Page 47 of Falling for You
“I’ll talk to G, Rome. And Vi will talk to Liam. They’ll get over it.”
“I appreciate it but you know they’re all pissed at me.” I shrug and look at Emma who looks more worried than me.
“Not Cooper.” She reaches out to touch my cheek again. “He’s not mad. I mean he’s mad he missed the gossip being gone, but he’s not mad at you.”
“Neither is Nathan. Or me.” Mom hands Emma a warm, wet towel and a towel packed with ice.
I wince as Emma cleans my cheek. It’s already swelling.
“Come on girls, let’s go back out, it’s almost time for Willow to go back on. Gunnar and Nathan are on their way back.”
They all give Emma a side hug, and me a sad smile on their way out.
“I’m so sorry, Rome. I wasn’t trying to piss you off. I just wanted to dance and I was buzzed. I know it’s not an excuse but I’m sorry that I forced your hand.”
I pull her into my lap. “You told them you love me.” The smile that spreads already pulls at my cheek.
“I did. So did you.” She rests her head on my shoulder. “Did you mean it?”
“No.” Her head snaps up to look at me again and she tries to get off my lap, but I hold her to me. “A simple statement could never be true, Sunshine. My love for you could never be summed up in three little words. You are my everything, my sunshine. I need your light in my world, and I want to be the light in yours. I don’t just love you, you are every good part of me. You’re everything I want, everything I need, everything I crave, you’re mine.”
“You’re everything to me too, Stud. You and Livvy Girl fill a gaping hole in my heart that only you could fill. You make everything better.”
Our lips crash once more, and I suck in a breath as she grips my face.
My grip on her hips tightens, squeezing her through the pain. When she pulls away she looks at her hand with my blood on it. Her eyes go wide at the sight.
“I’m fine.” I reach out to take the ice off my desk. “Come on. You go back out and enjoy the night with Willow and Violet. Ihave to finish up here, then we’ll go home. Together. How does that sound?”
She kisses my clean cheek gently and slides off. “Come on. I can’t wait to go home with you.”
I take her hand and follow her back out to the crowd.
Finishing this shift was miserable. My head is throbbing and the Tylenol isn’t touching it yet. Clark quickly figured out what happened, and he and Jasmine offered to finish up closing duties once everyone is out.
I trust Jasmine as a manager, but not on a night I have Willow Harper singing. She packs my brewery to the point I have to stream her music outside on the patio. I won’t complain about the sales, but I won’t leave my staff to deal with this crowd on their own.
Willow finished about ten minutes ago, but the crowd is still lingering. I flash the lights a few times, signaling last call, and in ten more minutes I’ll turn them on for good.
Willow sits in Gunnar’s lap at their table, people coming up to meet her, and she’s too nice to turn any of them away. She recently went through a little scandal with her manager in Nashville and I know that her fans are really what carried her through to keep going.
Walking over to the group, I stop and stand next to Emma who’s on the edge of the booth. I lean down and place a kiss on the top of her head. It feels so freeing to be able to do this.
“Hey, how’s the cheek?” Gunnar nods to the very obvious black eye and gash on my cheekbone.
“I’ve had worse.”
“No shit. Remember when we tried to play bloody knuckles, and ended up just punching the shit out of each other? Mom was pissed.” He laughs at the memory.
“Only because I had to clean the blood out of all those clothes!”
We all laugh, because it was a huge mess and she made us clean rooms until she could get the blood out of every piece.
The laughter dies down and Gunnar looks at me, “We good?”
“I don’t know, G. Are we?”
“You going to do the right thing by her?”
