Twenty
20
Salem
Present Day
Remembering to smile and respond properly when spoken to was a task I feared I might be failing this morning. The scene I’d witnessed when stepping out of the room I’d shared with Pepper last night was in a continuous loop in my head. Taunting me. If only there was a good brain cleanser for things like this. Something that wiped it all away.
“Here you go,” Nina said, taking a biscuit from her cast iron skillet and placing it on the plate she’d given me. “Nice and hot.”
“God, I love you,” Pepper told her, snatching one off the skillet before taking a bite. She’d gone to get another cup of coffee and not made it back to her stool yet.
“As you should,” Nina replied with a grin. “That’s the eighth batch I’ve made this morning. The boys being up early for church had the first few batches wiped out before nine.”
“That bitch Fox brought back last night ate three!” Goldie said, glancing back at us over her shoulder as she stirred a pot on the stove.
Nina nodded. “Yeah, she also lit up a fatty before she even got off the sofa, where he’d left her.”
“That explains the smell,” Goldie replied. “It hit me the minute I walked in, and I thought one of the men had broken Liam’s rule about all weed being smoked outside.”
Nina frowned at my plate. “You sure all you want is that one biscuit?”
I had no appetite at all. It had vanished the moment the stripper swung open the door when I was in the hallway, and not only was she walking out naked, but inside stood Rome, also wearing nothing and drinking a bottle of water. It was a miracle my heart was still beating after the riot of reactions it had suffered from the sight. The only bright spot—if there could be one—was that he didn’t notice me. But she did. She slammed the door shut and glared at me.
“Don’t look at what’s mine,” she had snarled, then strutted off.
The scent of cigarettes and lime snapped me out of my thoughts as Lick leaned over me and took the breakfast casserole that looked like tater tots smothered in cheese, bacon, eggs, and onions from in front of Nina.
“You gotta try this,” he said, then proceeded to spoon some onto my plate.
Thankfully, it wasn’t too much. I didn’t want to be rude, but I knew eating even half of the biscuit was going to be tough.
“Don’t you need to get ready for church?” Nina asked him.
I glanced up to see he was shirtless and covered in tattoos. Much like Rome was. Except his body was lean and muscular, similar to Eamon’s.
Rome had never been built like that. He was thick with cut muscles and wide shoulders. His waist narrowed, along with the V cut in his lower abs, which went straight to his…penis. My memory had not exaggerated that this morning, and that was the first time I’d seen it soft. When we’d been together, I’d only ever seen it hard and erect. But even in the state it had been this morning, it had been intimidating.
Lick had a sardonic glint in his eyes. “I’m just doing my good deed for the day and gracing you ladies with the beauty of my body.”
“Easy there, tiger,” Pepper drawled. “We are mere females and can only take so much this early.”
Nina chuckled and turned to go over to the sink.
His gaze dropped to mine, and then he pulled out the stool beside me and sat down. “You doing okay?”
Not exactly. I had the image of Rome’s naked body and his girlfriend’s perfect one, which men paid to see, embedded in my brain.
I nodded.
“You lose your shirt?”
A familiar voice set off havoc in my stomach. I’d hoped he wouldn’t come in here. I didn’t think I could look at him after witnessing his nudity this morning and knowing that the sex sounds I’d heard last night came from his room.
Lick’s gaze didn’t leave me immediately to shift toward Rome, but rather lazily, as if he had better things to do and couldn’t be bothered. I dropped my attention to my plate as if it were the most fascinating thing I’d ever seen.
“No,” he replied. “Gave it to your bitch since she seemed to have lost hers.”
Pepper choked, and my eyes flew up to her to see she had covered her mouth with one hand as her eyes danced with amusement.
“Oh damn,” Nina muttered under her breath as she walked back to the counter, her gaze shifting back and forth between the two men.
“I don’t have a bitch.” Rome’s response sounded tense.
I saw Lick shrug nonchalantly out of the corner of my eye.
“My mistake. The one you fuck more than the others then. That better?”
Please stop talking, Lick.
I did not need this information. I knew it, but I didn’t want to be around when Rome’s sex life was being discussed.
“Church is in ten minutes.” Rome’s response sounded like an order.
Lick reached over to the tray with fresh berries that Goldie had brought over and grabbed a strawberry. “I can tell time, brother,” he said, sounding amused.
Then he put the strawberry between his front teeth, biting down on it as I glanced at him.
He winked at me, then stood up. “Try the casserole. It’s good shit.”
I licked my lips that felt suddenly dry before replying, “I will.”
He walked behind me, and I looked from my plate of food and up at the other three women. They were all watching Lick and Rome. Pepper seemed entertained while Nina appeared ready to step in and break them up if needed. She might weigh no more than a feather, but I had a feeling she could handle both of them.
