Surrendered

  SURRENDERED

  SHE WHO DARES BOOK THREE

  BY LP LOVELL

  This book is a work of fiction, any reference to historical events, real events or real people are used fictitiously. Other name’s, characters, places and events are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual places, events or persons, living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © LP Lovell 2014

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  EPILOGUE

  RUINED

  DEAR READER

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  PROLOGUE

  Love. It’s the strongest of bonds, and the greatest of vulnerabilities. When you love someone, you hand them your heart without ever consciously doing so. To love is a risk, because you can only ever be sure of yourself. You rip your chest wide open and pray the person you love cherishes your offering for what it is, a sacrifice, a weakness, a willing vulnerability.

  I’ve spent my entire life running from such feelings. I’ve kept my walls so high, that even I couldn’t see over them. Until Theo. He besieged me within my fortress, relentlessly pressing forward in the face of my vicious rejection. I have run from him. I have fought him every way I know, and yet here he stands, true and strong.

  I don’t have the will or the strength to fight him anymore. I love him, and as much as I hate to admit it, even to myself, I need him.

  I’m standing on a precipice. I have two paths in front of me. I can take a leap of faith and hope that Theo catches me, or I can back away with my heart safely intact. One path may lead to happiness, the other won’t, but it will be a more tolerable misery than the one I will face if he rejects me.

  In the end, all any of us can really do is bare our most ugly scars, and hope that the person we love, loves us enough to overlook it. Life is brutal, and love is a war in which only the fearless may conquer. There is no second prize, there is no room for doubt. I’ve conquered my fear and placed my heart in Theo’s hands. The question is; will he crush it when he hears my story?

  There are some moments in your life that are pivotal. Moments upon which your past, present and future all hang in the very balance. This is one of those moments.

  Fighting is easy, surrendering is much harder. I surrender to love, I surrender to him, and in that, there is a certain beauty.

  CHAPTER ONE

  LILLY

  “My name isn’t really Lilly Parker.” The words hang between us. My pulse hammers in my ears as I watch his expression. “It’s Elizabeth Sampson.” He watches me carefully. His face is a mixture of surprise and confusion. I wait, but he says nothing. The air is suddenly heavy, and I feel as though my lungs are faltering. Time seems to stop as I wait for his response. Everything hangs on his next words. The silence is killing me. “Theo, say something.” I whisper.

  A deep frown mars his features. “Why would you lie about that?”

  I bite my bottom lip and sigh heavily. Time to tell him my sorry story. “I didn’t lie to you, my name is Lilly Parker…now.”

  I watch as comprehension registers on his face. “So you changed your name?” I nod. “Why?”

  “That…is the million dollar question.” I mumble. “Why does anyone change their name?”

  His blue eyes lock with mine. “Because they’re hiding.”

  “Exactly.”

  There’s a long beat of silence. “When did you change your name?” He asks carefully. I glance away from him. Fuck I hate talking about this shit. I need to tell him though. This is the moment, the moment where I can either take the plunge, and trust him, or walk away. His eyes meet mine, and I can see the steady devotion in his blue depths. I can’t walk away, so I really have no choice. Was there ever a choice with him? It feels as though this point was inevitable. He was always going to back me into a corner eventually. He was never going to just let me walk away. Maybe he’ll wish he had when he hears what I have to say. Complicated does not even begin to describe me.

  He’s leant forward, listening intently as though he may miss some small, vital piece of information. He’s desperate for something I’ve never given him before.

  “When I was fourteen, when we were running.”

  His brow creases in a frown. “Why were you running?”

  I sigh. “Okay, that’s…that’s a long and sorry story. Before I tell you, I need to ask something of you.” He nods slowly. “Just don’t feel sorry for me, don’t feel bad about it. You can’t change it any more than I can, and I can’t stand pity.” I drop my eyes from his. “Especially not from you.” I whisper. I feel as though brick by brick, I’m slowly relinquishing my beloved fortress. I feel stripped and exposed. There is nothing I hate more than feeling vulnerable. I fight the urge to throw my walls back up, a reaction honed over years.

  He swallows heavily and looks away. “You know I can’t promise that.” He’s right. I can’t expect him to feel nothing, and I can’t ask it of him.

  I nod. “Okay, well, try?” He gives a quick jerk of his head.

  I press my lips together and stare at a spot on the sofa. Where to begin? Jesus. “When I was five my dad died in a car crash. Up until then, we were just a normal family, you know.” Once the words start coming, I can’t stop. I just need to get it out, I need him to know. “When my dad died, everything changed. I really think he was the love of my mother’s life.” I glance at him. He’s focused on me completely. “When he died, she just stopped. She stopped living, stopped caring…about herself or anything around her. Her coping mechanism was alcohol. She couldn’t get through a single day without a drink. I thought that she would grieve, that she would move past it eventually, and get better. And so, with an optimism only a child can possess, I waited for her to get better. She never did.” I take a deep breath, this is where the story takes a dark turn.

  Theo touches my cheek gently. “It’s okay, sugar, remember, there is nothing you could tell me that could change the way I feel about you.” He smiles. I hope to god that’s true.

