Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Romeo
The clubhouse carried the usual Tuesday evening noise. Brothers drifted through the common room after dinner, the television played something nobody seemed to be watching, and the smell of beer and cigarette smoke had settled into the walls years ago.
I was in my room staring at my phone.
Again.
I could’ve called her. My thumb had hovered over the button enough times that I was starting to piss myself off, but texting was easier. That way, I could think before I answered. Delete something when my mouth got ahead of the little bit of common sense I had left.
A phone call was different. One laugh from Fiona and there was no telling what might come out of my mouth.
So I behaved.
My phone buzzed.
Ma Belle: Still awake?
I smiled. Apparently, she wasn’t helping.
Me: Always for you, Cher.
Ma Belle: That’s a dangerous promise
Me: I don’t make promises I can’t keep.
The dots appeared, disappeared, then came back. I could picture her staring at the screen, deciding whether I was serious.
I was more than fucking serious.
Probably more serious than she needed to know.
Me: How was work?
Ma Belle: Quiet.
Me: Quiet good or quiet boring?
Ma Belle: Good. That strange customer hasn’t been back.
My smile faded. I knew exactly why, and the satisfaction that came with knowing the bastard had listened probably said something ugly about me. I didn’t give a shit. Fiona had been uncomfortable. Now she wasn’t.
Me: Good.
Ma Belle: I’m starting to think he finally got the hint.
Me: Maybe he decided the coffee wasn’t worth it.
Ma Belle: Our coffee is good
A grin tugged at my mouth. Of course that was the part she chose to defend. Some asshole could make her uncomfortable for a week, but apparently insulting the Creamery’s coffee crossed a line.
Me: You’ve told me that.
Ma Belle: Because it’s true
Me: Best in Rosewood?
Ma Belle: Obviously.
I could practically hear the certainty in her voice, and something about knowing these stupid little pieces of her life made fifteen hundred miles feel a little less fucking far.
Me: I trust your judgment.
Ma Belle: That seems reckless
Me: I trust you with more important things than coffee.
Ma Belle: Like what?
I looked around my room.
My life had changed completely since Fiona. I used to spend my time wherever the night took me. At the clubhouse, drinking with the brothers, working late, sometimes waking up the next morning with a woman whose name took entirely too much thought to remember.
Now I spent every minute with a phone in my hand.
Me: My evenings.
Her answer took a second.
Ma Belle: You spend most of those irritating me
Me: And yet you keep answering.
Ma Belle: Someone has to keep your ego under control
Me: That sounds like a permanent position.
I watched the dots appear.
That one hadn’t slipped out. I’d known exactly what I was saying. The question was whether she did.
Ma Belle: Don’t get ahead of yourself
Me: Too late.
Probably the truest thing I’d said all night.
I was miles ahead. Fiona was still deciding whether this thing between us was friendship or something else, and I’d already pictured mornings with her. Years with her. A whole damn life I had no business planning when I hadn’t even kissed her yet.
I kept most of that to myself.
Ma Belle: You’re impossible
Me: You say that like it bothers you.
Ma Belle: I haven’t decided yet
Me: Take your time, Cher. I’m not going anywhere.
That one mattered too.
I let the phone settle against my chest. I’d had weeks reminding myself to wait, as if patience meant doing nothing.
It didn’t.
It meant still being here tomorrow. And the next day. It meant letting Fiona decide how much closer she wanted to come without disappearing the first time she hesitated.
I could do that.
Even if it drove me fucking insane.
The next afternoon, I was in my office reviewing landscape designs when I realized I hadn’t heard from her.
That wasn’t unusual. She was in school, and I knew better than to expect her to spend every free second texting me.
Still, Fiona usually found some point during the day to send me something.
A complaint about a teacher. Something Granny had said.
Some completely random question she expected an immediate answer to.
Today, there had been nothing.
I picked up my phone.
Me: You’re quiet today.
Her response came quickly.
Ma Belle: I had a meeting with the guidance counselor.
Me: Bad?
Ma Belle: Not exactly.
Me: That means yes.
This time I waited longer. Watched those incessant dots flicker as she typed.
Ma Belle: She kept asking about foster care, guardianship, and whether I have a stable home now.
My fingers tightened around the phone.
I knew pieces of her past. Josie had told me enough that first night to understand Fiona’s childhood hadn’t been easy, and Fiona occasionally dropped something into a conversation before moving on so quickly I knew better than to chase it.
There were gaps, though.
A hell of a lot of them.
Me: You do.
Ma Belle: I know. I just hate that every form makes me explain where I came from before anyone cares who I am.
That landed somewhere ugly. There were probably perfectly legitimate reasons for the counselor’s questions. At that moment, I didn’t give a shit about any of them.
Me: Paperwork doesn’t get to decide who you are.
Ma Belle: It decides a lot.
Me: Not the important things.
Ma Belle: You make everything sound simple.
Me: It isn’t simple. You’re just worth fighting through the complicated parts.
Her answer took a moment.
Ma Belle: That was almost sweet
Me: Almost?
Ma Belle: Don’t ruin it
I smiled, but when I looked back at her earlier message, the smile didn’t last.
I got up, grabbed my keys, and headed outside. By the time I reached my truck, I already had Sugar’s number pulled up.
She answered on the third ring.