“I’ll just go find me a shirt,” I heard Lick say before the sound of the door opening and swinging closed signaled he’d left.
“Crazy fucker,” Rome muttered.
“You sure woke up in a foul mood,” Goldie told him in a scolding tone while tossing a dish towel over her right shoulder.
He appeared in my peripheral vision, and I tried hard to focus on my food. It was pointless. The farther into the kitchen he came, the more I could see. Giving in, I glanced up as he opened the fridge and grabbed a bottle of water.
“Water before coffee?” Nina asked him.
“Fucking dehydrated,” he replied in a husky voice.
“Drinking a handle will do that to ya,” Goldie said.
He grunted and opened the water, then placed it to his lips as his eyes met mine. Frozen, I stared at him for a moment, then snapped my focus off him drinking water to Pepper, who was watching me. I could see her curiosity about the momentary stare-off we’d had, and she did not need to get the wrong idea.
“You good?” he asked.
My eyes swung back to him. He was talking to me.
I nodded, but said nothing. He’d ignored me, and he was now asking if I was good?
No, Rome, I am not good. I had a nightmare, reliving yesterday, every time I closed my eyes last night.
Pepper had woken me up twice because she said I had been whimpering in my sleep.
“A gang member had his arm wrapped around her neck, holding her against him, while guns were pointed all over the damn place yesterday, and then she got his blood sprayed on her when Lick put a bullet in the man’s head, and he fell dead at her feet. She’s peachy keen, Tex,” Pepper replied sarcastically.
When he shifted his focus to her, she cocked an eyebrow, as if to challenge him.
“You got a problem?” he asked her, frowning.
She sighed heavily, her shoulders rising and falling. “Just too early for stupid questions.”
“I wasn’t aware she was in there until after the fact,” he snarled at her.
Pepper took a drink of her coffee, ignoring his comment.
“Wait,” Goldie said, and then she wagged her pointer finger between Rome and me. “What difference would it have made if you’d known she was in there? You knew Pepper was and other people. Why make that comment about Salem?”
Nina leaned a hip against the counter and studied him. “Yeah, we’d met her already at the bar when we went to have drinks with Pep a couple of weeks ago. But you weren’t there.”
I felt Rome’s eyes on me, but I didn’t meet his gaze. I decided to stare at my biscuit again.
“We were friends when we were younger,” Rome told them.
Friends. I wanted to laugh at that description. He’d labeled it friends for a time back then too. It had become a joke between us. Because nothing had ever been just friendly when it came to me and Rome. Not back then.
“You were friends,” Nina replied, drawing out the last word as if it were one she had never heard. “To a female who looks like a cross between Marilyn Monroe and Demi Moore.”
That was flattering. My bottom lip began to sting, and I realized I had been biting it and let it go.
“It was a long time ago,” he drawled, sounding annoyed.
“That foul mood at Lick’s lack of clothing makes a little more sense now,” Goldie piped up.
I heard the door swing open, but didn’t look up to see who it was. I preferred not to make eye contact with anyone. Not when it felt as if everyone was waiting on me to say something.
“Church,” a deep voice called out. “Liam’s in there, waiting.”
“Can I have a biscuit with bacon to go?” Rome asked.
“Sure,” Nina replied.
“Hurry,” the deep voice said at the same time.
“I’m fucking coming, but I’m getting a goddamn biscuit,” Rome snapped.
“He’s pissy because Lick lost his shirt, Butch. Don’t push him,” Goldie said in an amused tone.
“What?” the man asked, sounding confused.
“Just give me the biscuit. Jesus,” Rome grumbled.
I could see Nina hold it out to him, but kept my eyes downward.
“Thanks,” he told her.
“Uh-huh.” Her voice sounded as if she wanted to laugh.
No one said anything else as his booted footsteps faded away. When the door closed behind him, I glanced over at Pepper, who was watching me. She raised both her eyebrows.
Nina plopped her elbows down on the counter across from me and rested her chin on both her hands, grinning. “All right, tell me all of it. Start at the beginning because the friends thing is bullshit. The tension was so thick between the two of you that I could almost reach out and grab a chunk of it.”
“Nina,” Pepper said, “her day was bad enough yesterday. Don’t ask her personal stuff.”
Nina barely flickered a glance at Pepper. “And this will get her mind off the bad shit from yesterday.”
“We were friends,” I told her.
She gave me a look that said she knew that was a lie.
I added, “At first.”
A grin spread across her face. “I knew it.”
Goldie hurried over to stand beside her. “I wasn’t gonna push, but if you’re telling it, I am here for it.” The giddiness in her tone was met with a groan from Pepper.
I liked these women. I didn’t know how long I would be stuck in this place, and I wanted them to like me. But there was a lot I would never share.
