Page 80 of Perfect
Once we’re in the car, Theo runs his hands through his hair and swears under his breath as he drives away quickly. The tension inside the car is so thick it makes my shoulders start to curl in on themselves, and I sink down in my seat, leaning against the door and staying quiet as we navigate onto the freeway, immediately winding up in bumper-to-bumper traffic. Theo swears under his breath and leans over to open the glove compartment, pulling something out quickly.
“Honey, can you look at me for a second?”
It’s a mistake.
The second I look at him, he grabs the wrist closest to him and snaps a handcuff around it, quickly placing the other one on his wrist, and I scream, starting to panic.
“What thefuck, Theo?” I jerk my wrist away, but he grabs my hand, forcing his fingers through mine and pulling our entwined, locked hands towards him.
“I need to talk to you.”
“You can’t do it without fuckinghandcuffs?”
He grimaces. “I don’t know. Can you calm down for a second?”
“No!You flipped your shit and handcuffed me after I met your friend!” Theo barks out a harsh laugh.
“We’renotfriends,” he spits. “I fuckinghatethat guy. He’s a real piece of shit, you have no idea. I had to deal with him for two years, and they were the longest two years of my life. Henevershut the fuck up, and I wanted to beat the shit out of him constantly.” He makes a disgusted sound in the back of his throat before he takes a deep breath. “We were cellmates,” he says quickly.
I freeze, looking over at him with wide eyes.
“Like injail?” He shoots me a worried look out of the corner of his eye as he squeezes my hand.
“Um, more likeprison,” he says quietly, “because I was in prison for nine years.” I stare at him, panic welling up inside of me.
"Why?" I ask quietly, leaning away from him.
“Sweetheart, listen to me, okay? In college, I had this girlfriend, Ashley. We were together for almost a year before she broke up with me,” he says quickly, squeezing my hand so hard it hurts.
Oh my god, hedidkill his ex.
“When she broke up with me, she said it was so she could focus on getting into med school. I assumed she was just overwhelmed with classes and her internship, and I thought we’d get back together once she saw that she didn’t have to give up our relationship to get into med school. I tried to show her that, but she started avoiding me, and then she filed thisbullshitrestraining order. When I went to talk to her about it, I found out that we were onverydifferent pages about our relationship,” he says, his voice slowing and getting terse.
Hasn’t he told mewe’reon different pages?
Oh,fuck.
“Apparently, she filed the restraining order because she’d been fucking my asshole roommate forsix months, and she knew I wasn’t going to take it well.” He takes a deep breath in and blows it out quickly. “Ididn’ttake it well. I couldn’t really control my reaction – I was young, you know? – and I absolutelylostit.” He grimaces. “I wanted to take my time telling you, maybe wait until you and I were in a better place and you were more adjusted.” He raises our hands to his mouth and presses a gentle kiss to the back of my hand. “It seemed like that washappening,” he says under his breath, his tone sad and a little resigned.
He looks over at me, but I’m looking out the window, staring at the car ahead of us as I struggle to get my breathing under control. He killed her, and now he’s going to kill me.
Now that I’m not pushing him to do it, it’s so much scarier.
I can’t believe I’ve been stupid enough to think I can handle this.
I start hyperventilating as Theo takes the exit to get us on the highway towards the coast. He’s going to kill me when we get back, I’m sure of it.
“Woah, hey, deep breaths, okay?” He squeezes my hand again. “I know this is a lot to take in, but it’s not as bad as it sounds, I promise. Why don’t we -”
“Please don’t kill me,” I beg, and he shoots me a wounded look.
“Alex, comeon. That’s fucked up.”
I gape at him in horror. “I just found out you killed your fucking girlfriend!”
“Wait,what? I didn’t kill Ashley! I didn’t fuckingtouchher. Jesus, Alex, you know me better than that,” he says, his voice indignant and hurt. He squeezes my hand again, frowning at me. “I tried to killKevin,sweetie. I got reallyclose, too, before Ashley knocked me out with a baseball bat, but I still beat the ever-loving shit out of him and put him in a coma. I mean, technically, hisdoctorsput him in a coma, I just gave him the brain damage that made it necessary.” He snorts and shakes his head slightly. “Ashley was a softball player in high school, so Kevin wasn’t the only one with brain damage,” he says, rolling his eyes at me. He seems to realize that joking is the wrong move once he sees my face, and he looks away quickly. “Anyway, he’s awake now and lives with his mom, I think. He kind ofhasto,” he mutters the last part under his breath, but I catch it.
I stare at him, horrified.
