“She’s pretty.”
“I said, it’s none of your business.” I stand, shoving the table into him. Ev is my girl. He’d better keep his hands off her.
“Hey, relax.” Seth smirks and leans back, folding his arms across his chest. “Fuck, you have it bad, don’t you?”
I kick at a table leg and place my fists on the top. “You’re not going near her.”
“Why would I? Doesn’t look like she’d want me to. But when she finds out you were on the streets, too? What then, genius?”
Cold trickles down my spine. “I’ll tell her.”
“Micah.” Seth unfolds his arms and scratches his cheek. “This is weird, man.”
“I said I’ll tell her. If she doesn’t like it, then that’s okay.”
Only it isn’t. But what choice is there?
“That’s not what I mean. Sit down, okay?”
I sink back into my chair. “Then what do you mean?”
“Something’s off. She looks spooked.”
I nod. She does. “So what’s your point?”
“My point, man...” His dark brows knit. I don’t remember ever seeing Seth so serious. “This girl shouldn’t be spooked. She shouldn’t be sad.”
I stare at him. The hell?
We don’t talk much with Seth. He’s not brooding and aggressive like his cousin Shane, but he’s not loud and easily excited like Ocean or Jesse, either. He’s a quiet guy. And now he can’t stop talking.
“... so if you know there’s anything she’s afraid of,” Seth is saying, “anything Shane and I can help with... If she needs someone to protect her.
We’re here for her. I’ve talked to Shane, and he feels the same way.”
I rub my face. Bleary or not, I’m obviously missing something here. “Why are you so eager to help her?”
“Why not?”
“Dammit, Seth. You think I’m an idiot?” I bang my fist on the table, making the mug jump and coffee slosh. Is he doing it on purpose, trying to make me hit him? “You said she helped you out once,” I bite out the words, “but going out on a fucking limb, I’d say there’s more to it than that, right?”
Seth looks away but not before I see a flash of pain in his expression. I’m good at reading faces. I’m good at connecting images with emotions. I’m a visual artist, after all.
And that flash of pain reins in my anger. I sit, patiently waiting for him to decide if he can trust me with his story or not. Because I’m sure there’s a story there. I can feel it in the shape of this meeting, in his reactions and words.
He finally turns to me but drops his gaze. I swear, if he did anything to hurt Ev in the past, I’m not gonna forgive him, no matter how bad it makes him feel now. I’m gonna punch his face into pulp.
The fact I’ve never been so angry on someone’s behalf before doesn’t escape me, but I can ignore it if I want, dammit. It’s my own fucked-up mind.
“You didn’t know us back then,” Seth says quietly. His body is slightly hunched over, and he spreads his hands on the table. “It was before Zane took us in.”
They’ve only known Zane for a few months, whereas I’ve known him for years. I was his apprentice back when I lived with my last foster family. Those were the good times, before I was sent back to the residential facility and ended up running away as often as I could.
Christ, I don’t want to remember that place.
Seth is silent for a while. Looks like he doesn’t want to remember, either.
“Being on the streets sucks,” he eventually says. “Having no home sucks. Having no options fucking sucks.”