THE RULES WE BREAK

  ALLIE EVERHART

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Darcy

  Chapter 2

  Theo

  Chapter 3

  Theo

  Chapter 4

  Darcy

  Chapter 5

  Darcy

  Chapter 6

  Theo

  Chapter 7

  Darcy

  Chapter 8

  Theo

  Chapter 9

  Darcy

  Chapter 10

  Theo

  Chapter 11

  Theo

  Chapter 12

  Darcy

  Chapter 13

  Darcy

  Chapter 14

  Theo

  Chapter 15

  Darcy

  Chapter 16

  Theo

  Chapter 17

  Theo

  Chapter 18

  Darcy

  Chapter 19

  Theo

  Chapter 20

  Theo

  Chapter 21

  Darcy

  Chapter 22

  Theo

  Chapter 23

  Darcy

  Chapter 24

  Theo

  Chapter 25

  Theo

  Chapter 26

  Theo

  Also by Allie Everhart

  Books by Kai Juniper

  The Rules We Break

  By Allie Everhart

  Copyright © 2023 Allie Everhart

  All rights reserved.

  Published by Waltham Publishing, LLC

  Cover Designed by Marisa Wesley of Cover Me Darling

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters, things, and events are fictitious, and any similarities to real persons (live or dead), things, or events are coincidental and not intended by the author. Brand names of products mentioned in this book are used for reference only and the author acknowledges that any trademarks and product names are the property of their respective owners.

  The author holds exclusive rights to this work and unauthorized duplication is prohibited. No part of this book is to be reproduced in any form without written permission from the author.

  CHAPTER ONE

  DARCY

  “What was that noise?” I ask, jumping up from the couch.

  Theo walks up behind it and reaches behind the cushion. He pulls out a half-eaten bag of potato chips and smiles. “I was looking for these.” He opens the bag and digs his hand into it, pulling out a handful of chips. “You crushed them.”

  “Because they were in the couch!” I march over to him. “I can’t live this way.”

  “What way?” he asks, stuffing the chips in his mouth.

  “This!” I motion to the living room, which is littered with empty pizza boxes, soda bottles, chip bags, and who knows what else? I’m afraid to look too closely, fearing what I’ll find. “It’s disgusting! I can’t live like this.”

  “Yeah, okay,” he says, walking to the kitchen. “I’ll work on it.”

  “What does that mean?” I follow him to the fridge. “That you’ll clean up the mess?”

  He shrugs as he opens the fridge and takes out a bottle of soda. “It means I’ll work on it. I’ll try not to leave chips on the couch.”

  I watch as he walks back to the living room with the chips and soda. He sits down on the couch and turns on the TV.

  Taking a deep breath, I try to remain calm. The guy is driving me crazy. And I’ve only lived with him for three days! How am I going to survive an entire semester?

  Storming over to the couch, I grab the remote from Theo, turn off the TV, and stand in front of him.

  “Hey! I was watching that!”

  “You weren’t watching it. You just turned it on.”

  “I want to see the sports highlights. I missed the game last night.”

  Taking another deep breath, I sit down beside him and calmly say, “Theo, we need to talk.”

  “About what?” He takes a drink of his soda.

  “Our living arrangement.”

  “What about it?” he asks, leaning back and putting his arm up along the back of the couch.

  “If we’re going to be roommates, you need to clean up after yourself.”

  “I just told you I’d try to stop leaving chips on the couch.”

  “Yes, but it’s more than that.” I pick up an empty soda bottle from the floor. “Like this bottle. Could you throw it away instead of leaving it on the floor?”

  “That’s not mine. It’s Colton’s.”

  My mind drifts to Colton, the blond-haired hottie I’ve been obsessing over since last year when I sat behind him in Freshman English. I didn’t have the confidence to talk to him back then, but now, halfway through my sophomore year, my confidence has grown, along with my crush on Colton.

  Now that I’m living with Theo, who happens to be one of Colton’s best friends, I might actually have a chance with him. Colton’s over here all the time, which is one of the reasons I agreed to live with Theo. That, and because I had no other options. When my former roommate Avery ditched me to live with her boyfriend Wes, I decided it was time to move out of the dorms and live off campus. But finding a place in the middle of the year is nearly impossible. Wes suggested I live here and rent out his room since he was moving in with Avery. He assured me Theo was a great roommate.

  Great roommate? Not even close. Wes either overlooked all of Theo’s annoying traits or he lied to get me to move in.

  “Are we done?” Theo asks.

  “No.” I set the soda bottle on the coffee table and turn to Theo. “Can you explain something to me?”

  “What?”

  “Why didn’t it look like this when Wes lived here? When Avery and I would come over, there weren’t chip bags in the couch or soda bottles on the floor.”

  “Wes is kind of a neat freak. Not like he cleaned all the time, but he’d pick up the place.”

  “Okay, but I’m not going to do that. I’m not picking up after you.”

