Page 50 of Devil May Lie
“Since my bestie decided to go off on a vacation without me,” he stated. “You’re always busy here or with your secret-not-so-secret-boyfriend.”
Bay was dating a student and the two had agreed to keep it hush hush until the guy graduated. Not that anyone would truly care, but whatever. Not Berga’s business. Nate Narek was a mutual friend that also happened to be a racer at the Docks.
“He called me,” Berga added. “I guess he wants to do something special for Kaz to celebrate the fact they’re official but can’t think of anything on his own.”
“I feel like that should be fairly simple,” Bay drawled, and Berga chuckled in agreement.
“Right? Just gift him ass. Kazimir is so easy.” Unlike Madden. The two of them held similar positions in their respective groups, and yet Kazimir was hotheaded and rash, whereas Madden was collected, even if he could be sporadic at times. “Why’d I have to get tangled up with a Retinue member?”
“There’s a big race tomorrow evening,” Bay told him. “Nate is going to be there. Why don’t you ask to meet there instead?”
Berga dropped his hand and glared.
“It’s just a suggestion.”
“It’s a stupid one.”
“Is it?” the professor clicked his tongue. “As your doctor—”
“You are not my doctor,” he laughed.
“I’m the closest thing you have since, in your own words, therapy doesn’t work for you, remember?” Bay picked up his stylus and returned it to grading papers. “You love experiments. This is the perfect chance to conduct one. Madden will certainly be at this race. See him and test out how you feel.”
“How I feel?” Berga huffed. “I’m not—”
“Just because you haven’t been capable of feeling a full range of emotions since you were little does not mean feelings are associated with children, Berga. Coming from someone who struggled for such a long time to regain his, trust me. If you’re having an emotional reaction toward Madden, that isn’t a bad thing.”
Bay’s trauma had cut off his emotions, making him unfeeling for the most part. It was ironic that Berga had hoped for his friend to rediscover them, yet he was complaining about doing the same.
“Just because aggressive cock worked for you,” he drawled, mostly jokingly, “doesn’t mean it will do the same for me.” Berga was too broken. Too fucked up. Even if Madden managed to stitch parts of him back together again, so what? What about the rest of him?
What about the girl in the pink dress?
“You said he held you down and you liked it,” Bay reminded.
“I said he held me down and I wanted to turn his insides to jelly,” he corrected.
“I thought it was stone?”
“Whatever.” Berga stood with a flourish and adjusted his black dress shirt, then fixed the pin of the university crest that was attached to his belt. The Vail uniform was strongly enforced, which was something he’d always appreciated. Order in pleasant society was nice. Chaos was best reserved for his lab.
Royal Madden Odell? That bitch was pure, undiluted chaos.
“Fucking him was insightful,” he found himself admitting, unable to meet his friend’s knowing gaze. “But that doesn’t have to mean anything more or less than what it does.”
“Cryptic.” Bay crossed his arms. “What if Nate came all over you?”
Berga grimaced.
“So it’s directly related to Madden after all. Perhaps you can be normal with him?”
“Normal?” What an odd word. “What is normal, exactly? This is my normal.”
“You hate this, Berga.”
“I hate not being in control,” he stated. “But I don’t see her because I’ve got come on my body. It doesn’t even happen when I get blood on me anymore, you know that.”
“I also know you make a mistake and get blood on you maybe once every two years.” Bay sighed. “What set it off this time?”