“Like a storm cloud with a personal vendetta,” I snapped. “You were practically growling the entire time and were rude to your own brother.”
He exhaled slowly, but his jaw tightened. “I wasn’t growling.”
“Yes, you were.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
His silence admitted it for him.
I stepped closer. “Timofey was bleeding, and I was helping him. You didn’t need to sit there glaring at the two of us like we had committed a crime. What was with the attitude?”
His eyes flicked to me, sharp and cutting. “He talks too much.”
“No,” I said. “He talks normally. You’re the one who’s—”
“Enough,” he muttered.
“No,” I repeated, heat rising in my voice. “Not enough. You’ve been snapping at me all night for no good reason, and now you want me to shut up and not even complain about it? Who do you think I am?”
“Ilana.” His tone was a warning, but I didn’t care.
“You were rude, impatient, and clearly hostile for no good reason. What is your problem?”
His gaze finally locked with mine, and there I could see it. The storm. The very thing he tried to hide but never could.
“My problem,” he said lowly, “is that he doesn’t know how to shut up. He flirts with anything that breathes. He makes jokes when he’s bleeding out. And he—”
He broke off.
I raised an eyebrow. “And he what?”
Avgust looked away sharply, but I stepped closer to him, refusing to let the matter slide.
“Say it.”
“No.”
“Avgust, please don’t test my patience right now. Just say it.”
His eyes snapped back to mine, and I could see how dark, dangerous and heated they looked.
Fine.
If he wasn’t going to say it, I would.
“Were you jealous?”
His entire body went still. Utterly motionless.
“Don’t push me right now, Ilana. I am already seething.” That was not a denial.
My pulse tripped, but not with fear. With something else entirely. With something reckless and hot.
“I don’t know if you failed to notice, but I wasn’t flirting back with him,” I said quietly.
“You were talking to him.” His voice was tight, almost strained. “Too easily. As if you had known each other for decades.”
