I suck down a deep breath, rub my forehead, and trace the curved bars in my eyebrow before exhaling.
“She went to our high school,” I admit.
His quiet curse echoes through me.
“But she wasn’t part of the group that locked me in the closet,” I say.
He scowls.
“You don’t have to protect her, Penelope.What she did today was dangerous and unforgivable.She will face every legal charge my lawyers can think of to ensure she never works in this industry or area ever again,” he vows.
The vindictive resolve in his voice steals the breath from my lungs.No one except him has ever stood up for me so fiercely before.
“Why?”I ask.
“Because she put you in danger.”
His short response leaves much unanswered, but a large part of me rejoices in his unbending tone.
“I’m not protecting her,” I argue.“She really wasn’t part of the group that locked me in the closet,” I say.
He tilts his head and leans forward.
“Then who did?”he asks.
“The popular girls.”
I try to play it off with a shrug, but he weaves his fingers together and leans forward.His attention on my face sends chills down my spine and heat through my veins.
“Why would the popular girls pick on you?”he asks.“If anything, I recall the academic overachievers were up in arms because of your scores, but everyone else wanted to be your friend to see if your smarts could rub off on them.”
I stare at him as my brain tries to fit this new information in with what I already know.No matter how I restructure things, his version doesn’t match.
I scoff and shake my head.
“I was the freak in the circus, Sebastian.No one wanted to be friends with me for fear of catching my disease,” I say.
He scowls, leans back in his chair, and crosses his arms over his chest.
“You’re wrong, pipsqueak.Everyone was head over heels for you.They thought you were so cute and smart and—”
Horror drains the blood from my head.
“You told them off, didn’t you?”I accuse.
He freezes as though caught in an ambush.His pupils shrink, and he flattens his lips.
“Your brother and I shut down a less-than-respectful discussion in the boys’ locker room once, but I never—”
I jump to my feet and hug myself for fear of flying apart.
“Sebastian!How could you?Everything is all your fault!I thought—”
“We were only protecting you,” he defends.
I curl my nails into my sides until the scars itch and burn.
“Did you ever explain that I was Samuel’s sister or did you just use my age to shut them up?”
