Jay Crownover - Rome

I was used to being around men and women who marked their body to define their individuality, to claim their skin as their own. Seeing those scars, those marks that he most definitely had never asked for, I had to wonder how he felt about being permanently marked up against his will. His skin also reflected his life, the choice he made to go off and become a warrior, a man who fought for the freedom of others, and now he would carry those reminders for the rest of his life. It was body modification on an entirely different level than tattooing, with a different purpose.

I gave my head a quick shake and told myself to stop being a creeper. He clearly needed the sleep since he didn’t so much as twitch an eyelash as I got out an oversized T-shirt and a pair of shorts to sleep in. I wasn’t exactly stealthy as I banged around in the bathroom and got ready for bed. It was early for a Saturday night but no one was out and Ayden didn’t like to party while Jet was gone, so it was just going to be me and cable until I zonked out. I was back in my room, trying to unplug my phone charger from the nightstand next to Rome’s head. I wasn’t worried about bothering him since he seemed like he was out like a light—that is, until I suddenly had a massive hand curled around my bicep.

“Hey!” The startled word didn’t get any force behind it as I was yanked down and my back met the mattress with a thud. I let out a startled shriek as the arm he had dangling over the edge of the bed curled around me and pulled me half under him as he rolled over. He weighed a freaking ton and no amount of pushing at his broad shoulders seemed to have an effect on him. His dark head buried itself in the curve of my neck, his ridiculously long eyelashes were still pressed closed and brushed against my skin. His breath was coming in a steady stream as his chest rose and fell with no sign of alertness or wakefulness, even as I wiggled and squirmed to get free of his iron hold.

“Rome?” I tapped him on the side of the head lightly and felt him frown against my neck. “Hey, big guy, I need to get up.”

I tried to shake him once more and he muttered something under his breath and settled more fully on top of me. One of his denim-clad legs slid between mine and the thick arm he had wrapped around me locked even more in place and that wide palm settled fully across the curve of my backside. He turned his head and rubbed his cheek against the side of my temple and sighed. It made me stop struggling for a second and I looked up so I could peer questioningly at him because the sound was just so defeated. It hurt me to hear it.

He felt like his motor was running at a thousand degrees and he had to weigh over double what I did, but he was holding on to me like I was a lifeline. Like I was a living breathing teddy bear, and whatever it was that was keeping him up at night, holding me would make it stay away. I huffed out a breath and tried to decide what the best course of action was. In hindsight I should have just given the bartender Rule’s number and let him be caught up in this mess, but as usual I had to meddle. No good deed went unpunished.

There was no way I was getting free unless I kneed him in the junk or punched him in the face to wake him up, and that just seemed a little too extreme. I felt bad for the guy. He was obviously struggling, and clearly a bad day didn’t begin to cover what he was trying to drink away. I figured it wouldn’t kill me to just lie still until he rolled over or loosened his hold. Plus it had the added benefit of letting me enjoy all that hardness that battle-ready body pressed against mine. I doubted that I would ever have an opportunity like it again. The landscape of my sexual experience was pretty barren over the last few years. There had been a guy here or there, but not one that I had wanted to hang out with for more than a minute and none could ever compare to the sheer physical perfection of the guy I was trapped under right now.

I sighed in resignation and tried to wiggle a little in order to get some more breathing room. Rome just tightened his hold even more and settled more fully into me. I relented and wrapped one arm around his shoulders; they were so wide, so broad, I could barely reach the other side. I put the other hand on his ribs, right above that healing wound. I kept my eyes on the ceiling and not the clock, figuring he would get uncomfortable, realize he wasn’t alone anymore, and roll over at any second. Only at some point I heard the front door open and Ayden’s heels on the floor in the hallway, which meant it was well past two in the morning and my human blanket hadn’t moved a muscle. I had been pinned to the bed for over two hours, and it didn’t look like I was getting free before dawn.

Finally I was too tired to just stare at the side of his sleeping face or wonder at all the little nicks and tiny marks that dotted his skin. This close to him the scar above his eyebrow was really wicked-looking. It hooked from the arch up into his hairline and spidered off to web across his temple. It looked like he was a very lucky man to still have a functioning eyeball on that side of his handsome face. There was history there, a life lived hard and dangerously mapped out across his skin for the entire world to see and judge. It made Rome an even more difficult man for me to try and figure out, and frankly I was exhausted by all of it. My last thought before I gave up the fight of trying to wait him out was that not once in all the years Jimmy and I had shared a bed had he ever held me this close, like he never wanted me to go.

I wasn’t sure what had me stirring awake—if it was the sun coming in the blinds, if it was the feeling of being covered by an electric blanket in the middle of summer, or if it was the impossible-to-ignore fact that I wasn’t in my frilly pink bed alone. I squinted against the morning light coming in the room, but all I could see for days and days was blue. A blue that no words could describe, a blue that was so hot and bright I felt like it could burn me alive from the inside out. I opened my mouth to ask Rome if he was feeling all right, to tell him to get the hell off of me, but nothing came out. We just stared at each other and the lack of clothing between us suddenly became a noticeable thing. I could feel his heart thundering against my own where our chests were pressed together, could feel his sides rise and fall as he sucked in a breath and let it out slowly, could feel the hardness of an erection that needed its own zip code press against the softness between my legs, not protected at all by my tiny sleep shorts. This was a compromising situation to be in any way you looked at it, and considering we were practically strangers, my normally nimble tongue was having a hard time finding its defenses.

His hand that was holding on to my butt gave the cheek a squeeze and I thought he was going to lever himself up and off of me, but he didn’t. He used the other hand to hold his considerable bulk up off of me for the first time in hours and his free hand lifted and I went frozen still as he used it to oh so gently trace the curve of my bottom lip where my mouth was still hanging open like a dimwit. Hands that big, that rough, shouldn’t be capable of being so reverent, so delicate. It made me gasp.

I should say something. He should say something. Neither of us did, though, and when those pretty, sad eyes moved closer to mine, when that mouth surrounded by a sexy shadow of scruff dropped to cover mine, all I could do was lie there and take it like it was inevitable. I had been kissed plenty in my lifetime—by good boys and bad boys, by boys I liked and boys I didn’t, by boys I spent just a minute with and boys I had spent years with, but no one had ever kissed me like this. Something happened when that firm mouth settled over mine. My brain short-circuited, my common sense and basic rationality took a hike, and all I was left with was a bundle of raging hormones and a desire so sharp and pointed it almost hurt when it started to pulse under my skin.