Page 28 of Kiss From A Rose

"Yeah, well, she made vows, and she's gonna keep them." Like hell, I was going to sign divorce papers. She was out of her fucking mind if she thought I would.

"You made vows, too; you didn't keep them."

"I told you I'm not havin' an affair," I snapped.

"You promised to love and cherish, Gray." Leah rose then. "You didn't. Sign the papers and send them back to me. And let me know how you want to handle the car. I told her just to keep it, but she keeps bringing up your prenup."

I shook my head. "Thatfuckingprenup."

"You could've stopped your mother from making her sign something so insulting," Leah added.

"Rose signed it. If she had a problem, she should've said so," I remarked callously, something I'd been saying and thinking for years. It was, unfortunately,habit.

Leah banged her fist on my desk and glared at me. "She was eighteen, pregnant, afraid, and in love with your rich sorry ass. She signed whatever she was asked to sign because she didn't give a rat's ass about your money—something you never understood. These papers are Rose telling you that she still doesn't care about your money. Sure, you housed and clothed her for twenty years; but you got a free maid, nanny, cook, housekeeper, and whore—so I think you're even."

"Don't call my wife a whore."

"That wasn't me, Gray; that's howRosefeels. These areherwords."

I felt something cold and unpleasant slither inside me. "She's mywife. I never made her feel like a—"

"Everyone else did. Your mother, your brother, fucking Bonnie, and even your kids. You all treat her like she's somethin' to either pity or ignore. She's not. Sign the papers, or I swear to God, I'll convince her to go after everythin' you got."

She walked out of my office, and I felt like an even bigger asshole than I had all those years ago when Rose was pregnant.

I went to her place that night after I saw her at the diner, after she saw Violet kiss me.

She opened the door of her trailer after the first knock. She was in a ratty T-shirt and shorts. Her eyes were swollen. She'd been crying. She let me in and stood at the far end of that tiny dingy room I'd spent time with her in, her arms crossed.

I pulled out ten hundred dollar bills from my wallet and put them on the sofa bed we used to make love on. "I just…wanted to leave this here…so you can…you know."

She looked at me with sad eyes. "I can what?"

"Get it taken care of." I raised my chin toward her stomach and felt bile rise through me at the thought of her aborting our baby.

God, she was so sad, and I wanted to hold her, love her, and tell her it was going to be okay. But it wasn't. My family would never accept her. Mama would be so angry.

She put a hand on her stomach defensively. "I don't need your money," she whispered, looking at her bare feet as they curled into the cheap linoleum floor of the trailer that I knew she kept meticulously clean. "I…I'm fine. I'm going to move in with my friend Malou. She just moved to Savannah."

"Look, Rose, for what it's worth, I really like you." Even then, I knew I was lying. I didn't like her; I was in love with her. But I was too much of a coward to say it, go against my family, and take what I wanted. I'd never have this kind of happiness with anyone else; a part of me knew that. She was it. When I was with her, the world seemed better. No one had done that for me.

"Thanks for coming. Ah…just take the money. I'm leaving next week, so" —she looked up at me, and my heart ached, there were tears in her eyes— "can you not come to the diner while I'm there?Please. After next Saturday, you can come back."

Fucking hell!

No. I couldn't let her be in pain. I took the few steps to reach her and pulled her into a hug. She was keeping the baby; I knew she would. She would not be able to hurt anyone.

"We'll get married, Rose." I kissed her mouth softly.

Tears began to stream down her face. "No. I know you don't want me…and…."

"I love you, Rose," I confessed, "I'm so sorry for being an asshole, for being a coward. I love you, and we're going to be a family."

CHAPTER 11

Rose

"Miss Rose, that's just about the best meal I've ever eaten," Kyle Adams, one of the B&B guests, told me when I served after-dinner coffee with little homemade mint truffles.

---