Sweet Rome (Sweet Home) (15 page)

You, I want only you
, I thought. But out loud, I said, “Then let me show you what I want. Stop fuckin’ fighting this.” I couldn’t deal with any more running, any more hiding, couldn’t tolerate one more day without knowing I had her as mine.

Arms fidgeted and she tried to break loose, but I held on tight, causing her to murmur, “No, Rome, this is just… just…”

I’d well and truly had enough of this back-and-forth shit.

“I want to be with you,” I snapped, losing my patience, arms like a vise around her waist. “Come on, Mol. I need you. Tell me you get me. Tell me you’re as fuckin’ into me as I am you.”

Caramel eyes closed, and any remaining shreds of resistance left her rigid body. Then two words from her mouth changed everything. “Come inside.”

Exhaling a long, pent-up breath, I could only respond in the best way I knew how—with a sincere and a heartfelt, “Fuck. Yeah.”

12

The minute we’d stepped into her room, I was on Mol—hands roaming on her tight body, fisting her nightgown—and I slowly backed her toward her bed. Our mouths meshed furiously, tongues thrashed together as we hit the mattress, and I set to doing what do best.

Molly gripped my shirt hard, moaning and groaning into my mouth, and when her hands met the bare skin of my back, it was the green light I’d been waiting for.

Breaking from her mouth, I slipped my hand up her thigh, working toward her core, when she slammed on the breaks with a tight hold on my wrist.

“I-I can’t. It’s going too fast.”

Tipping my head back, I almost screamed out in frustration. I was so damn turned on I was almost blind with need. Molly released an embarrassed whimper, and seeing her flushed face, I instantly felt like an ass.

“Don’t do that,” I said, holding her face in my hands.

“Do what?”

“Feel bad for stopping. Never feel bad for that. When I have you, it’ll be when I have you writhing in need, begging me to fuck you. Never feel bad for stopping. When you give yourself to me, you’ll be so wet you can’t fucking stand it.”

Her pupils dilated and her lips parted. “When I give myself to you?”

She was so friggin’ cute.

“
When
you give yourself to me.”

Shifting slightly away, she said, affronted, “You’re confident. I might refuse you.”

She wouldn’t. Yeah, I may sound like an arrogant dick, but the way her eyes devoured me, my body, there was
no
fucking way she’d hold out long.

She was still staring at me, waiting for me to speak, so I said, “We’re going to happen. We both know it’s true, and I’m counting the days until I get inside you and make you come… over and over again. Fuckin’ counting the
minutes
…”

Lust took her over and she almost pounced on me there and then, but I pushed her back to the mattress. She was the one girl I didn’t want to just fuck and leave as soon as it was done.

“I shouldn’t have pushed you. You’re not ready.”

“You didn’t. It’s just… It’s just that… I’m… not very experienced… and I…”

I sat up, reality hitting home. “Shit, are you a virgin?”

Shifting before me, she blushed and confessed, “No, not a virgin, but I’m not exactly skilled in all things… seductive. I’ve only ever slept with one person and only one time, this past year.”

And just like that, I really fucking wished she
was
a virgin, jealously over some unknown douchebag taking hold.

Some unworthy fucker’d had
my
Mol.

“When did this happen?” I asked through slightly gritted teeth.

“When I was at Oxford. Oliver and I—”

“Oliver?” I interrupted.

Her eyebrows drew together and she said, “Yeah, Oliver Bartholomew.”

I couldn’t help it, but I laughed, my anger put aside for a minute. The way she said that fucking pompous-ass English name was comical.
Bartholomew?
Fuck, and I thought Romeo Prince was bad enough.

“What?” she questioned, seeming pretty pissed at me.

Clearing my throat and trying my damndest to hide my smile with my hand, I said, “Oliver Bartholomew? Very… British.”

Her eyes narrowed behind those thick lenses and she stressed, “He is British! As am I! Quit making fun!”

With a frustrated groan, Molly turned her back to me, causing me to swallow my friggin’ laughter and pull her back into my chest. “Okay, okay, I’m sorry.”

She shook her head in admonishment, but when she threw a small smile, I knew we were good.

“So Oliver, was he your boyfriend?” I asked, suddenly in that weird state of mind where you don’t want to know the answer but desperately need it at the same time.