  “When I was eight, she met Shane.” I blurt. Just saying his name makes me feel physically sick. “She picked him up in some bar somewhere. He was a thirty something merchant banker on the rise. She was a lonely, drunk woman with a large bank balance, thanks to my dad’s life insurance. Within two months he was living in the house. At first he had very little to do with us. Mum still fed us, looked after us, but things went downhill fast.” I pause, trying desperately to hold onto my resolve. Theo is the good in my life. He can be an arse, but he makes me feel beautiful and special, and untouchable. He looks at me like I’m the world. This is the tainted ugly part of me that I never wanted him to see, and I feel like I’m ripping my chest wide open just so he can get a real good look at it all. I have to trust him with this though. I have to trust that he loves me enough to see past the ugliness. I meet his eyes, which are trained on me. “Shane was far from what he first appeared to be. He was abusive, violent, and had a seriously short temper. Jane became his own personal punching bag. Within three months her daily alcohol intake became hourly. She couldn’t physically be sober. She never kicked him out though.” I have to smirk at that. Who would take that? Weakness, it’s a poison. “And when she was passed out drunk twenty hours a day,
then he would turn on Harry and me.” I watch as Theo’s jaw clenches so hard it looks as though the muscle in his cheek is about to jump out. I say nothing as I watch him try and get a handle on things. I’ve had years to deal with this, and I’m still angry about it, not for myself, but for Harry. The hardest thing to endure in life, is knowing that someone you love has been hurt. I can relate to that.

  “It’s okay.” He says quietly. “Carry on.”

  I don’t want to tell him these things, but he needs to understand. I need him to know. That may be selfish, and I can’t explain why, but I want him to know. I can’t keep running and fighting. I want to stand still…with him.

  So I tell him about my living nightmare. “This went on for years. Most of the time Harry would try and stand between Shane and I. He got beaten so badly, so many times.” My voice breaks and I dig my nails into my palms to stop the age-old pain from rising to the surface. Now is not the time. I fight back images of Harry’s broken body, and try to focus on Theo. His eyes soften and he reaches out and brushes my cheek gently. I drop my eyes. I can’t take his pity right now. I hate it. It’s not fair of me to ask him not to feel it, but I fucking hate it.

  I pull away from his touch and look away from him, unable to take his sympathy. I keep talking, the words pouring from me in a torrent of pain and anger. “When I was thirteen Shane started to treat me differently. I was no longer a dog to be kicked around for amusement. I could entertain him in a wholly different way. It did help keep him away from Harry though.” I can feel the bile threatening to creep up my throat. I clutch at my stomach and breath deep. I’ve never had to say this, never had to utter the words.

  Theo stiffens next to me. He places his hands on either side of his head. “Fuck!” He says brokenly. I feel like a monster for inflicting my pain upon him.

  “Hey.” I whisper as I place my hand against his cheek. “Look at me.” His eyes meet mine, and they’re tortured. “I made my peace with this a long time ago.” As much peace as a fuck load of vodka can bring. He closes his eyes, a frown etching across his features before he nods his head stiffly.

  “Go on.” He says the words, but his body language tells me he’s heard more than enough.

  I pull my hand back as an uneasy feeling swirls in my stomach. Doubt starts to creep into my mind, and my former resolve seems to have run out the door screaming. Some things, you can never take back. If I tell him this now, he might never look at me the same way. Can I take that risk? “Theo, I…this is my burden. There is a very good reason that I didn’t tell you about this before. You don’t need to hear the rest. I think you have a pretty good picture.” I tell him.

  “No.” He cuts me off. “If you can be strong enough to sit here and tell me these things, then I can be strong enough to hear them. I won’t pretend it doesn’t upset me, or make me angry. It does. So fucking much. But this is your life, your past, and Lilly, I want to know everything there is to know about you. The good and the bad.”

  I nod my head and fight back the tears that threaten to spill. I drop my gaze back to my hands in my lap. Shame and resentment, crawl over my skin like insects. “When I was fourteen Shane started selling me.”

  “Oh, fuck no.” He breathes. He stands up abruptly and stalks across the room. I don’t follow him. I can’t. I feel stripped bare and raw, as though every single part of my ugly is on full display. I don’t like feeling exposed. Ever. I hear the patio doors slide open. The cool autumn air blows into the house, making me shiver slightly.

  I glance toward the doors. The afternoon sun frames Theo’s form as he leans on the railings that surround the patio. He hangs his head. His entire demeanour just looks defeated. Sometimes, no matter how much you love someone, there is only so much you can give. Theo may have had an selfish mother, but his life has mainly been care free and blessed. His world is untouched by the ugliness that cloaks mine. I just brought that ugliness into his world. I just made him deal with something that I had no right to ask him to deal with. I may hate it, but I have come to terms with my past. I have spent years feeling tainted and soiled by what was done to me. I spent most of those years in self –destruct mode, not giving a shit about anything, because honestly, I was continuously chasing a fix. Whether it was alcohol or sex, I was chasing that numb feeling. I wanted to be dead inside. When I got date raped, it made me realise that I was letting my past control my present. I let it rule my actions, which resulted in me being dragged back to the very place I was trying so desperately to escape in the first place. So I stopped wallowing in it, and I decided to fight it. I focused entirely on my degree, and I made my career my escape. I used men when I wanted sex, and I didn’t let anyone get close, until Theo.

