Was that feeling heartbreak? I didn’t know. Embarrassment? Pain? Maybe it was just the feeling of all of your life’s plans flushing down the toilet in a single second.
Then I noticed the man.
Standing over Josh, looking down at him, was a guy I didn’t know. He was wearing beat-up jeans, motorcycle boots—one of which was untied—and a gray T-shirt so worn that the hem had come unstitched. A brown leather jacket lay discarded on the floor at his feet. His hands were curled into fists, his arms flexed. They were impressive arms, sleek with muscle. In fact, all of him was impressive—his shoulders, his back through the thin shirt, his narrow waist. He had tousled brown hair, a scruff of stubble, a face that knocked me back. My first thought was Jesus, he’s good-looking. Everyone in this little scene was good-looking except, maybe, me. And they were all so focused that not a single one of them had noticed me.
“Hey,” I said.
Everyone turned and looked at me. It was like a crazy tableau, and for a second it hurt so sickeningly much that I felt like laughing. Evie Finds Boyfriend With Pants Down. I was breathless with pain, but I was also a little detached. Is this really happening? Why can’t I feel anything? What’s wrong with me?
Josh dropped his hands from his face, and I could see blood dripping from his nose. “Evie!” he said, in a tone of such pure horror it was almost comical. I felt like laughing again. Or maybe screaming.
The bare-assed woman took her turn. “Oh, my God!” she cried, dropping to her knees. “Josh!” She touched him gingerly, getting close to but not quite touching any blood. She looked up at the man above her. “Stop hitting him, Nick, you asshole!”
But Nick, the asshole, wasn’t even looking at her. He was looking at me.
He was still poised in his fight stance, his fists curled, but instead of looking angry or threatening, he looked… distracted. His gaze took me in, up and down, and then it rested on my face, his eyes catching mine, as if he was trying to figure something out.
I was wearing a green T-shirt and denim overalls. Okay, fine, overalls aren’t exactly fashionable, but they were the first things I pulled off the floor. The overalls, plus the gray cardigan I’d put on, hid the fact that I wore no bra, so that was a win. May in Michigan, especially in the middle of the night, is not exactly warm, and my nipples were showing the fact behind the overalls. I had flip-flops on my feet—my toes were wet and freezing—and my shoulder-length hair was a mess, my face devoid of makeup and probably creased with sleep. I wasn’t exactly Giselle, but at least my ass was covered.
“Evie,” Josh said from the floor. “I can explain.”
“Nick, he’s bleeding!” the beautiful woman shrieked. “Should we call an ambulance? What do we do?”
“No ambulance!” Josh replied. He rolled over and groaned, cupping his bleeding nose. The only person who didn’t say anything was Nick, who was still looking at me.
Despite the craziness of the scene, and my hurt, and the fact that my boyfriend had—it seemed likely—recently put his dick into the bare-assed girl, I was calm. Be polite, my mother had always taught me. No one likes a girl who makes a fuss. That’s who I was now. I was the polite girl, after years of failure at it. I ran a hand through my hair, thinking maybe I should make a fuss in this situation—but then again, Josh and the gorgeous woman were making enough of a fuss for everyone.
I met Nick’s gaze without flinching. I couldn’t read his expression.
“The neighbors are about to call the cops,” I told him in my oddly normal voice.
He blinked once—his eyelashes were ridiculously dark—and looked down at Josh, who was still moaning. I watched him uncurl his fists. He toed Josh with his boot, nudging him in the ribs as the woman poked at him, still not getting bloody. “Hey,” he said, the voice I recognized from the phone call. “Shut up.”
The woman wasn’t done. “You asshole!” she shouted at Nick again.
Nick actually sighed. “You shut up, too, Gina,” he said. She went quiet, still glaring.
I should be screaming, or crying maybe. I should be losing my shit. Instead, I watched as Nick bent and picked up his brown leather jacket, shrugged it on. He scrubbed a hand over his face. His knuckles were red—he’d given Josh a hell of a hit. There was a second of furious satisfaction at that, and then I pushed it down again. That wasn’t me.
Ignoring the two on the floor, Nick walked toward me, his untied boot clomping loudly. I felt a jolt of alarm low in my belly. I’d met bad boys in my life—even done things I shouldn’t with a few of them, back when I was Old Evie—but I’d never seen one like this. This Nick guy owned a room without even trying. He probably wrecked things without even trying, too. Lives. Women. Virginities. Reputations. He was that kind of guy.
Still, I assumed that with his ass-kicking finished he would leave, and Old Evie felt a pang over it. I didn’t know who Nick was, but he was very fucking cool, and I envied him that. Old Evie would have followed a guy like this like a lapdog. “Thanks for the phone call,” I said to him.
He stopped, looking at me again in that way he had, like he was figuring something out. “Yeah?”
“I mean it.” I did. If he hadn’t called me, I would have continued getting cheated on, not knowing about it. It wasn’t his fault. “It takes guts to be the bearer of bad news.”
r /> Nick considered that, his gorgeous gray eyes looking me over. “Are you pissed off, Evie Bates?” he asked in his bar-band growl.
It was a strange question, but somehow it fit the strange, surreal night I was having. I looked past him at Josh and naked girl, who were watching us. Josh had sat up, and I could see his nicely styled hair, his washboard stomach. He’d had sex with me a week ago, on my bed in my apartment. I remembered now.
Old Evie would have screamed at Josh. New Evie didn’t make a fuss.
But maybe both Evies were angry.
I nodded, answering Nick’s question. “Yeah. I think I’m pissed off.”
“Yeah?” Nick said. “Okay, then. You hungry?”