The Worst Wedding Date

I should not be following Theo out of the resort, but I am so tired of shoulds.

Why can’t I have fun?

Why can’t I be irresponsible?

I hate missing Emma. Hate it. This is her week and I want to be here for her and see her for more than five minutes at a time. But there are forty people coming to dinner tonight. Forty. Parents, grandparents, the bridal party, aunts, cousins… It might be a family dinner, but it’s still a lot of people.

I tell myself I’m helping Theo stay away from Chandler, which is better for Emma, whom I see all the time. That she had a great day today because I handled all things Theo-related.

But I also feel an utter thrill at knowing I’m doing something I shouldn’t do. Something forbidden. Something dangerous.

Something with potentially life-altering consequences bigger than me losing my bikini top in a pool.

Something that would give my mother a heart attack and a half.

And that makes it all the more appealing.

Not because I want her to suffer. But because I want to live. And I can’t live in the fear of the world that I was raised to cower in.

It’s happening.

I’m having my rebellion. And now that it’s started, I can’t stop it.

Nor do I want to. This can’t wait until next week.

It has to happen now.

Theo stops next to a red convertible. “Climb in.”

“Are you serious?”

He dangles the keys.

My jaw is on the pavement. A convertible? “When did you get—”

“Airport. When I landed.”

“But we took—”

“Ride share to and from the clinic? Even I won’t drive when I can’t see, and no way was I letting you behind the wheel of this baby.”

He says it with the same flirty grin he was aiming at Claire earlier.

The one that reminds me of the smile he aimed my way when he nudged me into doing my cannonball.

“Because I have a horrible driving record?” I say like old Laney, and I immediately want to take it back.

But he grins wider. “No, because she’s built for speed. None of that granny driving you do.”

I look at the car again. Red. Shiny. Top down. A feral black cat peering at me from the passenger seat’s foot well.

And then I look at Theo again.

“I didn’t steal the car,” he says.

There’s cheek in his words, there’s something else too. Like he expects did you steal the car is the top question in my head right now, because it’s the first thing I would’ve asked him in high school.

But he’s not high school Theo. And I’m not high school Laney.

I swallow. “I didn’t say you had.”

“And I didn’t say I’ve never stolen a car. Just not this one.”

Oh, god. I’m running away with a bad boy.

Oh, god. I’m running away with a bad boy.

Maybe not the same kind of bad boy he was in high school, but still someone well outside my normal dating circles.

This is going to be fabulous.

I hesitate only the briefest moment before I open the door, shoo out the stray cat—he has enough cats, and this one has a clipped ear, indicating it’s wild and fixed—and slide in.

Theo doesn’t open his door.

He pulls a movie-star move and swings his legs over the side of the car, slides into the driver’s seat, takes a minute to unbutton his Hawaiian shirt all the way before buckling his seat belt over his dark jeans, and then punches the button to start the motor.

The car roars to life and makes my clit tingle.

Not. Good.

But I can ignore this.

I text Emma quickly. Turns out Theo actually DOES have gas. Have fun dancing! I’ve got this under control.

Theo looks at me. “Did you just tell my sister that I have gas?”

“Yes.”

Why is he aiming the flirt grin at me again? “Good. She knows how bad I can stink. Add that I had sardines for lunch.”

And then he’s tucking his arm around the back of my seat while he looks behind us and backs the car out.

Like there’s not a backup camera right there in the dash.

A thrill zings through the rest of me.

I’m being a bad girl tonight.

For just one night.

For good reasons.

I am absolutely going to be that person I’ve always been told I shouldn’t want to be, but that person that I’ve wanted more and more to explore every single day of the past year.

“Where are we going?” I ask over the engine as Theo heads out of the parking lot.

“Does it matter?”

The question shouldn’t stump me, but it does.

And not because I don’t know the right answer. No is clearly the right answer here.

But how often do I ever do things in my own life without purpose?

Never.

And that’s not wrong. But maybe it’s not enough.

“I want fish tacos,” I tell Theo.

It’s what pops into my head. I’m hungry. Fish tacos sound good.

No overthinking.

I just want fish tacos.

Fifteen minutes later, I have a bag of fish tacos in hand courtesy of a local drive-through place, and Theo’s driving us out of town.

I don’t ask where we’re going again, or why he didn’t get anything for himself.

Instead, I eat fish tacos and watch the sun dip lower in the horizon until he steers us up a road going inland, putting the sunset behind us.

Going nowhere.

Or maybe somewhere specific, and it’s a surprise.

Theo’s quiet. It’s an unusual side of him from what I expect. Almost like he can turn down the chaos dial sometimes and just be chill.