“Yeah, I suppose. I tried to have him as a boyfriend anyway.”

“Tried?” I questioned at the strange response.

Her lashes fluttered as her eyes quickly met mine, and she said, “Yeah. I… I don’t really get close to people. I tried with him, but in the end, I just couldn’t do it. We’d been sort of dating for a few months—coffee dates, study partners, that type of thing—and I decided to just take the next step, just get it over with. He wanted it badly. I was indifferent. So I thought why not? Olly was sweet to me and I liked him well enough. The sex—not so much.”

“What? You didn’t like sex?” I almost shouted. How could anyone
not
like sex?

Her face went as red as my damn Tide jersey, and she admitted, “It was awkward, fumbled, and not everything it was hyped up to be.”

“Olly just didn’t do it right.”

Meeting her eyes, I said, “I imagine with you, Shakespeare, it’d be like nothing else. I’ve never wanted anything so much in my damned life—to taste you, feel you… hear you scream my name.” The pulse in her neck set off thumping like a drum and that pull we both felt began drawing us back in.

“Romeo—” She edged away, but I pulled on her arm to keep her close.

“I’ll stop, but I won’t hide the fact that I want it real bad, Shakespeare.
Real
fuckin’ bad.”

I watched as her thighs clenched together and my cock slammed against my fly. Things were too tense, but Molly managed to diffuse the moment by thrusting a pillow over her head, warning, “We need to find something to do, Rome. I really need distracting right now!”

Pulling back the pillow, holding in my laughter, I said, “You’ve stolen my line, Shakespeare. Ain’t I the one that’s meant to say that to you?”

“Probably, but I’m about ready to jump your bones and would prefer not to tonight if it could be helped. I’d like it if I didn’t go from near-virgin to slut after one night in your friggin’ company!”

Unable to stop laughing this time, I creased up, falling on my back and pulled her to drape over my chest. “What should we do, then, near-virgin, just so you don’t give in and jump my bones? Although, it’s mighty tempting for me to just let you do your thing.”

“I have just the thing, if you’re game?”

She put on friggin’
Monty Python
.

We watched the movie. I actually
watched
a movie with a girl
and
made no move to seduce her… much. I still caught a kiss and the occasional feel, but most surprising, I
liked
just chilling with Mol. It kind of felt like I was twelve again, on some first date that I’d never had, but it was good… It made me feel kinda normal.

That was until I fucked up by taking offense at her joke.

I was just tipping the last of the popcorn in my mouth when Molly ripped the bowl from my hands. “You’re meant to be an athlete! Isn’t that an overload of starchy-carby crappiness for you or something? You’ve polished it all off, you greedy bugger!”

Snorting out a laugh, I flexed my bicep, catching Mol’s small, impressed gasp, and said, “I’m a fucking machine, Shakespeare. Popcorn’s no match for me!”

“Sorry, I forgot I was talking to the
Bullet!
” she quipped, but her words felt like a cold bucket of water being dumped on my head.

“Don’t,” I hissed, losing all humor.

“Allaaabbbaaammmmaaa!!! Get to your feet for your hometown quarterback, Romeo… ‘Bullet’… Prince! ‘There’s a bullet in the gun. There’s a fire in your heart. You will move all mountains that stand in your path…’”
Molly was laughing as she sang that damn song the IT guys always played in Bryant-Denny whenever I was on the big screen, but all I felt was annoyed. She wasn’t getting the hint that I was serious.

Taking hold of her wrists, I pulled her forward until her eyes met mine and growled, “Quit it, Shakespeare.
Fuck!
”

Almost choking on her words, she sat back. “I’m only kidding. You don’t have to be so bloody grumpy with me.”

Shit. I hadn’t meant to be, but I hated that bastard name.
Bullet,
it was almost as bad as Romeo. I hated the football hype so damn much; it’d always just made shit at home that much worse.

Taking another look at Molly’s hurt face, I sighed. “I know, sorry, but I fucking hate all that shit. You don’t know how much. I don’t want to be the Bullet to you. You’re the first person to ever not be affected by all the football fame. To you… I just want to be Rome.”

Molly got me. She got I didn’t want to go into why the football fame bothered me so much, and moving us away from that uncomfortable topic, she asked, “So… MVP?”

