Total pages in book: 106
Estimated words: 99949 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 500(@200wpm)___ 400(@250wpm)___ 333(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99949 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 500(@200wpm)___ 400(@250wpm)___ 333(@300wpm)
I forced myself to look somewhere else. Anywhere else. My eyes fell to the thin wrist of the hand I was holding. A sudden thought hit me and I quickly reached up with my free hand to pull my hair tie loose. Theo didn’t resist as I stretched the band over his hand. It was snug on his wrist but not tight enough to risk cutting off his circulation. I turned my eyes back to meet Theo’s so I could explain about the band on his wrist but found him studying my hair which was probably a curly mess. But it wasn’t just my hair he was staring at. His eyes moved slowly over every feature of my face and when they finally landed on my lips, I nearly came on the spot.
Because I knew I could have seized his mouth in that moment. I knew he would have made delicious little whimpering sounds as his arms went around my shoulders and his lush tongue greeted mine.
I was actually in the process of pulling him closer and dipping my head when a twig snapped off to our right. Theo jerked back so hard and fast that my arm around his waist was the only thing that kept him upright. We both turned to see whatever asshole had ruined what I knew in my gut would have been an epic moment. A flash of white bobbing a few times before disappearing behind a large thicket of bushes gave me the answer.
“Just a deer,” I said. I forced myself to release Theo entirely. His mask hadn’t slipped back in place yet, but I knew it would.
He looked down at his wrist, noticing the hair tie for the first time since I’d put it on him. “What—?”
I snapped the band hard enough that he’d feel the sting of it. He flinched and looked up at me in surprise.
“For when you need relief but aren’t in a place where you can get it.” I didn’t have the guts to be as blunt as I wanted. The band was meant to replace the razors and even his own fists. The relief might only last a few seconds but maybe, just maybe, it would buy me or whoever he was with time to intervene.
I didn’t give him a chance to respond. “We should go.”
I fully expected Theo to ignore my suggestion and stay where he was out of sheer spite but to my surprise, I could hear the leaves rustling just a few feet behind me.
It wasn’t much, but hell if it didn’t feel like the biggest victory in the world.
CHAPTER TEN
THEO
“Are you sure you had enough? Cam’s fried chicken almost tastes better cold than it does warm,” Ford said. He was up to his elbows in soapy water, a stack of dirty dishes sitting next to the sink on his right side.
I could tell my friend was nervous and I couldn’t really blame him. I had been and still was preoccupied with the encounter I’d had with Lincoln that afternoon. The man had been a no-show for dinner. I’d been desperate to know where he was but there was no way I could have asked without making everyone curious. Thankfully, Walter had taken care of it for me by asking if Nurse Ratchet had gone to get his dong “fix.”
I’d barely caught any of the conversation that had followed after Riley had mistakenly heard fixed instead of fix. The teen had then asked why a dong would need fixing. I’d tuned the rest out as I’d tried to eat more of the fried chicken on my plate, but I’d started to feel sick to my stomach, so I’d poked at the mashed potatoes instead. The food had been delicious and for once I hadn’t hesitated to eat a few bites of it even though I’d been a mess of nerves as I’d waited for Lincoln to appear in the kitchen.
He and I hadn’t spoken during the walk back to the house and as soon as we’d reached it, Lincoln had told me he needed to get something from his car which was parked on the other side of the driveway. I’d been both disappointed and relieved as I’d hurried to my room. I’d spent the next hour reexamining every moment that I’d spent with Lincoln. I’d also played with the band on my wrist, especially when I’d thought back to the moment where I’d told him what had happened to Ford and me as kids. Surprisingly, several hard snaps of the band had helped bring my anxiety down enough that the cold feeling I normally felt didn’t escalate.
I had questions.
A million of them.
And the only person who could answer them had left so he could apparently go fuck some stranger or maybe even a boyfriend. Hell, with what little I knew about him, he could be into women. The way he’d looked at me, though… the way he’d looked at my mouth. Yeah, he was definitely into guys, but he could easily be bisexual.