I want to ask him what he does for work, but that’s too Laney of me. So instead, I finish licking all of the delicious fish taco sauce off my fingers, then I pick a quite possibly more dangerous topic.

“Are you enjoying Emma’s wedding week?”

His gaze shifts to mine briefly, and I swear he knows it was on the tip of my tongue to ask him how he supports himself. “Could be worse,” he replies finally with that smile dialed up again. “Aunt Brenda could be babysitting me.”

Good thing I’m done eating, or I’d be choking on a fish taco right now. “I’m sure she wouldn’t have minded at all if you woke up with your hand asleep.”

“When you wake up with your hand asleep tomorrow, I’m going to laugh my ass off.”

“I don’t wake up with my appendages asleep.”

“Of course not.”

“I’m a good sleeper.” Shut up, Delaney. Shut. Up.

His lips twist in bigger amusement. “Was today your first time going skinny dipping?”

“I was not—ahem. Excuse me. No. No, it was not.”

The car swerves. Like, actually swerves as Theo jerks the wheel while he glances at me as we leave behind the black lava rock landscape and head into a more desert-like area of the inner part of the island. I hope I get to see the tropical rainforest side while we’re here too. I want to see all of it.

“When was the other time?” he asks.

Is that my imagination, or did his voice go a little hoarse?

My imagination, I decide. Or a side effect of the wind whipping around the open top of the car.

But I smile at him like his voice did go hoarse. “Much like Sabrina, I am a steel trap. Fish tacos cannot buy this secret out of me.” And yes, I’ll be paying him back for buying my food.

I didn’t grab my wallet before dinner. I have no credit card and no ID on me. I’m living on the edge.

“Ah,” Theo says. “You quickly pulled your suit down during senior dare night in the pool in the dark.”

“No.” Okay, yes. I did that too. But I don’t count it.

I didn’t pull my suit all the way off. And it was like, half a second. I didn’t want to be the one with my suit down if we got busted. My parents would’ve died.

Bad enough I was there.

But I should’ve done it all the way.

“Being naked in your own bathtub doesn’t count,” he tells me with a grin.

“Just how often do you think about me naked?”

“Pretty much every day.”

My nipples tingle. I tell them to stop because this is not the kind of fun we’re having tonight, but they don’t listen. And my mouth doesn’t get the message either. “Like, once a day? Or is it breakfast-lunch-dinner, time to think about naked people time several times a day? Do you just flip through your contact list and picture everyone naked, or only certain people?”

“Only certain people. Usually several times an hour.”

“Do you say that to make me uncomfortable or because it’s true?”

“Do you really want to know the answer to that?”

Do I?

Usually, no.

Today?

“I want to know.”

He glances at me again. “Are you going to call me a dick if you don’t like my answer?”

“Yes. It’s my defense mechanism so I don’t notice you have very nice abs.”

Oh my god. I said that out loud.

I said that out loud, and now he’s flexing his abs.

The man is flexing his abs.

For me.

Today’s been a weird day. So weird. From the very unexpected wake-up with his personal problem looming between us, to watching him playing with a bunch of kids on the beach, to worrying over his eyes, to the kittens he rescued in secret and his confession that he used to like me, to the bikini mishap in the pool, to running away with him now—

He puts himself out there.

For everything.

“What’s it like to not care what anyone thinks of you?” I ask before I can stop myself.

“Who says I don’t care?”

“If you cared, you wouldn’t be so…”

“Stupid?” he supplies.

“No, I was going to say whatever the word is for willing to jump into potentially dangerous and often unwise things without thinking them all the way through, but then I realized that sounds like Frumpy Dumpy Delaney, and I’m not her tonight, so please erase the question from your brain. It doesn’t exist.”

“You think I don’t care what anyone thinks of me because I’m spontaneous.”

“I think you’re forty-six steps beyond spontaneous. I also think you care what Emma thinks of you or we wouldn’t be in this car running away from her wedding together. You would’ve ditched me.”

“Maybe that’s my plan.”

I gasp.

Like, actually gasp.

He laughs but then stops as he seems to realize I’m taking him halfway seriously. “I’m not dumping you in the middle of the island.”

“But I know about your kittens. I could make life horrible for you.”

“I have way bigger secrets than kittens.”

“Like what?”

He cuts another look at me and chuckles again. “Dream on, Laney.”

“Maybe I’ll tell everyone about your kittens if you don’t.” I totally won’t. But I feel like I’m flirting.

Like I’m having fun.

Like I don’t have to watch everything that comes out of my mouth to make sure it’s living up to the expectations that I’ve been told the world has for me.

