Page 79 of The Friend Zone

I raised an eyebrow. “He didn’t feed you?” She hadn’t eaten before they left. They’d taken off over three hours ago. Damn, that fucker played with fire.

I hoped she was a nightmare the whole time.

“He kinda fed me.” She grimaced. “I had some deconstructed Chilean sea bass ceviche tapenade thingy.”

I scoffed. “Is that even food?”

“I have no idea. I’m starving,” she mumbled, turning for the house.

It hadn’t gone well. That was obvious. And they’d just been at a restaurant, like I thought—a shitty restaurant that she didn’t like, on top of it. He hadn’t scored himself any points with that rookie move.

Hope swelled inside me. Maybe this was the last we’d see of Tyler.

Still, she was down.

“Is everything okay?” I asked, standing.

She stopped with her back to me and let her head loll. “Fine.” She paused for a moment. “He asked me to marry him.”

The punch to my heart knocked the wind out of me. What?

I was grateful she wasn’t looking at me because she would have seen it on my face. I couldn’t catch my breath. I almost couldn’t compose myself to answer.

I cleared my throat. “Oh yeah? What did you say?”

She waited a beat until she replied, talking over her shoulder. “I said maybe.”

* * *

While she changed, I made her a sandwich—no mayo, only one piece of ham, provolone, no crust—the way she liked it. I handed it to her wrapped in a paper towel when she came out of her room. She looked like she wanted to cry when she took it from me. I hated seeing her so upset.

We called an Uber so we could drink.

And drink I planned to fucking do.

I said maybe.

He wanted to marry her and she was actually considering it. I felt sick.

In the Uber, she sat next to me with her leg tucked under her in the back seat, her knee poking through the ragged hole of her jeans. She’d done her makeup. She gazed wearily out the window.

I stared at her hand on the seat. Her ring finger was bare. For now. “Do you want to talk about it?” I asked.

She looked over at me. “You want to talk to me about my boyfriend?”

Boyfriend. She called him her boyfriend. Not ex-boyfriend. Boyfriend.

The knife twisted in my heart, but through sheer will I managed to keep my voice level. “Sure. I might be able to give you some insight.”

I was torn between wanting to remain blissfully ignorant and needing to be informed. Morbid curiosity won out. I reasoned that whatever was going to happen would happen whether I knew the details or not. And if she talked to me about it, maybe I could sway her decision in my favor.

She took a deep breath. “Well, he reenlisted. Only this time he won’t be in war zones. He’ll be translating for dignitaries and high-ranking military personnel.”

I wrinkled my forehead. “Translating?”

“Yeah. He’s a linguist. He’s fluent in nine languages—ten. Maybe now it’s ten. He said he’s studying Mandarin. I don’t know.”

Jesus Christ. How had Brandon failed to mention that this joker wasn’t some infantryman doing grunt work? He was smart, educated, and good-looking to boot?