“I was fifteen when his mother took me in. My dad was an alcoholic and abusive. His temper was volatile, and he exploded one night at a bar, then bashed a man’s head into the wall, killing him. He was sentenced to fifteen years, but was killed five years in by another inmate in a fight.” I didn’t like to talk about my father, but I’d rather share that part of my past than the part that had come after.
Nina winced. “That abusive-dad thing I can sympathize with. Mine was meaner ’n hell. Just about killed my momma, and if he wasn’t slapping me around, he was doing things he shouldn’t to his daughter—or any little girl for that matter. Jars just about went to prison for killing him once I told him about it.”
Goldie sighed. “Yeah, but the bastard deserved it.”
Nina nodded in agreement. “Okay, so how did Tex’s mom find you?”
“Vanna was my art teacher in high school. She’d noticed the bruising and marks I’d tried to cover up my freshman year and asked me about them. I didn’t know her at first and didn’t trust her with the truth. My dad was bad, but if I was taken away from him and thrown into the foster system, it could be worse. Then there was his brother, who hadn’t…” I paused. I didn’t like talking about this, and I knew I wouldn’t have the courage to if Nina hadn’t been so open and honest about her father’s abuse. “He hadn’t broken my hymen, but he’d touched me. My dad had known and let him. I’d rather be hit than be sent to live with him.”
Nina reached over and squeezed my hands that I had clasped together. “They’re both bad.”
I nodded. “Yeah.” I cleared my throat, then took a drink of water before continuing, “My sophomore year, when he was arrested, Vanna found out about it from my counselor at school. She was friends with the judge and was able to get custody of me within days. I don’t…” I took a deep breath. When I thought about her, my nose burned, and my throat constricted. “I don’t know what I did to deserve her, but fate gave me a gift that I will always cherish. I miss her every day.”
“I didn’t know Tex’s momma was dead,” Nina said softly.
Goldie nodded. “Yeah. Brick said he was real close to his momma, and when she passed, it did a number on him. He was young too, wasn’t he? It was before Brick and I met.”
I stared at Goldie for a minute as a memory came back to me. Brick…I’d heard that name before.
“Is Brick…did he own a bike repair shop in Ocala twenty years ago?”
Goldie smiled and nodded. “He did. That’s how he and Tex met.”
“He was Rome, uh, Tex’s boss,” I replied.
I hadn’t recognized him. He’d changed with age.
“Rome? Is that Tex’s real name?” Nina asked, wide-eyed.
I likely wasn’t supposed to tell anyone that. I didn’t know why he had changed it to Tex of all things.
Goldie chuckled. “It’s not a secret,” she told me, reading my expression. “Yes, his real name is Rome. After he had gone missing for a year, he finally called Brick to see if he could have his job back. Brick brought him here, and he ended up becoming a prospect. Anyway, during his disappearing act, he’d started bull riding in Texas. Brick had thought that was hilarious and began calling him Texas.
It got shortened to Tex.”
He’d ridden bulls in Texas? Hearing about his life that had happened after he cut me out of it was odd. It made our past feel even more like a small mark in his life. Something that had been so big back then had become insignificant.
Yet, while he had lived this wild ride of a life without me, just a girl he used to know, I’d been unable to forget him. He had snuck into my dreams, appeared in my thoughts at times I wished he hadn’t.
When I had walked down the aisle at my wedding, he’d been there in my head. It should have only been Eamon I was thinking about, but Rome had been there too. I had once believed that when I married, it would be to Rome. He’d be the groom at the altar. I’d lived with guilt for years over that thought during a moment when I should have had only one man in my heart.
“Back on track,” Nina said. “So, Vanna took you in, and you met Tex?”
I smiled, unable to help myself from remembering the first time I had seen him. “He had moved out and lived with a friend between McIntosh and Ocala. He was working for Brick. But he came to eat dinner with his mom a couple of times a week. He told her he did it to check on her. She always said he did it because he wanted her cooking. Anyway, I was almost sixteen, and he was nineteen. But I thought he was the most beautiful guy I’d ever seen. He dated girls his age and older while I longed for him silently.” I let out a small laugh. “I guess you could say I had a crush on him.”
Goldie smacked both her hands on the bar, causing me to jump and Nina to yelp. “Oh my fucking God,” she said, staring at me, wide-eyed.
I had no idea what I’d said, but she’d caused my heart to race from the loud exclamation.
Then she pointed at me and broke into a huge grin.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Nina asked her, frowning. “You about gave me a stroke.”
Goldie shook her finger at me. “It is YOU! The black hair! The beauty mark! OH MY GOD!”
