Page 33 of Caught Stealing

“Long,” he replies, leaning against the driver’s door. “Yours?”

“It’s a disaster, honestly.” Blowing out a breath, I shake my head and walk in his direction. “Thank God we’re stopping for the night, or I’d be inclined to run us off the road.”

“Already sick of driving?”

“If only,” I say with a laugh. “Just sick of Phoenix aiming evil eyes at the back of my head for hours on end. I swear he’s plotting murder back there. Simply looking for the right opportunity to act.”

Theo snorts, amusement evident in his tone when he asks, “I take it things between the two of you didn’t end well, then?”

The question catches me off guard, and my brows clash together. “End well?”

“At the Kappa Sig party?” When I don’t acknowledge what he says, he lets out a laugh and shakes his head. “Man, you really need to start keeping a log of the people you sleep with if they’re starting to run together this badly.”

My brain comes screeching to a halt, attempting to recalibrate and make sense of what he’s saying. Only, it doesn’t. Because Phoenix and I have never slept together. Apart from him making out with me, dry humping me to high heaven, and cuffing me to my bed for Theo to find, nothing has happened between us.

And even then, I haven’t told a soul about that night. Theo might have an idea of what happened, but even he doesn’t know who it was with.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

It’s Theo’s turn to look confused, dark brows slashing down over light green eyes. “The final’s week party in May. The same night as—”

“Oh, my God,” I whisper, piece after piece clicking into place in rapid-fire succession—all the answers I was missing to create a clear picture in my head.

The anniversary of my parents’ death. Blacking out, only to wake up naked and alone the next morning with no memories from the night before.

No idea who it was I’d spent the night with.

It was Phoenix?

“There’s the lightbulb,” Theo jokes, oblivious to the plethora of epiphanies slamming into me like a fifty-car pile-up.

Why Phoenix’s hatred for me seems to run so deep for no reason. Why his image of me was tainted from the moment we met. Why he wants me nowhere near Kason. Yet the most significant being…why my body felt familiarity in his touch when he left me chained to my bed.

It was because my body subconsciously remembered it.

Shit.

“Yeah,” I choke out, doing my best to recover from the onslaught of emotions rampaging through me. “Takes a second sometimes.”

He laughs again before going to say something, but the commotion behind me causes him to glance over my shoulder. Turning to look, I spot Harrison, Noah, and the rest heading back out with ten bags of food and piling back in the cars.

“Ugh, I’m starving,” Theo says as Phoenix approaches and hands him his order. “You’re the best.”

Phoenix gives him a weak smile. “No problem, man.”

He must feel me staring at him, because his attention shifts to me. And while so many questions have been answered, there’s now a new one pinging around in my brain.

Why hasn’t he said anything?

I don’t have a chance to even think of a reason, let alone ask him, because he takes me off guard by shoving a greasy bag of food in my chest.

“What—”

“Your food,” is all he says before turning back toward the Jeep.

I’m left staring after him, wordless and more confused than ever, when a chuckle comes from beside me.

“Yep,” Theo muses with a shake of his head. “Definitely didn’t end well.”

---