Talk to him?

That had me flicking my gaze in his direction, taking in that face I hadn’t seen in over two weeks. That face I had gotten used to seeing six days a week but had somehow become more like seven days a week from all the extra time we spent together. That face that the last time I had seen, had been beside me as I sat on an exam table, listening to the doctor tell me that, best-case scenario, I might be back on my feet in six weeks. But no promises. Grade 2 sprains to your ATFL and your CFL are problematic, the doctor had warned before dropping the recovery time period on me.

Eight weeks had never seemed so long before.

Especially when you couldn’t forgive yourself for being a reckless moron.

It took everything in me to ask him, keeping my voice steady, “What do you want to talk about?”

He stared at me, those gray-blue eyes as intense as ever, and I watched his chest expand with a breath I knew was a steadying one. He was annoyed.

Tough shit for him, I was more annoyed than he was.

“I’ve tried calling you,” he said, like I didn’t know he’d called me at least six times every day for the last twelve days. Today alone, he’d called twice. And like every time my phone rang, I didn’t pick up. I hadn’t picked up. Not once. Not for anyone. Not for my siblings, not for my dad who had left moments before my fall, not Coach Lee, not Galina. Nobody.

I kept my gaze steady on him as I answered. “I haven’t felt like talking. Nothing has changed. I don’t get the boot off for another two days.”

And then, after the doctor gave me the okay to take the boot off, I’d be replacing it with an Aircast air-stirrup ankle brace. The physical therapist I’d been driving myself to for the last nine days had been optimistic I was healing “just fine.”

But fine had never been good enough for me.

Especially not when it had been my own damn fault I was in this situation.

But Ivan blinked, and he sighed again, and I knew he was this fucking close to losing his shit. The thing was, I didn’t care. What was he going to do? Yell at me? “I know nothing has changed, dumbass.”

This asshole….

“Get your shit together. You’re coming with me.”

It was my turn to blink and then stare at him blankly. “What?”

A long index finger poked me right in the forehead. “Get your shit together. You’re coming with me,” he repeated, taking his time with every word. “You hurt your ankle, not your ears.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you.”

“Yes, you are.”

“No, I’m not.”

The smile that went over his mouth basically creeped me out and instantly made me wary. “You are.”

I stared right at him, ignoring the weird sensation in my belly as I did.

That creepy smile didn’t go anywhere. “You haven’t left your room in two weeks other than to go to physical therapy.”

I said nothing.

“It smells like you haven’t showered in two weeks.”

I had. Two days ago.

“Have you even been sleeping?” That finger gave my forehead another poke. “You look like shit.”

It was that, that had me gritting out, “Yes, I’ve been sleeping.” He didn’t need to know not very well.

He didn’t look like he believed me, but he still said, “You need to get out of here.”

“Why?” I asked before I could stop myself, sounding just as angry as I felt.

“Because there’s no point in you moping around in here, acting like GI Jane working out randomly, Jesus Christ, Jasmine.”

That had me smacking his hand away from my face and sitting up straight, turning my upper body just enough so I could look him in the eye. “I’m not moping, ass. I’ve been working out. I can’t just sit around and rest and totally let myself go.”

“You’re not working out so that you don’t let yourself go. You’re working out because you’re pissed off and in a bad mood. You think I don’t know you?”

I opened my mouth to say no, I wasn’t working out for that reason, but he’d see right through my bullshit. Instead, I said, “I’m not in a bad mood. I haven’t taken anything out on anybody. You can’t call it being in a bad mood if I’m not being mean to other people.”

“All right, then what do you call it when you’re only being mean to yourself?”

I hated it when he asked me things I didn’t know how to answer.

Ivan’s face twisted up into this frustrated expression. “Your mom has invited you to do things with her, and you ignore her.”

“I did not ignore her. I said no.” I blinked and felt another wave of irritation. “Has she been snitching to you?” When? How?