“It’s the phentermine. She takes it daily, and I’ve been telling her for years that it’s gonna cause damage. It’s made her lose her damn mind,” Nina said, shaking her head.
“No,” Goldie said, slapping Nina’s arm. “Brick said that Tex had snapped after his momma died. He went off the rails, and then he broke up with this girl.” She pointed at me again. “Brick couldn’t remember her name, but she had black hair and a beauty mark on her face.” She then pointed at my beauty mark. “Right there. And Tex had been crazy in love with her. Losing her broke him, and he was never the same.”
I could feel all three pairs of eyes on me now.
“It’s you,” Goldie said, then clapped her hands together. “You’re the only female Tex has ever loved. Brick said he had been obsessed with you. Then—poof—you were gone, and Tex went insane.”
“Holy shit,” Nina drawled out, breaking into a smile. “This has just turned into a television drama, and I am tuned the fuck in.”
I held up both hands with my palms out and shook my head. “No, no, no. It was a first love, young love kinda thing. He was all my firsts, and Vanna’s passing is what changed him. He realized he didn’t love me. Broke up with me. When I got the scholarship to attend Rhode Island School of Design, I went to tell him, and he wasn’t at work. Neither was Brick. I left my contact information there with some other guy, but he never called, never came, never even wrote a letter. I was not the one who made him go insane.”
Goldie crossed her arms over her chest and cocked her head to the side. “Oh, yeah? Well, the tattoo over his heart tells a different story.”
Nina swung her eyes back to Goldie. “The tattoo is about Salem?”
What tattoo?
My chest tightened, and my heart did a weird flutter.
Goldie nodded. “Brick took him to the guy he used to get it done. He wanted it over the place where his heart was. It was an exact replica of a drawing that the girl who had taken his heart had given him for something…I don’t remember that part.”
They were all looking at me now. I didn’t want them to be. Right now, I wanted to be alone. Process this without witnesses. I’d seen him through the door naked this morning, but it had been a side view. I’d not seen his bare chest straight on. But if he’d tattooed what I thought he had over his heart, I needed to curl up in a ball for a while and let it sink in.
Pushing back the stool, I stood up and attempted to smile, but I wasn’t sure what my lips were doing. “I, uh…I need to go,” I blurted out, then spun and hurried from the room before anyone could stop me.
The range of emotions hitting me at once was similar to the panic attacks I had once suffered from regularly. I didn’t want to have one of those in front of them. That was something only Eamon had witnessed, and it was going to stay that way.
-One Years Ago
The front door opened, and I sat up from where I’d been lying on the sofa, watching a movie from the huge DVD collection that Vanna had shelved. She had gone out with friends on her monthly girls’ night and wouldn’t be home until midnight.
I hadn’t been sure if Rome was coming home after work or if he had other plans. He’d not said at breakfast, but he had winked at me before leaving the table and told me not to cause too much trouble at school.
He had moved back to live here a month ago. It had been only a couple of weeks after the prom. His showing up that night had been the beginning of a change in us or him. He had told his mom he wanted to save up to invest in the new body shop that his boss was opening in Miami and that was why he’d moved home. I had believed that at first. I still did, but the more he found ways to be around me when his mom wasn’t around, the more I began to think that maybe he’d moved here for me too.
The sound of his boots as he walked across the hardwood made me giddy with excitement. There was a chance he’d only come home to shower and change before heading out again. Hiding a hand behind my back, I crossed my fingers as if I were eight years old, hoping he was staying here. With me. Alone.
Nothing was as thrilling as the sight of Rome Bower. If hearts could skip a beat, mine did every time he entered a room. The smile that lit up my face couldn’t be helped. The corner of his mouth twitched as his gaze found mine.
“Hey.” That one word in his deep drawl was enough to make the tingle in my private areas start up.
“Hey,” I replied, hoping I didn’t sound as breathless as I felt.
His gaze shifted to the television. “That’s one of my favorites. Would you pause it until I can get a shower and something to eat? I want to watch it too.”
He wasn’t leaving. I was going to giggle with joy.
I nodded my head. “We can watch it from the beginning. And I can make you something to eat if you tell me what you want. Your mom left money for pizza, but I haven’t ordered it yet.”
“That sounds good. I can call and order it. What do you like on yours?”
“I normally get a meat lovers,” I admitted, scrunching my nose.
“Figures your pizza preference is as fucking perfect as the rest of you.”
It wasn’t the first time he’d told me I was perfect, but when he said it, I felt a thrill of pleasure run through me. I was far from perfect, but if Rome wanted to think I was, I wouldn’t argue.
“Let me get cleaned up,” he told me, then headed in the direction of his room.
I watched until he left the room, then sighed, placing my hand on my heart and falling back onto the sofa.
This night had just become my favorite, and it hadn’t even started yet.