“I need the name of Fiona’s guidance counselor,” I said.
Silence.
Then, she asked, “Why?”
“Because I’m going to make her understand what it feels like to be interrogated about the worst parts of her life,” I said, gripping the phone tighter.
“I’m going to make her understand that she doesn’t get to treat Fiona like a problem to be solved, like some case file to be processed. I’m going to—”
“Romeo, stop.” Sugar’s voice sliced through mine.
“Listen to yourself. You’re talking about threatening a guidance counselor at a high school.
You’re talking about showing up and making a scene that’ll embarrass Fiona and prove to everyone, including her, that you are exactly what everyone has thought our whole lives—an unhinged, Cajun asshole. ”
I leaned back against the seat and closed my eyes. “She made Fiona explain her past. Made her justify having a stable home. Made her feel like she has to prove she’s worth—”
“I know,” Sugar interrupted, softer now. “She texted me about it during lunch. And I know it makes you want to burn the world down. But, Romeo, you need to step back. You need to breathe. You need to think about what Fiona needs instead of what your rage demands.”
I stared through the windshield.
That was significantly less satisfying than threatening someone.
Unfortunately, Sugar had a point.
“I need you to tell me about Fiona’s past,” I said. “I need to understand what she’s been through so I can—”
“No.”
“Sugar…”
“No,” she repeated. “I don’t gossip, Romeo. You know that. I don’t talk about people’s business, especially not when it’s painful, especially not when it’s not mine to share.”
I rubbed my thumb over the steering wheel. “Then you know why I’m asking. I need to understand so I can protect her, so I can make sure no one ever—”
“So you can what?” Sugar interrupted. “Charge in like some avenging angel and fix problems she’s already learned to handle on her own?
Romeo, listen to me. Fiona has been through enough.
She’s been hurt in ways that would break most people, and she survived it.
She’s built a life for herself, found a family, made a home. And she did all of that without you.”
That one landed squarely in my chest. I didn’t like hearing it, which was probably why I needed to.
“What she needs from you,” Sugar continued, “is patience. She needs you to let her open up when she’s ready, to trust that she’ll tell you what you need to know when the time is right.”
“But—”
“No buts.” Sugar’s tone shifted into the one she used when she’d decided the conversation was no longer a democracy.
“You want her to trust you? You want her to let you in? Then you prove to her that you’re safe.
You prove that you’ll wait, that you’ll listen, that you won’t push her before she’s ready.
Because if you push too hard, if you let her see how dark and possessive you really are before she’s ready to handle it, you’ll lose her.
And I know you, Romeo. Losing her would destroy you. ”
My hand went still on the wheel.
I hated when my family made sense.
“I don’t know how to do this, Sugar,” I admitted. “I don’t know how to be patient when every instinct I have is screaming at me to claim her, protect her, make sure no one ever hurts her again.”
“You do it the same way you’ve been doing it for the past few months,” Sugar said, gentler now.
“You text her. You talk to her. You let her set the pace. You prove to her that you’re worth the risk of letting you in.
And you trust that what you’re building with her is real enough, strong enough, to survive the wait. ”
I dropped my head against the seat. “What if it’s not?” The words escaped before pride could kill them. “What if I wait too long and she finds someone else? Someone closer, someone easier, someone who doesn’t come with all the baggage I bring?”
“Then she was never yours to begin with,” Sugar said simply.
“But I don’t think that’s going to happen.
I see the way she looks at her phone when you text her.
The way she smiles at the screen. She’s falling for you, Rome.
She just doesn’t know it yet. And when she figures it out, when she’s ready to admit it, you’ll be there.
Just like you promised her you would be. ”
Falling for you.
I knew better than to take Sugar’s opinion and turn it into a certainty.
Didn’t mean I wasn’t tempted, though.
“You really think she’s falling for me?” I asked.
There went the last of my dignity.
“I know she is,” Sugar said, and I could hear the smile in her voice. “Just keep doing what you’re doing. Keep being patient. Keep proving to her that you’re worth it. And, Romeo?”
“Yeah?”
“When the time comes, when she’s ready, don’t hold back. Don’t hide who you are or what you feel. She’s stronger than you think. She can handle the intensity of what you feel for her. She just needs time to get there.”
“Okay,” I said. “Okay.”
“Good. Now take a breath and go back to work. And, Romeo? Don’t do anything stupid. Fiona doesn’t need you to fight her battles. She just needs you to be there when she’s ready to let you in.”
“Thanks, Sugar.”
The call ended and I sat there for a while longer, my phone resting against my thigh. My first instinct was still to fix it. Find the counselor. Find out exactly what she’d said. Make damn sure nobody put that kind of doubt in Fiona’s head again.
Sugar had drawn a line through every one of those options.
Fiona’s past was hers.
If she wanted me to know it, she’d tell me.
That should’ve been obvious, but apparently being obsessed with a woman did terrible things to common sense.
I opened our text thread. Her last message was still there.
Don’t ruin it.
A smile pulled at my mouth.
Maybe patience wasn’t just keeping my hands off her until she was ready. Maybe it was this too. Not demanding the pieces she hadn’t offered. Not turning every problem in her life into one I had to solve.
Just being there when she decided she wanted me.
I could learn that.
For Fiona, I’d damn well try.