And he hasn’t kicked me out of the car. He’s not slowing down. The sunset is so lovely that it’s even lighting up the clouds looming to the east with a gorgeous pink-orange hue again.

I love the sunrise and sunset back home over the mountains, but this sunset is special too.

“You won’t tell anyone about my kittens,” he says.

His confidence annoys me. “Why won’t I?”

“Because if you do, I’ll launch a save the kittens so Theo can take them home campaign, go viral, get thousands of dollars in donations from around the world, have half the women at the resort fawning over me, and you’ll be that woman who turned in the internet’s new favorite son.”

I don’t gasp this time.

I squeak.

He’s the type of person that could happen to. I swear he is.

Can this car maybe swallow me whole? I’m trying to be fun, and instead, I already feel like the horrible person who’d sacrifice the future of a litter of kittens for the sake of learning a secret.

Theo cuts another look at me. “Laney. If you were going to tell anyone, you would’ve done it already. Crazy rule-breaker, you.”

“I can have fun.”

He doesn’t answer.

“I can. It’s just hard when there’s so much pressure to always do the right thing and look the right way so that you don’t mess up your future.”

“Ask you a question?”

The correct answer here is no. Every instinct inside of me is hollering for me to say no.

I ignore it. Tonight’s about ignoring what I’ve been taught and leaning into being someone else. “Sure.”

“How long’s it gonna take for you to get to that magical future you want to live in, and do you really think you’ll like it when you get there?”

My brain breaks. Splinters and shatters and cracks wide open. “I—I—I mean, I’m living it right now, but I also have to think about how that impacts next year, and next decade, and—”

“You really enjoying it?”

Once again, I know the correct answer. Yes. Yes, this is what I want and it makes me happy.

But instead of answering, I’m frozen.

I love my job. I love the fulfillment. But there’s still pressure.

One day, Delaney will take over Kingston Photo Gifts. She’s so good there. We might retire early. No worries at all. The company will be in the best hands. All she needs now is the perfect husband to run it by her side.

Theo doesn’t call me on my silence.

To his credit, he’s not smirking either. Not making fun of me for being boring Princess Plainy-Laney.

I take a deep breath, fully intending to find it inside me to tell him that I love my job but yes, I’m unfulfilled in my private life and working on that—boring, Laney, boring—when something else entirely comes out of my mouth.

“Deer. Deer. Deer!”

There are no deer in Hawaii. Not like at home. But there’s an animal running into the road and I don’t know what it is and I know I’m supposed to say right bumper or something else to tell him where the animal is, but instead, he swerves off the road and slams on the brakes as a thump and a crunch come from the front of the car, and then there’s a sudden white explosion as the airbags deploy.

“Oh my god,” I gasp as I rock in my seat in the aftermath of the crash.

“Well, that’s a new one,” Theo says.

“Your car. Rental car. Did you take the extra insurance?” Dammit. Can I not be that person for one damn hour?

Theo unbuckles, then flings his door open and steps out.

I scurry out my side too, cringing. He’s going to be so pissed. I hurry around the front of the car, bracing myself for images of him kicking the tire and cussing and yelling at me for freaking out and yelling at the animal we hit for running across the road, but instead—

Instead, I find Theo tilting his head and staring at a barrel-shaped black animal about a third as long as the convertible is wide with a thoughtful expression on his face.

“What…what is that?” I whisper.

He whips his phone out of his pocket and aims it at the dead animal like he’s taking its picture. “Pig, looks like.”

And he wants a souvenir photo.

Of course he does, Laney. Insurance will require it. He doesn’t keep pictures of dead animals as souvenirs.

I glance at the front bumper, which is totally crushed. The light is crushed. The pretty red hood is crushed. The fender is crushed.

Can we drive this?

Will it even start?

“I’m sorry,” I blurt. “I should’ve said something sooner. Or clearer. It came out of nowhere. I’m sorry.”

“Not your fault.”

“But I saw it before I found words. I should’ve spoken up sooner.”

He looks up at me and studies me like he’s perplexed. “You’re not responsible for the whole world, Laney.”

“No, but I—”

“Wasn’t driving,” he prompts.

“But I saw it and you—”

“Also saw it. And tried to avoid it. And failed. You still alive?”

“Yes, but—”

“You hurt?”

“No, I—”

“Not at all?”

“No, not at all. I’m fine.”

He studies me longer than absolutely necessary, and then he does the last thing I expect, which honestly should’ve been the first thing I’d expect, given that this is Theo.

He cracks a grin. “Think we can load it in the car so my pops can stuff it?”

“What?”

“The pig. Don’t think he’s ever done a stuffed Hawaiian pig before.”

“Are you—are you serious right now?”

