Jay Crownover - Rome

He looked at me and I felt my heart turn over in my chest. The pleading in his gaze, the clear, naked longing for me to understand just a little part of what he was dealing with, really touched me. All I really wanted from a partner was honesty, and it didn’t get more honest than this.

“I don’t ever want anyone to see me like that, Cora. It rips me apart to live that shit over and over again, and nothing, not even really great things, like you and me, makes it stop. It’s embarrassing to be that exposed to someone else. I’m so sorry I didn’t handle it the right way.”

“Rome.” I wasn’t sure what I wanted to say, but I didn’t get the chance to anyway because he grabbed me by my upper arms and pulled me up on my toes so that we were eye to eye.

“Please, Cora.” His voice was husky and so sad. “You are so much better for me than a bottle of vodka every night. I can’t be perfect for you, but I can be someone you rely on, someone you want to keep around even though it isn’t always going to be easy.”

I put my hands on his broad shoulders and barked out a laugh. I laughed so hard I had to rest my forehead against his throat to catch my breath. I could feel his confusion in the way he tensed up and set me back down. I pulled away from him and crossed my arms over my chest. He would never know how much those simple words meant to me.

“I’m pregnant.”

His eyes widened to the size of dinner plates and his mouth sagged open in a way that would have been comical had the situation not been so serious.

“I took an over-the-counter test last night, and it was as positive as positive could get.”

“You … I … we …” He trailed off and looked like he might pass out. “For real?”

“For real.”

“Are you okay?” His gaze swept over me from head to toe like he was looking for some sign of change in me already.

“I’m fine. Look, I know this is a lot to take in. I don’t expect anything from you, but if you’re looking for a really good reason to pull it together, I think you have one now.”

“What do you mean you don’t expect anything from me?”

I sighed. “Look, Rome, we hung out for less than a month. We were never really friends, then we became lovers and now soon-to-be parents. That’s a lot for anybody to try and handle. I care about you and I really do think you’re an amazing guy, but I’m not going to risk this baby or my heart on someone that isn’t all in with me. I’ve been there and done that and seriously I wish I could give the T-shirt back.”

“Give me a chance, Half-Pint, I’m all in.”

I could see it there, dazzling and bright in the blue that was as sharp as a razor blade. He believed it, wanted it, I just didn’t know that I could trust him to follow through on it and not leave me hanging again.

“The drinking …”

He shook his head. “Done. I’m all over it. It doesn’t do me any good and Brite won’t let me hang at the bar if I’m loaded. He’s been in and out over the last few weeks and finally told me that if I didn’t get my act together, I was done. I was already feeling like I let you down. I couldn’t stand the idea of disappointing him on top of that, which is why I finally called his friend for help.” He made a face that resembled a grimace of pain. “There’s a good chance I’m gonna be struggling with the aftereffects of PTSD for a long time. I’m not going to wake up tomorrow and be all shiny, polished, and perfect, but I can get better. The difference is I didn’t really have the motivation to head in that direction until I lost it and couldn’t face you. I don’t want you to be part of my nightmares, Cora, but I’m selfish enough to ask you to want to be.”

He was saying all the right things, he was putting more of himself on the line for me than Jimmy ever had, and I was selfish enough to want to believe that what he was saying was real. I didn’t really want to let him go just yet, but I had to make sure he understood the rules moving forward.

“Nightmares are just bad dreams. If you want me to be part of your dreams, there isn’t a better place I could think to be. Rome, I’m more than willing to stick this out with you, but this baby is bigger than both of us. You can’t just walk away when you’re freaked out or because something from the past is standing between us. You have to let me in, you have to stick around so we can work through it together. I’m not flawless either, Captain No-Fun, but I kinda think together we might get close to something spectacular, if we want it bad enough.”

I squealed in surprise when he picked me up and crushed me to his chest. I didn’t think I was ever going to get tired of the solid way he felt pressed against me. He pressed a hard kiss to my mouth, and I put my hands on either side of his face to hold him there. I missed him, missed this, but I didn’t have any delusion that this was the last of the bumps in the road we were probably going to have to face if we managed to stay together. It took a special kind of man to stick around when the reality of fatherhood was looking him right in the eye. We didn’t know each other well enough to know if this was going to be it for us, but he affected me enough, moved me in ways I was continually surprised by, that I liked to think with some work he very well could be my new dream, that he could indeed fit what my new idea of perfect might be.

When he set me back on my feet, I laughed a little and moved my hands from his face to his shoulders.

“We might need to slow things down between us a little bit. We’re going to be moving full steam ahead, and while there is no question that we are sexually compatible, we should probably figure out if we can stand to be around each other for the long haul.”

He dropped his head so that his forehead was resting against mine. “All right.”

I tapped him on the chin with my index finger. “And you need to make nice with Rule. Family is important and he’s going to be this kid’s uncle. Plus Shaw is going to drive everyone nuts trying to fix things if you can’t patch it all up on your own. Same goes for your folks.” I would never squander family away, and he was just going to have to reconcile that fact if this was going to work.

He pulled back and bit the tip of my finger, which made me scowl up at him.

“Repentance is my new middle name. Rule and I are both afflicted with the Archer stubborn streak and I can’t really be mad at him for wanting to protect you. He’s right: I did do the same thing to him over Shaw. The only difference is I don’t have the reputation of the Mile-High Lothario to warrant it. I’ll work it all out, I swear this matters to me. More than anything I can remember since I started looking out for the twins.”

I finally wrapped my arms around his lean waist and gave him the hug I had been dying to give him since I saw him standing in the shop.

Of course, as soon as I walked back in the shop, the boys jumped all over me. Rule was still all fired up and pissed off, Nash was acting like a concerned big brother even though he was younger than me, and Rowdy was just watching it all with a maniacal grin that made me want to hurt his pretty face. There were only about ten minutes until we opened, so I dragged all three of them into the back room and faced off with them. Telling them to back off and mind their own wasn’t going to cut it, so I laid it out for them in terms even stubborn, hardheaded, but well-meaning boys could understand.

I told them I was having Rome’s baby and I didn’t want to hear a single word about it because it was still so early and things were so tenuous. I thought Rule was going to go through the roof until I smacked him with the back of my hand in the gut and told him to calm down. Nash looked like he was in shock, and Rowdy was the only one to press a tiny kiss to the top of my head and tell me congratulations. I explained that what I was or was not doing with Rome had nothing to do with them and that everybody better play nice because the big picture was that I was having a kid and everybody I loved and cared about was going to be a part of his or her life, whether they liked it or not. Rule and I had a pretty lengthy stare-down, but really it was cute, and at his center he was a big ol’ pile of mush, so eventually he caved and scooped me up in a rib-breaking hug.