Chapter 36
Roman
He rasped out a laugh and compromised by rolling onto his side, catching his breath at the slide of skin on sensitive skin as she moved with him.
“You won’t say that when I’ve squashed you like strawberry jelly.”
His voice sounded shaky to his own ears. Roman felt her laugh against his skin and a wide smile spread across his own mouth.
“Damn, Elenie. I wanted that to take twice as long, but you blew my mind. I was hoping to impress you with my incredible stamina and lothario moves.”
Elenie tipped her chin to look up at him. Her gray eyes shone in the afternoon sun and Roman’s heart turned over.
“Count me impressed,”
she told him.
“Lotharios are not to be trusted. I’d rather put my faith in the new chief of police.”
Her grin was infectious. He would happily lie here for hours and just look at her face. With the echoes of his climax still tingling in his muscles, he already wanted her again. He was officially sunk.
“I’d better head for the bathroom.”
Sliding unwillingly out from under her, Roman stood up from the bed. He didn’t mind a bit when Elenie’s eyes followed him.
“Back in a moment.”
He dealt with the condom in seconds and paused in the doorway of the bedroom. She lay stretched out on top of the quilt, the look on her face shy but unselfconscious. He ran his gaze over her body.
“I may have mentioned it before, but you are absolutely stunning.”
Roman crossed to sit on the edge of the bed.
“I’ll probably keep telling you and your head will get huge and you’ll be all cocky and unbearable and everyone will get fed up with you. But I don’t think I’ll be able to help myself.”
She sat up and pulled her knees into her chest, wrapping her arms around them. Her beautiful breasts disappeared from sight and he frowned automatically.
Elenie laughed. Her face shone.
“You’re just saying that because you got lucky.”
He knew without a shadow of a doubt she’d never been told how lovely she was. It broke his heart more than a little. Roman swore to himself that he would tell her at every opportunity until she was forced to believe him.
“I certainly did.”
Unable to resist, he leaned in to taste her lips again.
“I consider myself to be the luckiest bastard in Pine Springs right now.”
Elenie quivered under his touch and he made himself pull away, even as he felt the familiar tug in his groin which he was powerless to control.
“I would love nothing better than to curl up with you all afternoon. But maybe, if we’re planning to visit my parents, we should go sooner rather than later. What do you think?” He hated to see the cloud that drifted across her face. “Honestly, I don’t want you to worry. This will be fine—you’ll see.” Standing up, he held out a hand to pull her up from the bed. “Would you like a quick shower?” His length twitched at the words, drawing Elenie’s eyes. Roman stifled a moan. Grabbing his shorts from the floor, he held them in front of himself like a shield. “Ignore that,” he instructed her, fiercely. “My cock isn’t running this show and, just because I’m picturing you in my shower, doesn’t mean I’m going to jump on you again like a hot and horny teenager.”
Elenie giggled. She paused in the doorway of the bathroom and looked over her shoulder. Roman’s eyes devoured her gentle curves.
“How disappointing. I was kind of hoping you would.”
He felt the smile on his lips grow until it spread across his face. With a growl, he threw his shorts to one side and followed her into the bathroom.
They took the back roads to his parents’ house, and it was late afternoon by the time they pulled up on the roadside. Elenie paled at the two extra cars parked on the driveway.
“It’s just Florence, Thea, and Luke. And Thea and Luke know the score already.”
He jumped down from his truck, walking around to the passenger side when she didn’t move.
“Come on, tiger.”
She lifted her chin, squared her shoulders, and still managed to look as if she was heading for the gallows. Her fingers had a death-grip on the cake in her hands. His mother answered the ring on the doorbell. Her face lit up when she saw it was him and fell when she noticed Elenie behind him. They were back to square one again.
“Roman. Elenie.”
“Hey, Ma.”
He leaned down to give her a kiss.
“You plan to let us in?”
Ava stepped back and held the door open.
“Of course.”
They followed her into the kitchen, where Florence was making coffee. Everyone else sat around the table.
“I thought you were working today!”
Florence’s smile disappeared like the lights snapping off in a power outage.
“OK, so this is awkward—”
“No, it’s not. There are a few things we need to tell you.”
Roman pushed Elenie gently in front of him toward the table.
“I brought you a lemon pound cake,”
she said and set it down on a counter.
“My favorite. I’ll grab a knife!”
Warm and friendly, his dad sounded just like he always did. Ava, on the other hand, was assessing them carefully and Florence’s face was stormy. Luke pulled out the chair next to him in invitation. Elenie shot him a grateful look and slid into it without saying anything more. Thea gave her a sympathetic smile.
Roman took hold of Elenie’s hand, deliberately placing it on top of the table, despite her tug of resistance. The gesture wasn’t missed by anyone.
“I know you saw Elenie in Kalamazoo last night. She told me first thing this morning.”
