Boys And Their Toys: A Dark High School Bully Romance (Troubled Playthings 1)

I wasn’t sure how I managed to put together an appropriately casual text message. He would definitely have picked up on my nervousness in person.

But by the time I was going out to drive to Lucas, who still couldn’t legally get in his car and come to me, I was feeling more calm. And it was because I still had Rob’s paperwork in my hand… though the logic behind that was probably not what anyone would have expected.

I’d realised I was getting myself into exactly the same situation I’d started out with. I was considering using my sketchy evidence I’d gathered through questionable means to meet him on his own turf.

I couldn’t let myself go down that path again. I had to do something that was authentic to me… something I would be able to live with no matter what.

And that might even mean I had to make decisions a lot of the people who loved me and wanted me to do well would never understand.

Chapter Twenty-Six

I opened my mouth as soon as he opened the door. The risk of losing my nerve seemed too great otherwise. “Did you realise I was the target of your hit-and-run after the fact, or was it planned all along?”

If I’d had any doubt left at that point, he yanked me inside and upstairs so fast I would have dropped it at the door. He didn’t stop, or speak, until he had me behind the close

d door of his bedroom and somehow backed against a wall, tall and imposing against me.

“I didn’t think you would find out.”

“Obviously.” I ducked sideways and past him to reclaim some space. “Well, the fact that you didn’t just feed me some bullshit story helped me to figure it out, strangely enough. But I’m pretty sure Rob figured it out too.”

“I only realised when I saw your car there too,” Lucas said. “I’d remember that shitty thing anywhere. Seemed like a really fucking insane coincidence, but there’s no fucking point in telling real life it’s being too unrealistic. Trust me on that one.”

I looked up at the perfect ceiling of Lucas’s perfect bedroom. This whole house was just like Lucas himself: beautiful, but hard to hold onto, if you were someone like me. “Lucas, why didn’t you tell me the truth earlier?”

“I never thought I’d have to,” he said, which was more honesty than I’d expected.

“You realise this puts me in a bad position now. How am I supposed to trust you’re telling the truth and not just telling me what you think will get you out of trouble this time?”

Lucas shrugged. “I haven’t even worked out what the fuck it all means.”

Well, there was another angle to this I hadn’t considered yet. I crossed the room and sat down on his bed. “Lucas, from now on I’m going to need you to answer my questions directly and honestly. That’s a non-negotiable point. If I don’t at least know that I can come to you and confirm things I think I’ve found out, what do we have here?”

“Fine,” said Lucas. “That’s fair.”

He sat down next to me and tried to touch me, but I shooed him off. “I’m bothered that you agreed to that so quickly. It feels like there’s a catch.”

“No catch. I figure you’re still here, you came here tonight even knowing all of this, so what the point in playing stupid games?”

He had a point all right. “Well, time to put that into practice. Did you only start coming after me because of that crash? Because you thought… I don’t know, that it was fate or something?”

Lucas shook his head. “Not fate. That’s the last thing I believe in. But I do believe in life giving you moments where you’re supposed to act, and… us meeting like that, it felt like a moment. Suddenly that sense of unfinished business was just too strong.”

Anyone more superstitious than either of us would have been left with no doubt. It made for the most insane of coincidences.

“I should tell the police about this, you know,” I said. “Your parents—”

“My parents?” There I went surprising a laugh out of him again. Lucas stood up and stepped back so he could face me. “Callie, my parents helped me to cover the whole thing up.”

His turn to surprise me. “But they—”

“Have a lot to lose if they get caught out, I know, right?” He sounded so gleefully impressed. Only Lucas, indeed. “I think they were smart about it. If I got busted after all it’d look pretty much like I acted alone. They let me keep the car in the garage for a few weeks until the heat was likely to have gone down, I went to a lot of parties so I either had Steven or Lucy driving me in to school which happens a lot normally anyway, and my dad picked a repair place reasonably close to school so it would be easy for me to pick up after. Nothing too big.”

“Of course, you got Ashleigh to come talk to me first because—”

“I didn’t get Ashleigh to do anything,” Lucas said. “She interfered because she’s an interfering bitch. Honestly, Callie. Most guys have to worry about their girlfriends thinking they’re cheating with their female friends, not that they’re conspiring with them.”

He was talking so casually. Like there was no chance this could be leading to me walking away permanently. It was just another weird conversation he had to get through with me.