Chapter 15
Logan
As stressful asmy job could be sometimes, it was always there for me when I needed it. After Jas had shown her true colors and fucked off with the guy she was cheating on me with, I was able to throw myself into work, making sure that by the time I got home at the end of the night, I was too tired to think about her.
It was the same thing with Elise this time around. Work was there, keeping me from thinking about the look on her face when she'd said there was no reason for us to keep sleeping together.
The part that was the most annoying was that she was right. There wasn't a lot of reason for us to keep taking the risk, especially considering Dan would probably kick my ass from here back to Greece if he found out about it.
But that didn't make it feel any better to be essentially rejected.
At the end of the day, it was my own stupid fault for getting my hopes up. I shouldn't have assumed that just because she'd given into having sex with me for one more night, that meant it was going to be a regular thing.
As much as we didn't get along usually, I knew Elise. She wasn't the type to be happy with covert trysts every now and then. She wanted a relationship and all the stuff that went with it. Stuff that I had tried to give Jasmine and then had thrown back in my face.
I didn't know if I could offer it to Elise, and I didn't know if I wanted to. We had very little in common, and at the end of the day, she saw me as her brother's asshole best friend and probably little else.
So that was fine. It was for the best. Which didn't explain why I was so damned salty about it.
Even the nurses at the hospital started commenting on how my mood seemed to have shifted back into being angry, and I didn't have anything to say about that.
I kept my head down and tried to just focus on the work.
A week passed easily that way, and I unexpectedly found myself with a full two days off for the weekend.
On Friday night, Dan texted me to see if I wanted to hang out, and it had been a while, so I invited him over to my place for pizza and drinks.
He took me up on it, and on Saturday night he came over with a six pack of beer, a bottle of scotch, and a piping hot pizza.
That was the first red flag.
"I didn't mean you should bring over everything," I said when I let him in, taking the pizza box out of his hand before he dropped it. "We could have ordered the pizza when you got here."
"There was a pizza place having a deal next to the liquor store," he said. "It's not a big deal." He looked at me like he was waiting for me to say something, so I just shrugged and helped him bring the stuff to the living room.
"So," he said, sounding bright but not looking it. That was the second red flag. "You've been working a lot lately?"
I nodded. "Yeah. Long hours on call for the most part. A couple of the doctors are on vacation, so we're all covering for them. I don't mind taking a bit more on since they covered for me while I was out of town."
"Right. Makes sense." He fidgeted in place. "I want to ask you something, and I want you to be honest with me."
"Okay," I said slowly. "I mean. I'm always honest with you, but whatever."
"Right," Dan said again. "It's just...and please don't take this the wrong way. I can't stop thinking about you being at Elise's place last weekend. You did a nice thing for her, and I appreciate it, but the truth is, you're not that nice."
"Not sure if there's a right way to take that, Dan," I said, lifting an eyebrow.
"You know what I mean. Look, I know my sister, okay? Every time I invite her to a dinner party, she asks if you're going to be there because, and again, don't take this the wrong way, she doesn't like you. You're rude to her, and she's one of the nicest people out there."
"I'm rude to everyone," I said. "It's not personal."
"I get that. I spend a lot of time sticking up for you and telling her you're actually a really great person."
"Thanks, I guess?" I offered.
"That's not..." Dan heaved a sigh. "Okay, look. I just want to know why she called you. She's never been great about accepting help, and especially not from me, but when she needed it, she called you. That's just... it doesn't make a lot of sense, and I just want to understand why."
I couldn't tell if I was supposed to be relieved or confused. I knew Dan pretty well, and at first, it seemed like he was going to interrogate me for why Elise had called me because he thought something fishy was going on, but now it seemed like maybe he just wanted to know because he felt hurt she hadn't called him.