“Yeah. Crazy considering I couldn’t hit a truck for the first half.”

How did I tell her that seeing her in the stands changed everything, without revealing too much about my feelings? How could I tell her she was the first person to ever pull through for me without having to explain my past and my folks?

I just couldn’t find the words. So instead, I just filled her in on the locker room talk. “The fans and team are pumped, saying it’s because of you. That you’re my good luck charm, all from that one sweet kiss.”

And then she flipped the fuck out, shooting to sitting position, fighting for breath and rubbing at her chest. It looked like she was having a damn heart attack.

“What? What’s wrong? What did I say?” I asked frantically.

Her eyes were as big as the fucking moon and she tried to speak but nothing came out. My heart took off beating too fast, so I held her hand, and watched as she calmed the heck down, color coming back to her pale face. I stared down at our joined hands in confusion, wondering what the fuck had just happened?

“What is it, Mol? Tell me.” I pushed, needing some explanation of why she just nearly collapsed.

Taking a deep breath, she said, “I’m sorry, it’s just something my Grandma used to say to me. It took me back to those days. I panicked. I-I just… I was just surprised when you said it. Of all the ways to say what you did, you quoted her word for word.”

“What did she say to you? What did
I
say?”

Smiling a broken smile, she said softly, “That I had sweet kisses. Grandma would say one sweet kiss from me would make any problem just that little bit easier.”

“I believe she might be right. She must have been a wise woman because that’s exactly what you did for me tonight at the game.”

“She was. She was everything to me.” Tears fell from her eyes as her fingers tightened against mine. “We used to say we were a matching set. When she died, she took half my soul with her. I don’t like to think of my past too much… It kills me to remember all that I’ve lost.”

I stayed silent. There are no words to comfort someone who’d lost those closest. So I just let her get it all out as I pressed her into my side, lying back against the bed, using my touch to keep her calm. Fuck. My touch had kept her calm.

“So you walked out of your own party?” Molly eventually asked as I stared at the ceiling, realizing she actually may be as fucked up as me.

“You weren’t there.”

Molly shuffled her legs to face me and nervously asked, “Do I matter that much to you?”

I wanted to laugh in her face, convinced that if she only knew the severity of my obsession with her, she’d run for the fucking hills.

“Do you really not know?”

She shook her head no, so pushing her back into the mattress, I confessed, “I like the way you are with me. I like me when I’m with you. I feel like I could tell you anything, that I could bear my fuckin’ black soul. You make me feel… well… you know… You get me?” I was such a douche and evidently no good at all the romantic shit.

But a finger stroked down my cheek, and smiling so damn big, Molly said, “I get you, Romeo.”

We stayed that way for a while, just talking. She apologized for our showdown at the lecture, admitting that she was pissed at me after believing I’d slept with Shelly. I told her the truth, that I was done with everyone but her, and she seemed more than happy with that fact.

After a time, music began blaring from the backyard and it was clear that the party was only getting bigger. I didn’t complain, though, because Molly asked me to stay—
only to sleep!
she’d stated—and I couldn’t have felt happier.

Molly moved into bed, nervously biting her thumb and watching every move I made. When I got in bed beside her and that tight ass of hers began grinding into my cock, it took all my might to edge forward and whisper, “We need to try and sleep or things will get out of control. I only have so much restraint.”

“O-okay,” she whispered back, and I wrapped my arm around her waist as she tucked herself farther against me.

It felt so damn right.

“Night, Shakespeare,” I said quietly.

“Night, Romeo,” she replied, and I couldn’t help but laugh in disbelief.

She stiffened at my amusement, so I quickly explained. “I actually like the sound of my name on your lips. Something I never thought would happen. I think it’s the English accent. It sounds all proper, like the way Shakespeare intended. No one calls me Romeo, has ever called me Romeo. I don’t allow it. But weirdly, I like it when you do.”

I heard her exhale and felt her trying to turn and face me. For some reason I couldn’t let her, too overcome with emotion to have her meet my eyes, to see the demons I fought in my gaze. But when she whispered,
“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet; so Romeo would, were he not Romeo call’d.”
I felt like I couldn’t breathe. The memories, the
pain
that name stirred in me was too much.