“Craig Perry? What are you even thinking!”
Florence thumped two cups of coffee down in front of them. Elenie’s fingers flinched in his grip.
“You know him?”
Roman’s voice was sharp.
“Not really, but he comes into the salon to get his hair cut. Jordan usually does it.”
Florence wrinkled her nose.
“You don’t like him?”
His sister gave him a look.
“Hairdressers tend to prefer it if you don’t grope them when they bend down to plug in the blow dryer. Sexy English accent or not. Pretty sure he chooses the salon over the barbershop because we all have breasts.”
His mother looked furious, his father horrified. Elenie shrank a little further into her seat.
“None of this is how it looks,”
Roman said firmly.
“It’s complicated and, when I’ve explained, I want you to keep what I tell you to yourselves.”
He explained Frank’s reaction to them being seen at the town fair, the public breakup to convince him their relationship was over, and how Elenie was fake-dating Perry to secure her safety. He left out any mention of her CI role. Beside him, Elenie’s shoulders curved inward when he described the violence she’d met with at home. He hated that she was embarrassed by something she had no control over. She kept her eyes pinned on his face, muted stress pulsing from the pores of her skin.
“Milo and Cait are in on this. So are Dougie and Summer. Thea and Luke knew already because they came to the gala dinner. And now you three know as well. But that is it and we need it to stay that way.”
He looked from his mother to his father to Florence.
“Elenie’s position is vulnerable and we’re working on a longer-term solution. But it needs to be handled sensitively at the moment. OK?”
“Fuck.”
Florence blinked.
“Yes.”
Roman gave a tight smile. “Fuck.”
There was a brief silence.
“My dear.”
His dad stood up from the table.
“I’m so sorry you’re dealing with all of that.”
Unruffled and accepting, he squeezed Elenie’s shoulder with a large hand and picked up her mug.
“Let me heat up your coffee.”
“I could not get my head around you dating that prick. I’m so glad to hear you’re not delusional, because I really like you.”
Florence’s smile was tentative.
“Plus, now we don’t hate you, we can eat your cake.”
She jumped up to gather some plates from one of the cupboards. Luke gave a dry chuckle.
“I was dying to say something after the gala dinner, but it was so hard to pick out what I could and couldn’t mention that I thought I’d best keep quiet about the whole thing!”
Thea put her hands to her temples and shook her head.
“Caitlyn nearly exploded from the pressure of keeping her mouth shut that night.”
Elenie gave a weak smile.
While the cake was being sliced and handed around, Roman looked across the table at his mother. Ava’s open face was deeply concerned.
“I don’t like this at all.”
She gave a tiny shake of her head.
He felt every muscle in Elenie’s body go rigid next to him.
“I’m so sorry,”
she said stiffly.
“I hate to involve you all in this. It’s bad enough that Roman’s been roped in, but my options are limited. My family is messed-up.”
Ava pushed back her chair.
“That’s why I don’t like the sound of this, mija.”
She bustled around the table to sweep Elenie up in her arms.
“It breaks my heart to hear what you’ve been dealing with.”
Roman swallowed a lump in his throat as his mother rocked Elenie back and forth in a lavish hug.
“We’re here for you in any way you need. All of us. Don’t you worry about that.” When she finally let go, Ava’s eyes were damp and Elenie’s shimmered in a shell-shocked face. “Let’s have some cake. You can tell us more if you want to and we’ll talk about something else if you don’t.”
Elenie’s smile trembled at the edges.
“What I’d really like to know is how the watercolor painting is going.”
And with that, his mother was off and running. Ava talked about a class she might join and a new technique that was currently defeating her, leapfrogging effortlessly from art to fitness to relatives he barely remembered to childhood memories in the way only his family could. Roman leaned back and let the conversation roll over him.
A lightness settled on Elenie’s face, banishing the blankness he hated with a passion, as Florence explained how she was responsible for the scar below his jawline.
“I was ten. He was an ass! What can I say? I had no idea the buckle on my schoolbag would turn it into such a deadly weapon.”
His sister shrugged, any repentance she might have once had long gone.
“I like to think I’ve given his face the character it lacked.”
“You’re blowing my cover.”
Roman hushed her without heat.
“I’ve been telling people I got that scar in a sword fight.”
Elenie snorted, and he would have taken ten more schoolbags in the face to hear it again.
“I heard you saved Mrs. Alberty from a coyote attack. You mean that’s not true?”
He aimed a lazy grin her way.
“I’d have left her to it. Those coyotes would rue the day they had the nerve.”
He stretched his arm along the back of her chair and stroked his thumb gently up and down her spine. The memory of her bare skin under his touch flared in his mind. Roman wrenched his thoughts back to the present before he was forced to adjust himself under the table. Luke caught his eye and gave him an imperceptible wink. It seemed he was not as unreadable as he’d been led to believe.