His smile gets broader and impossibly more attractive. “It’s a feral pig. You were gonna eat it anyway tonight if we’d stayed at the resort. And this is just a car. Piece of metal. Replaceable. I’m fine. You’re fine. Now find your muscles and help me get this thing in the trunk.”

“Absolutely not. And not because I’m a stuck-up rule-follower. There is zero good that will come of us putting that thing in the trunk.”

“You’d deny my dad the chance to work on a new species?”

“Is that even legal?”

Yep. That came out of my mouth.

Theo’s lips curve up into a dirty, naughty grin. “I never realized just how much I like it when you get all rule-follower. It’s a challenge. I like a challenge. You challenge me, Laney. Thank you.”

My stomach dips low and my mouth goes dry. “Are you seriously pretending to flirt with me over a dead pig?”

“Not pretending. C’mon. Help me get this thing in the trunk.”

“We should call someone. The sheriff’s office. Is there a sheriff on the island? Or is it the police? Who’s in charge of roadkill here? Will the car move? Are we going to need a tow truck? Oh, god. Emma. She’s going to be so upset.” I whip out my phone, and—

No signal.

“Em’s fine. We’re not hurt. And in case you forgot, Rocky Roadkill put food on our table and clothes on our backs our entire childhood. She knows about the circle of life.”

He squats next to the pig and takes a selfie.

A selfie.

I stifle another squeak.

“Makes more once it’s stuffed if you know where it came from,” he says like it’s the most reasonable thing in the world. “Rest well, little piggie. Didn’t mean to kill you. But I promise we’ll find your body a forever home where you’ll be loved and revered.”

“I can’t get a signal. We can’t call for help if I can’t get a signal.”

“Someone will come along. People were hitting animals on the road long before cell phones, and they survived to tell the tale.”

“We’ll walk. Can’t be far to find a signal.”

“Pig in the trunk first.”

“I am not helping you—”

I don’t finish.

I can’t.

Not when the dead animal suddenly squeals the unholiest, loudest squeal in the history of undead squeals, shoots to its feet like it took a hot poker up its ass, and charges Theo.

“Zombie pig!” I yell. “Duck! Dive! Run! Zombie pig!”

Theo gets the full force of the pig right to the chest and goes sprawling back onto the pavement.

I shriek and dash for him.

But that’s the exact wrong move because the zombie pig is pissed, and now I’m his new target.

“Holy fuck, it’s alive,” Theo gasps.

It flares its snout at me. There’s murder in its eye. It paws the ground once, snorts, and then charges me.

I scream and scramble onto the hood of the car.

Or try to.

Really, I’m grasping for purchase on the slick surface while the pig rams the car.

“Hey! Get! Stop!” Theo bellows at it as he jumps back to his feet, staggering only a little as he runs at the pig.

Did he hit his head?

Does he have a concussion?

The pig does a fast turn and hurtles its barrel body back toward Theo, who takes off around the car. “That’s right, fucker! Chase someone with your own kind of stubbornness and innate good looks and solid muscle structure!”

I’m trying to climb up the car so I can dive over the windshield and inside, and I’m trying not to laugh at his ridiculousness at the same time. “Get in the car, Theo! Get in the car!”

He dives.

The car shakes and my bottom half goes sliding to the edge of the hood.

There’s a thump as the pig slams into the car and connects with the door right where Theo just went over inside the convertible.

“Can it jump?” I shriek. “Is it going to eat us?”

“Pigs can’t jump.” Theo climbs to his feet on the front seat and reaches over the windshield to grab my arm.

“Are you sure?”

“No. Get in. We’re getting out of here before we find out otherwise.”

He pulls me over the windshield while I try to clamber up too, but I’ve never climbed a convertible windshield before.

Especially not while the car is being repeatedly head-butted by the most solid pig in the existence of wild, terrifying pigs.

I finally get the rest of the way up the windshield with Theo’s help, but that’s where the very worst thing in the history of terrible things happens.

I lose my balance.

Do I fall out of the car and get trampled by the very angry feral pig?

No.

That would be better.

Instead, I trip and fall headfirst onto Theo.

And he loses his balance.

And then the two of us are splayed together in the passenger seat, which has collapsed beneath us, both of us panting, our noses barely an inch apart, every inch of his solid body lined up against mine.

Belly to belly.

My breasts squished against his broad chest.

My thighs spread across his pelvis.

Our eyes locked.

It’s the locked eyes that are the worst.

Maybe.

The growing bulge against my pubic bone might be the very worst.

Okay, not the very worst. It’s definitely worse when the pig rams the car again, making the whole thing rock, which rocks my nipples against his chest while also rocking his erection against a spot soooo close to my clit, but not quite there.

