Page 30 of Penance (Rising From the Ashes #2)

Lily

“ W hat were you thinking?” I hiss so only Theo can hear me as he opens my door and I climb up in his truck. He waits to answer me until I’ve climbed up in my seat and settled in.

“Careful, hopeless,” he says, reaching across me and grabbing my seat belt before clicking it into place. Even with it in place, though, he doesn’t pull away. His face is lined up with mine, one corner of his mouth lifted into a smirk. “It might look like you didn’t want me to come.”

Before I can tell him that’s exactly what I had wanted, he winks and pulls back, sucking all of the air out the truck as he goes. He shuts the door, walking around the truck to his side, and in the meantime, I try to breathe—but the smell of sandalwood and smoke keeps filling my lungs.

When Theo’s door opens, he jumps in, making it look effortless while I pointedly try to ignore him and everything that happened before MJ shows up.

Only it turns out, ignoring Theo is like ignoring the fact that you’re being sucked up in a tornado. Impossible.

“So,” Theo says, putting his hand on the back of my headrest and backing out of the driveway, “Do you want to talk about that back there?”

“Nope.” I don’t even want to think about it. He saw my mask crack, but now it’s firmly back in place—and it won’t happen again. “But we can talk about what you were thinking when you agreed to this.”

He glances over me as he throws the truck into drive and pulls onto the highway. One arm rests on the door, and the other hangs loosely over the steering wheel. He’s effortless, and I hate him for it.

“Sure, hopeless. We can talk about that,” he says with a shrug. “I figured it would be good practice.”

I eye him, wearily watching for the other shoe to drop. “For what, exactly? I don’t think it’s Hayes, MJ, or any of their friends we need to convince here.”

Theo shrugs again. “You’re right. It’s not. But you need a place where you feel comfortable taking down some of those walls you’ve built, and what better place to do that than with friends?”

“I don’t have walls,” I argue, sitting back in my seat and crossing my arms.

He slices me a look. “And I don’t have a psycho ex-wife.

” He stops, smirking. “Oh wait, I do. Look, hopeless, you’ve built a fortress around yourself, and I’m not saying you didn’t have a reason to—most people usually do—but I am saying it’s going to prevent you from getting what you want.

You want the Birdies to see you as more of a person and less of an ice queen? Then let them see beneath the ice.”

“Yeah?” I ask, sarcasm lacing my voice because he makes it seem simple, but it’s far from it. I’ve spent my whole life constructing those walls, ensuring no one could get past them. They weren’t made to fall. “And what happens when they don’t like what they find underneath?”

Theo turns his head until he’s looking at me, honesty staring back in his mischievous dark eyes. “They will, Lily.”

A shiver runs over my spine at the sound of my name on his lips, and for a second, I almost believe him, but then my phone rings—and when I see who it is, I’m reminded why I built those walls in the first place.

My mom’s name lights up the screen, and I quickly hit decline.

I wasn’t good enough for the people who had brought me into this world. Why would anyone else like what they get when they see the real me?

______________________

MJ had said there’d only be a few people at the cookout, but apparently in her world, a few people means the whole town. Vehicles line the drive and spill into the grass in front of Hayes’s house, and apprehension spills into my gut.

“I change my mind,” I say, looking at Theo. “Let’s go back. I’ll tell MJ I got sick.”

Theo chuckles but doesn’t turn around. Instead, he pulls behind a car parked along the curb and shuts his engine off.

“What are you doing? Didn’t you hear me?” There’s a slight note of hysterics in my voice, but at that point, I don’t even care. I’m not mentally prepared to face this many people today—to wear the mask I never wear on weekends.

“I heard you,” Theo says, but he doesn’t look at me. Opening his door, he hops out of the truck and shuts it again before I can respond.

My mouth falls open, and I watch in outrage as he jogs around the front of the truck to my side. Theo opens my door, a smirk written on the fullness of his mouth.

“I heard you, hopeless,” he reiterates. “I just never took you for a coward.”

I snap my mouth closed and narrow my eyes. I’m not stupid. He’s calling my bluff, and yet, apparently I am because I find myself unable to back down from his challenge.

“I’m not scared of going in there.”