“It’s still rude and mean,” he explained. “And your brothers and sisters have tried calling, but you’re ignoring their calls too. I bet Galina’s called and you haven’t answered her either.”

It was true. It was all true. But I wasn’t about to admit or deny it.

“You’re not doing this shit to yourself, Jasmine,” he let me know. Like he’d made this decision for me and I was going to fucking listen.

He could get the fuck out.

Something swelled up in me that almost took the breath right out of me. “I’m not doing anything to myself, Ivan. I’m minding my own business. Hanging out by myself. I don’t see what’s so wrong with that. I’m healing. Resting. Like everyone told me to do.”

The blink he gave me made me feel bad. Really. But before I could apologize for snapping at him, he went back to frowning. “Don’t get an attitude with me. We both know you’re hiding, and I’m not letting you do it any longer. I was waiting, hoping you’d get out of this funk on your own, once you realized you didn’t completely tear the ligaments or get a fracture like we had been worried about… but you’re not, so I’m dragging you out of it if I have to. I’m done waiting for you to quit being a baby, and I’m not cutting you any slack, even if this is the first time you’ve pulled some shit like that.”

It wasn’t the first time I had pulled some shit like this. He hadn’t seen me back when Paul had left. It had been just as bad, but this time felt worse than then.

I poked him in the forehead the same way he had me and said one thing. “No.”

Ivan blinked those bright blue eyes, his eyelids hanging low over them, and he grit out, “Jasmine, you’re about to get your ass up, get out of this house, and go to mine. You’re either doing it on your own, or I’m doing it for you. You get to choose.”

“I’m not leaving the house.”

He shook his head. “You’re leaving the house.”

“I’m not leaving the house.”

“Yes, you are. You choose. You do it or I do it.”

I poked him in the forehead again. Twice. “No.”

His nostrils flared. “I’m going to count to five, and you have to make a decision between now and then, or I’m choosing for you, and you know what I’m choosing.”

“Ivan, I don’t want to go with you.”

“I don’t give a shit. You could have left with anyone else in your family, but you didn’t, so now you’re coming with me.”

Rage filled me in no time. Instantly, and I hissed, “No, I’m fucking not!”

Apparently, I wasn’t the only one about to get pissed off, because he hissed back, “Yes, you fucking are!”

“I don’t want to go with you, how hard is that for you to understand? I don’t want to be around anyone right now or anytime soon,” I fucking snapped, sounding like so much of an asshole, it made me cringe on the inside.

His eyelids swung even lower over his eyes, so they were barely slits. “Why? Are you over me now?”

I jerked my head back. “Over you? What the hell are you talking about?”

That angular jaw of his went tight. “Are you over me? Are you pissed off at me and don’t want to be my partner anymore?”

What in the fuck was he talking about? I gaped at him. Blinked. Then gaped a little more, because what the hell was wrong with him? “I don’t understand what you’re trying to say, Ivan.”

His nostrils flared, and his eyes stayed just short of closing as he asked, “Do you not want to be my partner anymore?”

“Why would I not want to be your partner anymore?” I asked him, sounding angry.

“Because of what happened!” he shouted.

“Why would I not want to be your partner? Because I fell like a dumbass? How is that your fault, idiot?”

When his face had started turning pink, I had no idea. But by the time I realized it, it was all rosy. “Because I could tell you were distracted and didn’t give you a chance to get focused. I landed too close to you.”

Was he seriously blaming himself? “You didn’t land that close to me, stupid.”

He shot me a look that could have burned my eyebrows off. “I did, Jasmine. I landed way too close to you.”

“Oh, shut up. No, you didn’t. I landed wrong because I was distracted. Because I screwed up. That wasn’t your fault.”

He glared at me so hard, it made my blood pressure go up. Why would he think something so stupid? Why would he blame himself? How did that make any sense?

“You really thought I didn’t want to see you because I blamed you?” I spat, looking at him like he was a jackass, because he was.

He still glared at me, telling me that answer was yes.