  He shrugs. “I don’t expect you to.”

  “Which means I need you to do it. You need to pick up after yourself.”

  “I said I’d try.” He holds his hand out. “Now can I have the remote?”

  “You need to do more than try. I can’t live like this.” I get up and walk over to the chair next to the couch. “Your socks have been on this chair since I moved in.”

  “I’ll pick them up when I do laundry.”

  “Theo, you’re not getting it. We share this room. I can’t even use it when your dirty clothes are everywhere.” I look down and notice his boxers under the coffee table. “Theo, why is your underwear under the table?”

  He peers under it and smiles. “Awesome! I was out. Now I don’t have to do laundry tonight.”

  I stare at him. “You’re going to rewear those?”

  “They’re clean. I must’ve dropped them when I was folding laundry. Throw them over.” He holds his hands in the air like he’s about to catch a football.

  I back away. “I’m not touching those.”

  “C’mon. They’re clean.”

  “Still not touching them.”

  “Then give me the remote so I can watch the sports highlights.”

  “You’re not going to pick them up?”

  He gets up, walks in front of me, and picks up his boxers. He turns to me, smiling. “We good?”

  “It’s a start.”

  He leans down to my face, looking me in the eye. “You know, most people get along with me just fine.”

  “Because they don’t have to live with you.”

  He straightens up. “If you don’t like it here, you’re free to go.”

  “And live where? It’s December. Nobody needs a roommate until summer.”

  “Guess you’re stuck with me then,” he says with a smirk as he yanks the remote from my hand. He goes back to the couch and sits down, tossing his boxers on the cushion next to him.

  I let out an annoyed sigh. “You’re impossible.”

  He’s not even paying attention, his focus on the TV and whatever sports show he’s watching. I don’t have a brother, but if I did, I imagine him being like Theo. Messy. Annoying. Immature.

  The doorbell rings.

  “I’ll get it,” I say, going to get the door. Wes and Avery are there.

  “Hey!” I give Avery a hug. “I didn’t know you guys were coming over.”

  “Wes texted Theo,” Avery says. “Didn’t he tell you?”

  “No,” I say, rolling my eyes. “Which doesn’t surprise me.”

  Wes laughs. “Still adjusting to living with him?”

  “You could say that.” I move aside to let them in.

  “Hey, man,” Wes says, going over to Theo.

  “Hey, you see the game highlights from last night?”

  “Let’s go upstairs,” I say, grabbing Avery’s arm. “I need to talk to you.”

  “Um, okay,” she says, giving me a confused look. “Wes, I’ll be upstairs with Darcy.”

  “Yeah, babe,” he says, sitting in the chair next to the couch.

  Keeping hold of Avery, I hurry her up the stairs and down to my room.

  “It’s looking really nice,” Avery says, glancing around the room, which I still need to finish decorating. “It’s so much different than when Wes lived here. He had like no stuff.”

  I shut the door and race up to her. �
��I can’t do this.”

  “Do what?”

  “Live with Theo. He’s driving me crazy! It’s at the point I’m starting to become like you, or how you used to be, before Wes loosened you up.”

  “I feel like I should be insulted by that,” she says.

  “I just mean how you used to be kind of uptight about stuff. Tense. Like you couldn’t relax. And you used to make all those rules. I used to tease you about it. And now…”

  “Now what?”

  I grip her shoulders and look at her. “This morning, I caught myself making a list. A list of rules. Roommate rules. I even wrote them down!”

  “Yeah? So? What’s wrong with that?”

  “Avery, seriously?” I turn and walk to my desk, picking up the notebook where I listed out the rules. I hold it up. “This isn’t me! I don’t make rules! I’m spontaneous. A free spirit. Up for trying new things.”

  She shrugs. “Maybe you’ve changed.”

  “I haven’t changed.” I drop the notebook and walk up to her. “It’s Theo. He’s the one making me like this! You know what I found under the coffee table?”

  “What?”

  “His underwear! And he didn’t see a problem with that.” I throw my hands up. “And I sat on a bag of chips, which for some reason were under the couch cushion.”

  Avery tightens her lips, trying to hold back a laugh.

  “Avery, this isn’t funny!”

  “It’s kind of funny. Seeing you get worked up like this? You’re always so chill.”

  “Exactly! Look what he’s doing to me!”

  “He’s a guy. Guys are messy. You knew that before you moved in.”

  “It wasn’t like this when Wes lived here.”

  “Wes is the exception. He doesn’t like living in a mess so he’d pick up around the house.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m not doing that. I’m Theo’s roommate, not his mother.”

  “Did you try talking to him?”

  “Yes, and he doesn’t think it’s a problem. You know how he is. Nothing bothers him.”

  “I think stuff bothers him. He just hides it well. Theo’s a really nice guy if you just give him a chance.”

  “I never said he wasn’t nice. I said he was a slob who thinks leaving his underwear under the coffee table is acceptable.”

