Oh yeah. He was totally into her. If only he could see what was right in front of him.
It was sad.
Really.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Helena
“Turkey on white okay?” I call out to Asher as he works on my leaking showerhead.
He calls back from the bathroom, “What the fuck ever.” His New York accent thickens when he spouts, “I’m starvin’ here.”
Nat laughs at something on TV, sitting on my sofa, eating chips from the bag, while I go ahead and work on feeding her apparently famished husband. How famished he is, I couldn’t tell. It seems Max, Ash, Nik, and Trick eat almost all day long. I’m not even sure how Mama Leokov wasn’t eaten out of house and home.
As I grab the Turkey and mayo from the refrigerator, I side-eye Nat, biting the inside of my cheek. I know I shouldn’t say anything, that it isn’t my business to tell, but the longer I think about it, the faster my heart beats. It beats faster and faster, when suddenly I blurt out, “I need to tell you something and it’s important, but you’re likely to overreact, and I’m sure she would just tell you if she was sure you wouldn’t overreact and blab to Mom and Dad, but we know you, and you have a tendency to overreact, dammit.”
Nat turns to me slowly, searching my face. “What the hell are you talking about, Cheech?”
I slap the bread on top of the sandwich and growl, “You’re so slow. I actually can’t believe you don’t know this already. Granted, I shouldn’t know, but I did some detective work and found out, because I fucking care.” I glare at her. “Don’t you care?”
Her brows rise to her hairline before she calls out to the bathroom, “Ash, baby, I think we need to take Helena to the hospital or some shit.”
He calls back, “She bleeding?”
Nat looks over me. “No, but she’s talking crazy.”
He grunts, “She is crazy.”
I glower at the bathroom door. “Crazy like a fox!”
Nat chuckles before asking, “What are you talking about, Lena?”
I make a sound of exasperation. “Nina.” Nat’s face tells me she clearly doesn’t know what the eff I’m talking about. I roll my eyes, throw my arms out by my sides, and boom, “She’s gay!”
Her eyes widen in disbelief a moment before she bursts into laughter. She laughs and laughs and coughs then laughs some more. But I’m not laughing. I look at her with a firm eye, and slowly, her laughter dies. After a moment, she sputters, “Are you joking? You’re not joking, are you?” She chuckles humorlessly. “Why do you think she’s gay?”
I look her in the eye and utter, “The simple fact she has a girlfriend.”
Nat’s eyes widen comically a moment before she jumps up from the sofa and paces, clearly shocked. “A girlfriend? What the fuck? How do you know this?”
I tip my head to the side. “Like I said, I did my research.”
She turns to face me with her hands on her hips, looking more hurt than I’ve ever seen. “And she would hide this from me? Like I’d give a flying fuck if she preferred tuna to a hot beef injection? Why would she hide this?”
Leaning my hip against the counter, I purse my lips. “I think she’d hide this, because of Mom and Dad.”
Nat looks up at me, determined, but her voice is small and unsure. “Mom and Dad wouldn’t care. They love her.
They love us.”
My mom and dad are from Eastern Europe, one of the only places left in the world that is still ridiculously homophobic. I love my mom and dad, but on this issue, I’m not sure they would be okay with it. I raise my brow. “You so confident that you would put money on that?”
At that moment, Ash walks out of the bathroom, wiping his hands on a rag. “Done. Now feed me, woman.”
Smiling, I hand him his plate. “Thank you, best brother-in-law ever.”
Taking a bite out of his sandwich, he raises it in the air in acknowledgement and jerks his chin at me, but Nat stands there looking more confused by the minute. She turns to Ash and asks, “Did you know about this?”