  As much as I hate to admit it though, I want him close. I want him to know every sordid detail of my life. I want him to shoulder the burden of my secrets, the way he shoulders everything else, but it’s not fair to ask that. I love him, and I don’t want those images in his head. There’s that small and broken part of me that still feels dirty and ashamed. I didn’t lose my virginity to a nice boy, or even in a drunken haze. I lost my virginity to a man almost three times my age, as he held me down whilst I screamed. Knowing that can change the way you look at a person. I wouldn’t blame Theo if he couldn’t stomach this. I’m damaged goods, a broken girl just trying to play the strong woman. My insecurities claw at me like a rabid animal. My walls come up on high alert, an instant reaction to the vile feeling that I hate so fucking much. Weakness. Vulnerability.

  I may be tainted, but I still have some dignity. I don’t want his pity. I knew this might change things, so this needn’t come as a surprise. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t fucking hurt. I’ll just release him from any pity fuelled obligations he thinks he may have, and be on my way. I wish it were that easy, but this is killing me. It seems that no matter how hard I try to rise above my past, it will always destroy me. Just when I think I’ve found my way out, it creeps up and drags me back down.

  I stand up and make my way to the patio doors. I stand in the doorway for a minute just watching him for what will probably be the last time. I approach him, but he doesn’t move.

  I have no idea what to say. “Theo, I’m sorry.” He says nothing, just keeps his back to me. “Look, you have no obligations here. I get that you probably don’t feel the same way about me now. I wouldn’t.” I force the words out through my tightening throat, though they leave a bitter taste in my mouth. The familiar feelings of disgust and self-hatred wrap around me, making me want to scream. I hate being this person.

  “Fuck!” He turns his body around to face me. He leans back and grips the railing tightly. When he lifts his head, his eyes are brimming with tears, his face streaked with them. He’s a mess. Oh my god. He stares me down for long seconds before he finally speaks. “Are you serious right now? Do you really think that little of me?” His face is contorted in an angry grimace. His body trembles as he grips the railing so hard that his knuckles turn white. I’ve never seen him like this. He’s always so implacable, so unshakeable.

  I feel like I’m being burned alive and he’s burning right along with me. My pain shouldn’t be his pain. I don’t want this. “I…I’m sorry.” I gasp, my voice breaking.

  His eyes snap to mine and widen. “Fuck Lilly, don’t you dare fucking apologise.” His voice is ragged, his anger and pain mixing violently. I can feel the tension radiating off him from here. “This isn’t your fault. I just…this is hard.” Hard? That’s a bloody understatement.

  “Theo.” I whisper. I can’t find the words to say to him. I genuinely have nothing, so I stand there mutely, feeling pathetic and weak. Shit, I can’t just drop this on him and say nothing. I shake my head as a lump forms in my throat. I need him. I feel like I’m splintering apart, but so is he. I clench my fists hard, stabbing my nails into my palms, I try to focus on the pain to pull myself together. I can’t fall apart now.

  As always though, it’s him that holds me together. Before I can do anything, he
closes the space between us, and pulls me into his arms. He holds me so tight I can barely breathe. “Don’t apologise. Not for this. Not for the actions of a monster.” He whispers. I can feel his warm breath on my hair. I wrap my arms around his big body and cling to him. He’s physically trembling. If this is him shouldering my pain, sharing the load, then I don’t want it.

  After a long time he loosens his grip. “Are you okay?” His hands smooth over my hair, my face, my neck. He stares at me as though I may break at any given moment.

  “I’m fine.” I say hoarsely. My emotions are going haywire. I don’t even know what I feel any more. I’m just…drained.

  There’s a long silence as he studies my face. I can almost hear the wheels turning in his mind, the questions bubbling on his lips.

  “What happened to him?” He asks in a barely audible whisper. I want to tell him the truth, I really do, but I can’t. I just…can’t.

  “I don’t know. We left the night Harry found out about everything.” That’s true, in part. “As soon as he knew what Shaun was doing, he took me and we ran.” That is true, in part.

  “He had no idea?” He asks.

  I shake my head, meeting his eyes. He seems more together now. He’s almost back to being the unshakable man I know. There are a few cracks in his armour, and I have a feeling there may be for a while. If there’s one thing I know about Theo, it’s that I am his weakness, and I just knocked him on his arse with this blow. I feel awful, I never wanted him to have to shoulder this burden. My life is ruled by my past, by my secrets, but I don’t want it to be. I want to let Theo in, in every way. I need to be able to bare my ugliest scars to him and know that he still loves me, that he can accept the not so pretty version of me. No more protecting myself. I can’t keep running from him, and dodging the hard stuff for fear of being hurt. I can’t keep trying to shut him out. We’ve danced around this for too long. Enough is enough. If I love him and he loves me, then there should be no barriers. I’m committed to this, and that means trusting him with the hard truths of my life.