  “That is pretty bad, but it could be worse. He could’ve left them in the kitchen,” she says with a laugh.

  I sigh. “You’re not helping.”

  “You need to give it more time. Adjusting to living with someone is hard at first. You and I didn’t get along right away.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” I say, thinking back to our first week together in the dorms. I wanted to have guys over and stay up late and Avery wanted to study and go to bed early. It took a couple weeks and a few arguments to finally work things out.

  “And hey,” Avery says. “At least he’s nice to look at.”

  “Who?”

  “Theo.”

  I shrug. “He’s like a brother. I don’t see him that way.”

  “C’mon, Darcy. You don’t think he’s even a little hot?”

  My mind goes to last night when Theo came home from the gym wearing a workout shirt that fit tight to his chest and barely stretched around his huge biceps. The guy’s got a good body, I’ll give him that. Did I feel a slight tingle when I saw him in that shirt? Maybe, but that’s totally normal. I’m a girl. He’s a good-looking guy. And I have a thing for football players.

  “Colton’s hotter,” I say. “And he’s more mature.” I walk over to my bed and sit down. “And I don’t have to live with him.”

  “Theo’s not immature.” Avery comes over to the bed and sits next to me. “You’re being too hard on him.”

  “All he does is play video games.”

  “A lot of guys do. Girls play too. In high school I used to play those games for hours.”

  “Only because your boyfriend did.”

  “True, but it was kind of fun. You should try playing with Theo sometime.”

  I look at her like she’s crazy. “I don’t see that happening.”

  “Colton loves video games. You could have Theo teach you how to play and then maybe you could play with Colton.”

  “Huh. That’s actually a good idea.”

  “See? Living with Theo isn’t so bad.”

  “Yeah, if you don’t mind living in garbage.”

  “Things will get better. You just need to give it some time.”

  “Hey, maybe we could switch roommates! Wes can live here and I’ll live with you.”

  “Nice try, but I’m going to stay with Wes.”

  “So how’s it going with you two?” I get up and go over to my desk to get my phone from the charger.

  “Great! We haven’t fought once since moving in together. I’m really surprised. I thought by now we’d have at least one argument.”

  “You’re probably too busy having sex,” I say, swiping through my phone.

  “You might be right.”

  I look up from my phone. “You guys really do it that much?”

  Avery just smiles, which tells me they do it all the time.

  “I’m jealous,” I say, leaning back against my desk. “I haven’t had sex in months.”

  “Maybe you’ll meet someone at the party this weekend.”

  “I doubt it. Most people have already gone home.”

  “When are you leaving? Did you decide?”

  “Probably not until the 23rd. My parents work all the time so if I go home, I’ll just be sitting around, bored.”

  “What about your friends?”

  “They have to do family stuff. They won’t have time to get together.”

  “But if you go home, you’ll get a break from Theo.”

  “I thought about that, but I still think I’ll stick around here. I need to unpack and get my room the way I want it. I want to shop for a new lamp and maybe a rug.”

  “I guess that means you’re going to keep living with Theo.”

  “I don’t have a choice. My dorm room is gone and I can’t find anyone else who needs a roommate.”

  “You could do a lot worse than living with a football player who has his hot football player friends over all the time.”

  “Yeah, and it’s only for a few months.”

  “A few months?”

  “I told Theo I’d only be here until May. After that I’ll go somewhere else. I’m already looking for summer rentals. There’s tons of them. I just need to pick one.”

  “Why don’t you wait and see how things go? Maybe after a few weeks, you’ll like living with Theo.”

  “I doubt it.” I smile. “Unless Colton comes over every night.”

  “I was thinking about that.”

  “About what?”

  “You and Colton. I don’t really see you with him.”

  “Why? You think he wouldn’t go out with me? Because I’ve seen the girls he’s dated and—”

  “It’s not that. I think he’d go out with you. I just don’t see you guys hitting it off.”

  “I didn’t see you and Wes getting along and now you’re living with him.”

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right.” She gets up. “Let’s go downstairs and see what the guys are up to.”

  “They’re just watching that sports show. Let’s stay up here. Tell me what you’re doing for Christmas.”

  As Avery talks, I realize how much I miss having her as my roommate. We got on each other’s nerves now and then, but it wasn’t often. And the longer we lived together, the better we got along. I don’t see that happening with Theo. It’s only been a few days and things are getting worse, not better. How am I going to survive an entire semester with him?

  CHAPTER TWO

  THEO

  “I don’t know if I can keep doing this,” I say to Wes.

  “Doing what?”

  “Living with Darcy. She’s driving me fucking crazy.”

  Wes laughs. “C’mon, it can’t be that bad.”

  “Trust me, it is.” I lean back on the couch. “She’s on me about every little thing. I can’t relax. And when have you ever known me to not relax? I’m the most chill guy on the team.”