Page 14 of Owning Emma

Chapter 8

EMMA

I layin bed most of the night, replaying the image of Roman standing in the kitchen without a shirt. His skin a soft layer over the hard granite of his muscles, decorated with scrolls and lines of ink. It was beautiful; he was beautiful.

And I hated that I thought about him. He wasn’t the type you thought of casually. No, he was the type you obsessed over, dreamed about, but would never actually touch. He was dangerous, and adrenaline and everything I grew up knowing was all wrong for me. But that didn’t stop the flutter that traveled through me the moment he walked up to me at the rec hall.

I thought maybe if I pushed at him, brought out some of the bad side he was so famous for, that maybe . . . maybe it would be easier to not think of him. Seeing him in action would surely force him from my mind. Only, he didn’t take the bait. He wasn’t mean; he didn’t have a flaring temper, and if I didn’t know any better, I would think he might have actually cared.

The sheets snagged on my ankle as I turned one more time, begging myself to find sleep but knowing that at five a.m., finding sleep would be futile. I kicked the sheets off more dramatically than was necessary, angry that I was awake on my day off instead of enjoying some much-needed slumber. Finally, giving up, I peeled off the rest of the sheets and lay on the mattress for a second, willing myself to get up.

As a kid, whenever I couldn’t sleep, my mother and I would get up and make breakfast. She’s been gone for a while now, passed away and left my dad and I when I was ten, but it’s still nostalgic, it still brought me peace. As much as I hated to cook on a day when I wasn’t paid to do so, it was comforting and right now, when I was in this situation, and admittingly not completely hating it, I needed the comfort. There was something sort of peaceful about beating eggs, or stirring batter, something that calmed the internal storm and settled the pending waves, and I craved the peace.

I pulled on a pair of cotton shorts and gave my messy hair a quick braid to the side before heading down to the kitchen. The view from outside the window was dark, the sun not quite risen, an indication that fall had finally set in and soon the weather and leaves would follow in the changes. After digging through the fridge and skimming the cabinets, I decided waffles, potato O'Brien, and eggs would do. I’d seen the way these boys could eat, and they had absolutely no concern for carbs.

I was just pulling down the bowls from the cabinet, when I heard bare footsteps against the tile that ran throughout the hallway. I turned, not knowing who to expect, waiting to see who walked through the door.

Roman.

As if plaguing my mind all night wasn’t enough, he had to walk through the doorway, sleepy-eyed, barely functioning, and still looking flawless. His feet carried him directly to the coffee pot, where he began prepping the machine. Taking the carafe, he turned toward the sink, then stopped mid-step.

“How long have you been there?” He looked slightly confused to have missed me, but I had tried to keep myself hidden. I took my time enjoying the sleepy lines around his eyes, his crumpled jeans he didn’t even bother to button, and his white-ribbed tank that was stretched far too tight over his chest. I wanted to get closer. I wanted to read the words on his arm and test if his muscles were nearly as solid as they looked from a distance.

But I didn’t touch him. Instead, I shifted nervously from foot to foot, nearly crumbling under the intense stare of his brown eyes. “I couldn’t sleep, so I was going to make breakfast.”

He looked down at the watch on his wrist. “It’s not even six o’clock, who gets up to cook on a day off this early.”

“You’re up early, too,” I stated, pointing out that he was equally guilty.

His hand came up and scratched his scalp. “Yeah, well, I don’t get days off, or sick days. It’s the downside to being a boss, running a network, owning an empire; there is never a break.”

“Does it have to mean you start your day so early, though?” He just shrugged, looking around me at the piles of food waiting to be prepped on the countertop.

“Do you drink coffee?” he asked, as he finally resumed his task of setting up the machine and switching it on.

“I can barely function without it,” I admitted. Still not familiar with his kitchen set up, which differed vastly from the kitchen in the rec hall that I usually helped Dot cook in, I began digging around the drawers, searching for the measuring cups.

I felt the warmth of his body next to mine before I even registered that he moved. In a quick motion, he pulled open the drawer, taking the measuring cups and dangling the loop from his fingers. “Need help finding anything else?”

Looking around at the array of items I’d already collected, I took a quick inventory. “Maybe vanilla?”

He leaned into me, and I should have pulled away, I wanted to pull away, but I didn’t. I froze, staring up at him, his eyes locked on mine, and his upper body tilted toward me. I should’ve stopped him, halted him in his tracks and explained to him I wasn’t that type of girl, but I didn’t because even though that girl wasn’t me, sometimes I wanted it to be. Sometimes, I wanted to shed the exterior of always being responsible and in control, and let my fate be in the hands of someone else.

His body didn’t stop as it neared mine, and my hands finally operated enough to come up and find his chest, my fingers half-heartedly pressing against his bulk in an attempt to stop his pursuit. I felt a rumble under my fingertips as a small laugh escaped his lips. His hand came up, and I thought for sure he was going to touch me, but it passed me and continued to the cabinet above. His palm flattened against the wood.

“Spices and such are right up here,” he whispered into my ear, then used his knuckle to knock on the wood, before opening the cabinet, grabbing the vanilla, and stepping out of my space. Taking my wrist in his palm, he brought my hand up, placing the vanilla into it, before stepping over a few feet to the sink to wash his hands.

I felt my face flame, knowing he knew my thoughts, praying he couldn’t tell that my thoughts might align with the reason I was up so early. I needed some sleep. Sleep that wasn’t littered with any of these men.

After washing his hands, he pulled out a knife and cutting board and began moving all the potatoes, peppers, and onion onto a spot on the middle island. “What are you doing?”

“Chopping,” he replied as the sound of him cutting the potato in half echoed through the kitchen.

“Why?” Having him in the kitchen was making me way more flustered than I should be, and this was supposed to be my relaxation time.

“I have a while before I have to be at work, and I’m hungry. If I help, it will be done a lot faster.” He sliced the knife through the potato again, an accurate representation of my anxiety eating at me.

“But . . .” I tried searching for any excuse to reject his help, grasping for something that wouldn’t seem like a lie.

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