17. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CONNOR
Ipull the helmet off and push my flattened hair back from my face, glancing around at whatever middle-of-fucking-nowhere place Theo has decided to bring me.
I’m prepared to hate it purely on principle, right up until I get a proper look at the lake.
The dirt track ends beneath a thick canopy of trees, with only a stretch of grass and scattered rocks sloping gently towards water so clear and blue it barely looks real.
Sunlight breaks through the leaves overhead in warm streams, catching across the surface and scattering every time the breeze disturbs it, and despite myself, I stand there staring.
It’s beautiful.
Annoyingly beautiful, considering Theo brought me here.
“Beautiful, right?” Theo drawls.
I look over as he pulls off his helmet and shakes out his hair, leaving it somehow even messier than before. He leans back against the bike with the same lazy ease he seems to do everything, tattooed arms folding loosely across his chest, an unlit cigarette hanging between his lips.
Naturally, the sunlight catches him perfectly. It falls across one side of his face, glinting off the silver of his lip ring whenever his mouth moves around the cigarette.
“It’s alright,” I hum, turning back towards the lake before Theo can notice I’ve spent more time looking at him than the view.
My attention stays there for maybe five seconds.
Apparently crystal blue water and sunlight breaking through the trees aren’t enough to compete with Theo Knox standing beside a motorbike, because my eyes find their way back to him anyway.
Or, more specifically, to the cigarette still resting between his lips.
I watch him take a slow pull, the end of the cigarette burning brighter between his fingers before he exhales through the corner of his mouth.
“Why do you smoke?”
Theo’s eyes flick to mine.
The question slips out somewhere between watching the smoke leave his mouth and wondering, not for the first time, what he actually gets from it.
Theo takes another pull instead of answering, his gaze moving out across the lake while his thumb works slowly over the cigarette.
He rolls it between his fingers, brings it back to his mouth and inhales again, taking so long over something he normally does without thinking that I realise what he’s doing.
He’s buying time.
I press my lips together and wait him out.
Eventually, Theo flicks the cigarette onto the dirt and crushes it beneath his heel.
“That wasn’t an answer,” I say, my eyes following the cigarette to the ground, lifting again just as Theo catches the bottom of his t-shirt and pulls it over his head in one smooth motion, and there’s a lot more Theo in front of me than there was a second ago.
Tattoos cut across tanned skin, disappearing over his ribs while the muscles in his stomach flex as he tosses the shirt aside, and I follow the movement long enough to realise I’m openly staring.
I look up, Theo’s eyes finding mine, satisfaction pulling the corner of his mouth up.
“Enjoying the view, princess?”
My face warms. I narrow my eyes at him, scrambling for something better and finding absolutely nothing.
“Shut up.”
Theo chuckles under his breath, and when I risk looking back, his fingers have moved to the button of his jeans.
He toys with it beneath my stare, making absolutely no attempt to hurry while his eyes lift to mine beneath dark lashes.
His fingers are still playing with the button of his jeans, and do something for me sounds considerably less innocent with them there.
My eyes drop to the slow movement of his thumb against the denim.
“What?” I manage, strained, Theo’s brow lifting.
His gaze lingers on mine before dropping pointedly to his own hand, still playing with the button of his jeans, and when he looks back up, his lips are already fighting a losing battle.
Fuck.
“Jesus Christ, Reid.” His laugh breaks out of him, my face burning before he’s even finished shaking his head. “I don’t mean suck my dick.”
“I would never-”
His palm lands against my cheek in a condescending little pat that makes violence feel entirely reasonable.
“Yeah, yeah,” he chuckles. “Save the denial for someone who cares.”
I slap his hand away, glaring at him while he grins back at me.
Theo shoves his jeans down, black denim giving way to snug black boxers and the unmistakable outline of his length pressing against them.
“Fucking hell,” I snap, turning towards the lake so quickly I nearly give myself whiplash.
Theo’s laugh carries across the space behind me, bright and completely shameless, while I fix my attention on the water and try very hard not to think about what I just saw.
Which obviously means I can think about nothing else.
Grass shifts behind me, Theo’s bare chest brushing my back, my shoulders tensing.
“Such a princess,” he hums beside my ear. “Can’t even look at me, huh?”
I spin around, planting my palm against his chest, ready to shove him away, but bare skin under my hand halts the plan somewhere between touching him and actually following through.
