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

Lucy shot me a perfect raised eyebrow. “I will say, it must have been some fight. What a place to leave someone in the early hours of the morning.”

“We’re not, um…” I was filled with dread at the sudden thought of Lucy having the wrong idea, and hauling me in there introducing me to Lucas’s parents as his girlfriend.

“Oh, you don’t have to explain it to me,” Lucy said. “I live with him, remember? I know what he’s like. I just thought you might need to see how he is once you found out… and he might even like to see that you’re all right.”

The way she said that left me convinced she really did know the situation as it stood pretty well, so I didn’t try to give her any more information she clearly didn’t want.

It was strange sitting there alongside her, already very familiar with her car—down to that stupid fairy air freshener—but awkward about its present driver. Its proper driver.

Then I started shaking again as we pulled into the parking at the front of the hospital. Lucy looked over me with a strange mixture of sympathy and exasperation.

“Look, he’s fine, and you’re fine. It’s going to be all right.” She smirked. “The real question is how we explain to my parents that I somehow picked up a friend of Lucas’s on the way to and from our house.”

Strangely enough, that really did put a stop to my worrying about being at the hospital again. After the way Lucas had behaved that night, at his most intimidating that I’d ever seen, it was no surprise I was freaked out by the thought of meeting more members of his family. Even Lucy was a confronting presence, in her way. I hadn’t done anything wrong, and I could still picture Lucas’s parents blaming me for this crash, just because I happened to be in the area when something went down.

But when Lucy led the way into a room that brought all those claustrophobic hospital feelings rushing right back, the good-looking woman and man perched on the edges of the chairs along the far wall didn’t have any questions to ask about my presence. They hardly even looked at me. I didn’t know if Lucy was aware of it and just trying to protect her brother by acting like it was no big deal, but they clearly knew a bit about how he conducted himself too.

Freed of the need to worry about the elder Starlings, I turned my attention to Lucas.

Half of his face was heavily bandaged, but it didn’t quite succeed in covering up the outer extents of the bruising and swelling on his right side. His right arm was in a cast. And yet, somehow with even all that, sitting cross-legged on his bed in a hospital gown, he had almost all of his usual poise.

His bandages kept me from reading his eyes as he looked me over.

“Nice to see you, Callie,” he said, each word slow and careful. I guessed talking must hurt a bit. “Could you guys leave the two of us alone for a moment?”

Lucas’s dad got out of his seat so fast he banged his head

on the edge of a cupboard behind him, but none of the Starlings acknowledged this incident, so I kept quiet too, though I felt my face burning with the need to say something.

“I suppose we’ll see if we can find a twenty-four hour McDonalds in the vicinity,” his mother suggested, taking the father’s hand.

I stared after the three of them incredulously as they filed out. I couldn’t imagine people that fit having junk food, ever. I felt like I was the heroine in one of those vampire movies, where she’s just met the ridiculously beautiful family and is never going to feel the same about her own stumpy human body again.

The night I’d had—thanks to him—on top of my now heightened awareness of how hideous I must look to his family, made me mean.

“Well, Lucas, I guess you’re not going to be quite so pretty as you once were when this is all done.” I sat down hard on the end of his bed.

“Callie,” said Lucas, talking fast, “I was going to come back for you. I never planned to leave you out there. I just…” He gestured to himself with his good hand, breathing hard.

It had been painful for him to say those words, but he’d pushed them out anyway. Even for someone as apparently careless of his own personal safety as Lucas, that said a lot.

“Knock it off, please, Lucas,” I said, and I could see from the way his eyebrows twitched before a wince that I’d surprised him. “I’m not sure I believe you, and I’m not sure there’s anything you could say that would change my mind, so perhaps you should keep quiet for your own sake.”

He tried a laugh, but pain and something else—something I would never have believed could be a part of the Lucas I knew—made the sound rather unconvincing. “This is some way to handle a man who’s just been in a terrible accident, Calista.”

“Oh, you’re going to be all right,” I said. “Like I said, the worst of it is you might be a bit more ugly at the end of it.” Another flinch. I was certain of it now. “It’s your own damn fault, anyway. And what sort of handling did you have for me when I was in hospital due to another accident that was your fault? You convinced everyone around me that I was losing my mind, that I was responsible for that accident, and then you took the opportunity to cop a feel.” My laugh was pretty obviously lacking in any humour. “Ah yes, I’m familiar with how you handle me. You’ve been abusing me ever since.”

“I never did anything to you that you didn’t—”

“Shut up, Lucas, I won’t ask again.” I knew once I walked away and got a proper night’s sleep I was unlikely to have the courage to speak to him like this again. I had to use the opportunity, the same as he always did. “Shall I guess what you were going to say? Want? Enjoy? I guess I did enjoy it, I can’t argue that: you’ve got a pretty magical mouth and hands… although probably more so before you smashed yourself up for no good reason.” Lucas winced again, even though he’d actually kept his mouth shut. “As for want… okay, maybe you did make me want it in the end. But I never wanted any of it the way you gave it to me. By that sort of logic you could say someone can never be raped by a person they’re attracted to, because they always want it no matter what, right?”

“I never raped you—”

“I suppose you didn’t,” I said, “because I don’t feel like I was ever raped, but you definitely knew what you were doing was crossing a line. You were very careful to make it seem like I had a choice even when you’d already set it up so that I couldn’t make one you didn’t like. Like I said, abuse.”

“Whatever you think you’re—”

“And I’ve realised something,” I said over the top of him. “Just while I’ve been in here. You always come across as so confident, so careless, like nothing can rattle you… but there is one thing that scares you right now, isn’t there?”