Page 105 of By the Letter

“Ah well, those functions are always a blur,” Roman replied, which was funny because I remembered that night clearly. I remembered the two of them laughing together and sitting beside each other during the presentations. And what came after. Roman’s mouth on me, his insatiable need to bring me pleasure. For me, that night had been marked something important. For him, it was a blur.

“It’s nice to meet you, Rosalie.” I tucked my hair behind my ear. “I’ll let you guys have your privacy. See you later.”

Then I spun around and raced back to my house as quickly as my legs would carry me. It wasn’t fast enough. Roman caught my elbow before I could even put one foot on my porch.

“Where are you going?” He sounded bemused rather than guilty. But I supposed he had nothing to be guilty about since he hadn’t done anything wrong.

I refused to turn my head to look at him. If I did, I would burst into tears, and that simply wasn’t going to happen. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt something. You can go back to her.”

“Shira, look at me. What are you talking about? Why did you run away?”

“Like I said, I’m giving you privacy with your…with Rosalie. Enjoy your evening.”

Somehow, I slipped free from him and made it to my door, but he was nipping at my heels when I let myself inside. I just wanted to drown in this wave of sadness on the verge of breaking over me, and I wanted to be alone when that happened. Roman seemed to have other plans.

“Shira, look at me,” he demanded, though not angrily. I sensed he was being careful with me. It was so very Roman it made this all the worse.

I lifted my gaze, knowing he would see the sheen blurring my eyes. “Please, just go. We can talk about this later.”

His brow dropped. “What do you think is happening? I’m trying to understand why you would think I need privacy with Rosalie.”

I shook my head, unable to say the bitterly obvious words.

He cocked his head as he frowned at me. “Do you think I’m seeing her? And you’re what—bowing out so I can be alone with her? Is that what’s happening here?”

In order for this to end, I would have to speak. That much was obvious. “I don’t want to get in the way. I’m fine. You can go back home and be with her. We’ll have dinner and catch up another night.”

He stared at me for several thrashing beats of my heart. Then, grunting, he stalked past me into my kitchen. I turned, stunned to find him with his hands braced on the island, his head bowed low.

What was going on? Why wouldn’t he just go so I could begin to piece together how to survive and endure this?

Without warning, he straightened, pinning his gaze on me. “I’m not a cheater, Shira. The fact that you would accept that from me makes me unbearably sad.”

“I don’t think you’re a cheater,” I croaked. “We aren’t together—”

“We’re not together?” he barked harshly, making me jump. “How the fuck can you say that?”

“We aren’t.”

This, I knew for a fact. I might not have a ton of experience, but even I knew in order to be a couple with someone, a discussion had to come first. That had never happened. Roman and I had sex, but we weren’t a couple.

He blinked at me as if he found me to be a puzzle he couldn’t solve. “So us spending almost every night together means nothing. We eat breakfast and dinner together, spend our weekends together, fuck every chance we get—bare, might I add. We tell each other we miss each other when we’re apart and have shared deeply personal parts of ourselves. All of that means nothing?”

“It means a lot,” I replied. “But I understand you have a life outside of me and Beanie—”

“Youaremy life.”

He wasn’t yelling, but his anger was visceral, filling the room with thick, spiky air. I tried not to be afraid of him. Deep down, I knew he would never lay a violent hand on me. But my instincts told me to run, hide, and be quiet. That was my focus—not the words coming out of his mouth.

He started for me, slow, cautious. “Rosalie is Nate’s ex-girlfriend and a family friend. Even if you didn’t exist, I would never go there with her. But you do exist, and you have become everything to me. I’m in love with you, Shira. Don’t you feel even a fraction of the same for me?”

I clutched my belly, panic activating my limbs to flee. It was all I could do to stay rooted to the spot. “If not for Beanie, you never would have looked twice at me. You didn’t before you knew about him, and that’s fine. I knew what this was from the start.”

He stopped where he was, several feet from me. I could only bear to look at him in my periphery, but I didn’t miss the way his entire body jerked like I’d struck him.

“What are youdoing?” he hissed.

“Isn’t it true? You’re standing here because of the baby, not me.”

---