Page 31 of Wicked Waters

I twisted in his grip, and he let me. Our eyes met, his still so dark, stormy seas raging in them. “Can you blame me?” I hissed. “Can you tell me you?—”

His mouth came down on mine in a hard, furious kiss, stealing the breath from my lungs.

He held me in place as he kissed me over and over again. I melted into him, moaning into his mouth, and he responded by kissing me harder, collapsing back onto the sofa and pulling me down with him so I was straddling his thighs, never moving his mouth from mine.

I lost myself in him. I couldn’t get enough.

His cock was hard beneath me, and I ground down on him, needing the friction, but he stopped my movements, tearing his mouth from mine.

“Wait,” he panted. “Need.” He kissed me again. “To talk.”

I nodded, too breathless to speak, and the corner of his lips curved up. He stroked a hand through the length of my hair over and over while we regained our breaths, and then he drew back a little so we could look into each other’s eyes. Being this close to him and holding eye contact when we were about to have a difficult conversation was intimidating, to say the least, but it was now clear to me that we needed to get it all out there. Or I did, at least. I owed him his answers, and then maybe he’d understand why I’d acted the way I had.

Exhaling an unsteady breath, I held his gaze. “Okay. Where do I start?”

“How about starting from the point where you left me? When you ghosted me?”

I could hear the hurt in his voice, even though he was trying to hide it.

“My parents…when we were…friends before, remember how I said they could be a little controlling, and they had connections with some of the staff? They found out about my rebellious phase, as they called it, and the fact I’d been hanging around with you. I guess they were concerned, in their own way, but they completely overreacted. My dad had been offered a secondment to his Swiss office and just…told me I was coming, too, and that was that. They said it would be a clean break, and they cut me off from everything. I wasn’t even allowed to stay in touch with people they’d previously approved of, like Penelope. After…when I was away, I gradually got my privileges back, but I thought there was no point in trying to contact anyone after so much time had passed. I thought…I thought you’d have forgotten about me, in all honesty.” I bit down on my lip, and Roman sighed, shaking his head.

“Baby, I could never forget about you. Believe me, I tried. Didn’t work.”

I attempted a smile, but against my will, my lips turned down. “I wish… There are so many things I wish had happened differently. But I can’t change them. Anyway, I became more and more unhappy, isolated from everything and everyone I knew, far away from home. My parents eventually realised that it was best for me to come back here, so I came back.”

Roman cupped my cheek, catching a tear with the pad of his thumb. I hadn’t even realised I was crying until then. Despite his gentle movement, his eyes were dark, and I could see the muscle ticking in his jaw.

“No one gets to make you cry,” he ground out. “Not even me. Not anymore.”

I wrapped my arms around him, burying my face in the crook of his neck, and he held me, a strong, solid presence I could cling to. When I raised my head, I met his gaze again, swallowing hard before I continued.

“There were conditions they placed on me. Conditions I had to meet in order to be allowed back. You were one of those conditions. I wasn’t allowed to interact with you. They…they knew you were on your last warning, Ro. They threatened to make sure you were expelled if I—if I—” I broke off with a deep, shuddering breath, and he swore loudly.

I could see the moment he understood what I was telling him. His entire expression softened, the visible concern and care in his eyes chasing all the darkness away. “Fucking hell. I get it now. They held that over you so you’d toe the line. Because I’m not good enough for you.”

My lip trembled. “You are. You’re so good. Too good for me. It killed me to say those things to you. I didn’t know how else to protect you. How to make you stay away.”

“Baby. Come here.” He kissed me so softly, softer than he ever had before. “I understand why you did it. I don’t fucking like your methods, and I wish you’d told me why, but I get it. Now, I need you to listen to me and listen carefully. I’m not gonna make your life more difficult with your parents, but I want you to understand that despite whatever power they have or think they have, I have more. Yeah, there is a genuine threat of me getting expelled, but if it came down to it, I’d have Knox’s and Tristan’s families on my side, as well as my uncle. And believe me, they’re way more influential than your parents could ever hope to be. It’s not just about the money. We all have plenty of that here. It’s about the power. Who you know. There is zero fucking chance of them getting rid of me, not if it was for something I didn’t do.” He spoke confidently, but I could hear the underlying hesitance in his tone that he was trying to hide, and I knew it wasn’t as simple as he was making it out to be.

I shook my head. “I still don’t want to risk it. They could…I don’t know, frame you or something. I’d like to think they wouldn’t go that far, that they actually have some morals, but after they did what they did to me, pulling me out of school…” My fingers stroked through the short hairs on the back of his head. “I just don’t know how far they’d go, and I’d never forgive myself if something happened to you because of me.”

He stared at me, his eyes wide, before huffing out a disbelieving laugh. “You really mean that, don’t you?”

“Yes. I know I hurt you, Roman. But I couldn’t live with myself if your life was ruined because of something I did, when I know that by staying away from you, I can keep you safe.”

“Fuck, Quinn.” Pulling me into him, he kissed the side of my head before drawing back a little to meet my gaze. “I want you to answer one question before we move on to the topic of the boat. Do you want to be with me? Imagine none of this other shit existed. Would you want us to be together?”

“Yes.” I didn’t have to think about my answer, not even for a second. “That’s all I wanted back then, and it’s all I want now.”

“Okay,” he said, a wide grin spreading across his face, happier than I’d ever seen him before. “Okay. Then we’ll make it happen.”

18

ROMAN

Quinn lifted her head from my shoulder, staring at me. “How?”

“We can worry about that later. I’ll talk to the boys, if you don’t mind them knowing.”

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