“Dude! Chill! Drunk, huh?” We stare at each other. Me with loathing. He with amusement like I’m a fucking unicorn.
Marlow bends to pick up the dropped cigarette from the ground, then takes a deep drag, the tip burning in the shadow of the tree as he stares me up and down.
“She is single and can fuck whoever she wants,” he says so calmly that I want to break his fucking face.
“So youarefucking her?”
The thought rubs me like the sound of nails scratching against glass.
“Tame it down a bit, yeah?” He tips his chin.
I breathe heavily.
My thoughts are a trainwreck. I was trying to be nice, professional, give her space. And she goes and fucks someone else. I want to punch something. Rip someone’s heart out. She’ll be on the first boat off this island tomorrow.
Marlow flicks the cigarette away and stabs his hands in his pockets.
“You are not her type,” I say, though I have a feeling Kat doesn’t have a type. It makes me angry. She is careless like a dude. Chicks are not supposed to be like this. “You don’t know how to handle her.” My own words make me even angrier.
“I’ve never seen you jealous, Archer.” Marlow chuckles through his nose.
I’ll punch the motherfucker, I swear.
“I’m not jealous.”
I’m giving too much of myself to this, but I can’t help it.
“Oh, yeah? So you flew here to the restaurant to check on her justbecause? And trying to start a fight with me—that’s because you feelresponsiblefor her? What is she, your sister?”
“Fuck off.”
“That’s your problem, Archer. You think people owe you attention. Women specifically. You are so used to them dropping their panties for you at the snap of your fingers that you forget how to appreciate them. You can’t even see your own feelings for what they are.”
“Which are?”
“You want her.” He is so calm that it ticks me off, but I try to hold back my rage. “Why not tell her so instead of waiting for her to come over and get down on her knees for you? Jesus, dude, step it up, will you?”
He smoothes his hair. So fucking understanding and perfect. Is that what Kat likes in him?
Marlow rubs his neck. “She won’t sit around waiting for someone whose arrogance is the size of the Empire State to spare her a minute. Only to fuck her and walk away.”
Nice. She is telling him about our little get-togethers.
“Oh, she told you she fucked me. Does she confide in you now?” Bitterness is like a snake, coiling in my heart.
The sound of Marlow’s abrupt laughter scratches my ears and nerves and pride. “She didn’t have to. You just did. You two are sooo alike.”
“We are not.”
“Whatever. And no, I didn’t fuck her, Archer. We are friends. I am not interested in her that way, and she won’t shut up about you. So there.” He locks his eyes with me.
The last words wash over me like a soft tide. Smoothly. Quietly.
Marlow pulls a joint out of his pocket and lights it. “Do you want me to go back to Tapas, or you gonna go and spend time with the girl who fusses about every message you send yet refuses to respond?”
He laughs through his nose.
“I got it,” I blurt and feel like a fucking schoolboy who just made a fool out of himself. I’ve never fussed about women. But this one…