“I don’t want to know what you’re doing, just get your ass here,” Luis said. “You’re late.”
“Yeah.” My ass is occupied at the moment. I garbled out an apology between pained, choppy exhales and did my best obscene-phone-call breathing into the receiver.
Luis, neither impressed nor aroused, hung up.
After slamming the phone down, I pressed my forehead against the wall, unleashing another stream of curses. “What the fuck is that you’re spreading on there, acid?”
“It’s Neosporin. Be good, or I’ll poke you again,” he warned.
“Asshole.” I laughed breathily. “Also not an instruction. Especially in the context of poking.”
“Nice. You kiss your mother with that mouth?”
“I don’t know my mother.”
His fingers stilled. “Why?”
I didn’t want to talk about my mother. Not while my ass was bared and Peter was on his knees attending to it. There were other things I wanted to discuss—or enact. But the words tumbled out anyway. Because I could cockblock myself better than any fucking phone. “She left for Europe the day my dad brought me home, and she didn’t come back.”
“She’s back now,” he said softly, resuming his task.
“Good for her.”
Given the positions we were in, I was unnerved by the silence—I didn’t know what to expect next, but based on the immediate history, I was convinced it would be unpleasant. “She’s dying,” he said.
What to make of that? Was I supposed to feel something? I didn’t. Maybe a little numb. “Well, I’m sorry for her. Are you done back there?”
He pulled up my boxers as an answer and snapped the elastic back into place at my hips. Grabbing my pants, I jerked them on and turned around. So much for Peter at my naked ass. I wasn’t going to ask the very wrongly-timed question of how he liked it.
“That’s it?” He looked up at me, brow pinched.
“What do you want me to say? I don’t know the woman.” I moved to the closet, turning my back on him to grab a shirt and tie.
I heard more rustling behind me, and then he was leaning against the closet door. “Then why are you angry all the sudden?”
“I’m not angry.” I yanked a shirt off the hanger and shoved my arms into it, fingers shaking so badly I could barely button it. Peter gently brushed my hands aside to do it for me.
“Sero-something. Liver disease?” he hedged. Both of us watched the quick rise and fall of my chest; another dead giveaway that I was upset.
“Cirrhosis,” I amended. “And fuck her. I don’t give a shit.” The muscles in my mouth were beginning to hurt from being pinched.
He nodded, remaining silent while his fingers ascended the button ladder. “You didn’t ask me how I knew about it.”
“My asshole father and his passive-aggressive way of getting me to help. He told you, assuming you’d relay it. I’m surprised he gives a shit. When she croaks, he’ll be free and clear to continue schtupping that fucking gold-digging bitch of a secretary.”
He smiled indifferently, flipping my collar up before reaching for the tie and winding it around my neck. Wisely, he changed the subject as my anger amplified. “Schtupping?”
“It means—”
“Do you think I’m stupid?” He pulled tight on the knot and glared at me.
“It was just an old-fashioned word. I thought— Never mind. And, no, I don’t think you’re stupid. Anyone who teaches himself seven languages without finishing seventh grade is not stupid.”
“Sixth grade.” He smoothed out my tie and looked up at me. I frowned, checking the knot. “I didn’t finish sixth grade. I wasn’t good at school.”
“Even more impressive,” I said softly, thumbing his lips. “Thanks for the help.”
He nodded again, pulling away to sit on the bed, propping up on his hands. “I’m not fluent in them, either.”
I grabbed my suit jacket from the closet as a distraction, trying to think what he was driving at. “It’s not like you to belittle yourself.”
“That’s not what I’m doing.” He blew a puff of air, sending his hair flying wildly off his brow.
“Then why diminish your accomplishments?”
“Why use words like ‘schtupping’ and ‘diminish your accomplishments’?”
“Because they’re words I know?” Jesus, I was becoming Cai, answering questions with questions.
“Exactly.”
If I had a list of my most used phrases with Peter, this would be zenith among them: “Huh?”