Theo lifts one shoulder, completely unaffected by the ire in my voice. “ Could have fooled me.” He stops, considering me. “Is this because of Hayes? Are you still in love with him?”

I snort. “I’m not in love with Hayes. I never was.”

A wrinkle creases his forehead. “But at the engagement party—”

“I wasn’t watching him because I was in love with him,” I interrupt, needing this conversation to end.

“Then why?

“That’s none of your business.

Theo’s lips tilt up. “Everything about you is my business, hopeless. You’re my girlfriend, after all.

” The smugness in his voice is what prompts me to get out of the truck.

My feet hit the ground, but I underestimated how close Theo was standing because my chest brushes against his, causing me to stumble.

His hand shoots out, catching my elbow, and my skin bursts into flames where his fingers meet it.

Theo stands looking down at me, his eyes alight with humor.

We stare at each other for a moment, a foreign ache forming in my chest before I yank my elbow out of his hold and smooth my hand over my clothes.

After composing myself, I step forward, expecting Theo to move, but he’s a statue—if a statue was made up of hard muscle and warm flesh.

Theo continues to stare down at me, the humor in his eyes dimmed, leaving something else behind. Something darker than before.

“Well,” I say, “I’m out of the truck. Let’s go.”

He shakes his head. “Not yet. Let’s talk.” His voice is cast so low that it sends a shiver over my spine, and Theo’s eyes follow the goosebumps that pop up along my arm. Thankfully, he doesn’t remark on them, though.

“Talk about what?” I ask, as if standing here, trapped by a man who is dangerous to my health—my mental health at least—is a regular everyday occurrence .

Theo lifts his hand, letting the pads of his fingers follow the line of bumps on my arms. “I told you—we’re going to treat this as practice. Help you lower those walls, even if it’s just a little bit, but I have a feeling you have no idea how to do that. So let’s talk about it.”

I stick my tongue in my cheek, ready to argue, but he shakes his head. “Don’t try to deny it, hopeless. We’ve already had that argument.”

Sighing, I give in. Arguing with him will get me nowhere, especially when he is right. “Fine?”

Theo’s grin could power the entire state of Texas. It’s beautiful. Because, of course, it is.

“Did that hurt?” he asks.

“Did what hurt?” I ask in a growl.

“Being agreeable.”

I raise my hand to show off one of my fingers, but he grabs it, his fist engulfing my entire hand.

“Tsk. Tsk, hopeless.”

Glaring up at him, I say, “Get on with what you have to say, Theo, before I lose my temper, and end up kicking you.”

“So violent,” he says, his voice like gravel.

Then he sobers. “Look, I know you don’t always have those walls up.

My son talks about you a lot—well, a lot, considering we hardly talk, but still.

I’ve heard about how good of a principal you are.

The kids like you, and that’s a hard thing to accomplish with teenagers.

You have to earn their respect, and they know better than anyone when someone is being fake.

So what’s the difference? Why can you be so open with them but closed off with everyone else? ’

The question catches me off-guard because I don’t know how to explain to him that it’s easier with kids because I want to be the adult in their life that I didn’t have in mine. So I take the easy way out instead. “I don’t know.”

He must have been expecting that answer because he steps closer into my body, forcing me to look up at him, and says, “Now tell the truth.”

“Because I’ve been the kid who needed an adult who cared.

Someone warm and kind.” The confession is pulled from beneath clenched teeth, but once it’s out, it’s like I can’t stop.

I keep talking, even though my brain is screaming at me to stop.

“I don’t have a lot of warmth in me, Theo, but I have enough for those kids. ”

He starts to open his mouth when his name is called from the direction of Hayes’s front porch.

“Theo. Yoohoo. Theo.”

We both turn to find Ethel standing on the top step, waving her hand and staring at Theo with hunger in her eye.

I couldn’t stop the snort that escaped me even if I tried.

Theo turns back to me, sheer terror on his face.

“You have to save me.”

His words only cause me to laugh harder, the sound causing my head to tilt back and warmth to spread into my limbs.

Despite the fear still on his face caused by the eighty-year-old woman drooling over him, Theo smiles at the sound of my laughter.

“There it is,” he says, watching me as if he somehow sees another side of me.

I scrunch my brows. “What?”

He smiles. “The warmth you weren’t sure you had.”