And I want it to be there.

It’s raw, primal instinct. I haven’t had a date in months. Okay, over a year.

God help me, this is the closest thing to sex I’ve had in over a year.

And it’s with Theo.

The pig flings itself against the side of the car with an ungodly squeal. My leg slips and opens me up so that my clit is rubbing against Theo’s shaft while the car jolts around us.

Accident.

I swear.

Just trying to hang on. If it happens to take clamping my legs around his hips for purchase, then I guess that’s the price I have to pay.

Theo’s eyes bore into mine, his pupils getting larger and his lids getting lower. He licks his lips. Visibly swallows. “That thing’s pissed,” he says while the animal hits the convertible once more.

“Y-you would be t-too.” Oh, god, his cock feels good against my clit. Sinfully good.

It shouldn’t.

But it does.

And isn’t this fun? a little voice that sounds like a long-forgotten me whispers deep inside my head.

The car rocks. Theo’s erection shamelessly rubs my clit. I stifle a moan at the sheer pleasure flowing through my body and pretend I’m whimpering in terror.

What would life be like if I could just enjoy this? If I didn’t feel that sense of fear, that feeling that I’m disappointing my parents every time I want sex that won’t lead to babies?

What if I just let go?

What if I stripped naked and had sex with Theo right here, in the middle of a road, while a wild pig attacks our car?

“It needs to stop.” Theo’s voice is thick. He closes his eyes, the tendons in his neck straining. “It’s going to hurt itself.”

Is he saying I need to stop?

I don’t want to stop.

This feels good.

It feels reckless. Daring. Adventurous. Wrong, but in the best way.

I bite my lower lip as a particularly hard ram from the pig makes the car bounce harder. The motion sends a spiraling sensation of need deep within my vagina, and I want to let go.

I want to let myself come.

Right here.

“Do you think it’ll get tired soon?” My voice is thick. And it hitches on the last word as the sway of the car makes my clit rub particularly deliciously against Theo’s hard length.

“Don’t—know—stamina of a—pig.”

Oh, god.

He’s turned on too.

He is so turned on.

The pig hits the car.

Crap. Crap. Crap fuck no no no no—yes.

That last jostle is pushing me over the edge and I’m coming.

I’m coming.

I’m having a freaking orgasm on top of Theo and his breathing is labored and I think he’s coming too.

I do.

I think I have just rubbed one out for him through our clothes by riding the waves of a wild pig shaking this wrecked convertible.

You wanted to live, Laney, that voice of temptation and sin whispers deep inside me while little earthquakes rock my core.

Yes.

Yes, I want to live.

But this is not how I saw living going when I got up this morning.

Theo stifles another noise deep in his throat as I realize the car is no longer moving beneath us.

The pig is gone.

The freaking pig prompted both of us to come, and now it’s freaking gone.

Neither of us says anything for a long, loooong time.

We just lie there, me splayed across Theo, him catching his breath beneath me, in a wrecked car in the middle of a road to nowhere, eventually working up the nerve to stare at each other.

And when I look at Theo, it’s like I’m seeing someone completely different.

Like we have no history. No animosity. No complications.

In this moment, we’re simply two people supporting each other through an unexpectedly erotic experience brought on by a wild animal in paradise.

“Are you okay?” he finally says.

“Yeah. You?” I pant.

“Why did you think I’d be mad at you?”

It takes a hot minute for me to understand the question, and when I realize he’s talking about me freaking out over not warning him fast enough about the pig, I flinch and realize I need to move.

I need to get off him.

We’re in the middle of the road with the light fading rapidly. We could get hit by a passing car. Or a wild goat could decide it wants to crash the party too, and goats can jump.

But Theo grips me by the waist and holds me tight when I start to squirm off. “It is not your fault I hit a pig. I know you were trying to warn me the best way you could.”

If you’d told me two days ago that Theo Monroe would hit a tender spot inside of me that needed to be told this mistake is not your fault, I would’ve laughed until I choked and then choked until I passed out from a lack of oxygen.

Yet here we are, with him soothing a wound I didn’t even know I had.

“Stop talking,” I whisper.

“We’re not so different, are we? Both of us living in the direction of the world’s expectations of us.”

My whole world stops spinning. Gravity ceases to work, and my entire existence floats out of my body, spiraling and spinning out of control to compensate for the fact that the world as I thought it was is not the world that actually is.

Theo’s trapped.

He’s trapped by low expectations just as much as I’m trapped by high expectations.

He’s right.

We’re basically the same.

And that changes everything.

I will never—ever—see him as a simple troublemaker again.