His chest rises beneath my palm, warm skin shifting against my fingers, and the fact that my hand is still there becomes impossible to ignore.
Theo looks down between us, and when his eyes return to mine, they’re dark. His chest pushes more firmly into my palm, forcing my elbow to bend as warm muscle shifts.
My fingers curl against his chest.
Swim with me,” he says quietly. “And maybe I’ll give you an answer.”
I swallow, painfully aware that I’m still touching him.
“To what?”
It leaves me embarrassingly close to a whisper, Theo’s eyes falling to my mouth.
“Anything.”
He steps closer again, his heart beating steadily beneath my palm, while mine is doing its best to punch straight through my ribs.
“Live a little, princess,” he says softly.
The challenge in his voice sinks beneath my skin.
I pull my hand away with an irritated huff and step back, catching the bottom of my hoodie and pulling it over my head.
“Good boy.”
My fingers falter at the waistband of my jeans, my head snapping up sharply, finding Theo already watching me, the corner of his mouth twitching up.
I narrow my eyes, the words rubbing me the wrong way, and the longer I look at that smug expression, the stronger the urge gets to turn them back on him and see how much he likes them then.
Theo’s smile slips, his tongue rolling over his lip ring, eyes holding mine.
“Good to know,” he breathes, his brow arching.
Theo turns towards the lake, leaving me standing there with those three words rattling around my head.
Good to know.
What the fuck is that supposed to mean?
I push a hand through my hair and follow him before I can do something humiliating like ask.
Cold closes around my feet when I step in, climbing higher with every reluctant step until a stuttering breath tears through my teeth.
Goosebumps rise across my arms despite the sun warming my shoulders.
By the time the water reaches my knees, I’m seriously reconsidering how badly I wanted an answer to one stupid question.
“Cold?” Theo asks, laughter thick in his voice.
I glare at him. “Shut up.”
He tips his face towards the sunlight breaking through the trees, closing his eyes with a soft chuckle.
Water runs in thin trails down his chest, catching against the ink over his ribs before disappearing beneath the waistband of his boxers.
His dark hair is pushed away from his face, leaving the line of his jaw exposed, and with all that tanned skin and muscle lit gold beneath the trees, he looks like one of those obnoxiously perfect Greek statues brought to life.
Except those don’t smirk at me.
Or call me princess.
Or apparently know exactly how to make me stare at them.
“I’m in,” I point out, folding my arms across my chest in a mostly useless attempt to keep some warmth in.
“You are,” he hums, grinning.
I roll my eyes, forcing myself deeper, the water reaching my thighs. The cold is vicious now, sinking through skin and muscle while loose gravel shifts beneath my feet, forcing me to concentrate on every step so I don’t end up flat on my ass.
Something brushes the back of my calf, a startled yelp tearing out of me as I jerk forward, my foot slipping over the rocks beneath the water.
“Fuck-”
I grab Theo’s shoulders to steady myself, but all I manage to do is take him with me. His arm catches around my waist as we stumble backwards. Freezing water closes over my head, the shock punching the air from my lungs, my muscles locking up.
Theo’s arm clamps around my waist, hauling me back up until we break through the surface together.
I come up coughing, sucking air into my lungs, water streaming down my face. My forehead drops against his shoulder, struggling to get my breathing under control, both hands braced against his chest while Theo holds me steady.
“Fucking hell, Reid,” he laughs breathlessly, the sound vibrating through the wet skin beneath my palms. “Are you trying to kill me?”
“If only it was that easy,” I mutter, my voice still hoarse from inhaling half the lake.
It takes another breath before the panic from going under clears enough for everything else to start becoming a problem.
Theo is practically wrapped around me.
His hand is spread low against my back, my fingers curling against his chest, clinging to him. Every breath brings us closer, his chest warm despite the freezing water surrounding us.
Water clings to his lashes, dripping onto his lower lip, and every time I manage to pull myself away from his mouth, there’s another part of him waiting to make things worse.
Water slips over his chest, down the hard lines of his stomach before disappearing beneath the waistband of his soaked boxers.
We’re standing half naked in a lake, and somehow the fact that it’s Theo Knox in front of me has become considerably more difficult to ignore.
“Are you flirting with me, princess?”
“You’re delusional,” I breathe, curling my hands into fists beneath the water.