own value.’” He sighs softly. “And me? Well, I don’t know any of those things.” His eyes are dark and unreadable as he gives me a shrug that’s meant to depict indifference but falls a little flat. “In short, I missed her deadline to propose, and she lost it with me.”
“Propose!?” I say like it’s a made-up word. A bad word that should never be used in polite company. Or any company, for that matter. “What do you meanpropose? You’re casually seeing each other. I mean, yeah, you live together, but you break up every few months. She slashed your tires over the summer. She can’t expect you to marry her. That’s insane. Is she fucking crazy?”
He shrugs and quirks his lips to one side. “I did gently ask about that, but…that’s when the yelling started.”
I laugh despite myself. The thought of anyone having the balls to question an irate Nadia if she’s crazy mid-breakup is damn funny. “I hope you don’t mean you actually asked about her mental health at a time like that, Sev. You must havesomesense of self-preservation. Surely.”
He looks at his feet and replies shiftily. “I, er, I didn’t word it exactly like that, but…”
“Jesus fucking Christ, you’re a lost cause.”
“That’s what Nate said when I told him.”
“What else did he say?” One of my favorite things about Nate is that I can always count on him to be the voice of reason when it comes to Nadia. He’s been my solid ally against her since day one, and he’s never let me down once.
“He said I need to spend some time thinking about what I want out of life, and if it’s not Nadia, I need to cut her loose. He got all stern about it. You know when he gets all dad-like and you can tell he’s using his hands to talk, even though he’s on the phone?”
I nod. I know that vibe very well. I’ve been on the receiving end of it plenty of times. Nate’s one of the few people I know who can make you feel scolded and loved at the same time. It hits right when he does it, and as a result, Sev has been known to try to emulate it when dealing with me under less-than-ideal circumstances. It makes me so angry that I almost black out.
“He was like that.” Sev stretches his jaw and attempts a weak grin. It falters. “I feel like a dick,” he says quietly. “I didn’t know that’s what she wanted.”
