Sweet Rome (Sweet Home) (29 page)

“No. She’s… erm…” Al couldn’t say a damn thing either, and my stomach flipped.

“Was it Shelly? Has that bitch—”

“It’s not Shelly either,” Ally cut in.

“Then what’s wrong…? Al, for fuck’s sake, move outta my way!” I physically lifted my cousin out of my way and beelined for Mol, her friends moving so I could pick her up off the floor.

Once in my arms, I took in her too-white face, her damp skin, and the fact that her chest was convulsing from too many tears. Moving to her unmade bed, I placed her down, lying beside her, ignoring our friends, and pressed a kiss on each of her cheeks, her huge, nervous eyes scaring the absolute shit out of me.

“Baby, what’s wrong?” I tried to ask gently, but my impatience was sneaking through.

Her eyes squeezed shut and she shook her head, still too emotional to speak.

I stared at our friends fidgeting nervously at the end of the bed and yelled, “Will somebody tell me what the fuck is going on?!”

Casting each other questioning glances, Cass pushed Ally forward and she said, “Rome, Molly needs to tell you. We’ll go, give you some time to yourselves.”

And that just caused me to worry more. What the hell could be so bad that my girl would be this hysterical and my cousin could barely make eye contact?

Within minutes, the girls had cleared, leaving me alone with Molly, my heart booming in anticipation of what she would say. Grasping her around the waist, I rolled us so she was above me. Her flushed face showed her surprise, but searching my eyes, she simply dipped forward, whispering, “I love you, Romeo.”

If that was meant to soothe me, it failed, but I told her, “I love you, too.” I couldn’t get enough of those words, and then I just waited for her to speak.

But she didn’t, causing me to groan loudly and say, “Mol—”

“I’ve been feeling off for a few days,” she interrupted and my heart immediately sank.

She was ill? Fuck, was it serious, like really serious? I felt nauseous.

“Why the hell didn’t you tell me?” I snapped out, now scared out of mind and pissed that she would keep something as important as her health a secret from me.

“I found out today why,” she said almost inaudibly.

“And… what’s wrong?”

“I’m… I’m…”

Fuck me, I was going to explode!

Gripping her harder around the waist, I shouted, “Christ! You’re what, Mol?”

“I’m pregnant,” she blurted out.

Golden eyes lowered, and my pulse took off like a hummingbird.

Pregnant. Shit, a baby. I was going to be a daddy?

“You’re pregnant?” I stared at her in disbelief, feeling like every drop of blood had just drained from my body.

My girl seemed to have turned into a friggin’ mute, so I flipped our positions, putting me on top. “You’re pregnant?” I asked again and watched Mol’s eyes well up.

“Yes, I’m pregnant, Romeo. I’m pregnant with your baby.” Each word was like a punch.

Sitting up, I stared at the white wall before closing my eyes, lost in my thoughts. How would this work? Would Molly be able to finish her master’s? Would it be the end of her education? Where would we live? I was going to be a daddy… And slowly, I realized that the thought of that didn’t have me running for the hills like I’d always thought, but rather feeling so damn content I could barely breathe. I was having a baby with my girl.

So many questions circled through my mind, too many to keep up with, and then my girl fucking froze me to the spot with one simple sentence. “I’ll make an appointment to see a doctor. I’ll just get rid of it immediately.”

Glaring at Molly below me, I barked, “You’d kill our baby?”

Bucking her body, trying to get up, Molly shouted, “Don’t get all high and mighty on me now! I don’t need to hear any moral shit! I’m trying to do the best thing for both of us. I’ll cope with whatever I have to do. If that means having an abortion, then that’s just what will have to happen. It doesn’t mean I want to go through with it!”

“Then don’t, baby, please. Getting rid of it can’t be what you fuckin’ want.” No way was she killing our child. It was
our
child.

“I don’t know what the hell I want!” she cried, the tears flowing once more. Shit. She was petrified, and I was being an ass.

Leaning down, I ran my hands through her hair. “Well, I do.”

Taking hold of my wrists, she searched my face before saying, “But… you…”

“Jesus, I was shocked!” I cut in, shaking my head, then moving my hand to her stomach. “I’m still shocked, but that’s our baby in there. We made it together.”

Desperate for her to understand, I pulled up her T-shirt and kissed along her stomach, stating, “And it’s not going anywhere. Promise me. I have real strong feelings about this, Mol. Don’t destroy our God-given angel.” Her silence almost killed me, but I had to make her understand how much this meant to me.

“Promise me I have a say in this. Don’t have an abortion, please.” She couldn’t. God, I couldn’t see her go through that.

I waited, barely breathing, pressing my forehead to her flat stomach until she whispered, “I promise.”

Relief like nothing I’d felt before settled in my bones, and I moved back to take the lips of my girl… the mother of my child.

As soon as our mouths meshed together, the same need that I always felt around my girl shot through my veins like a drug. Ridding Molly of her jeans, I freed myself and in seconds, plunged into her wet warmth.

Wrapping her legs around my waist, Molly moaned into my ear, clawing at my back and murmuring my name.

“I love you, Mol,” I said against her lips.

Tears slipped from her eyes as I pushed into her slowly; she studied my face as I took her, unhurried and slow.

We came together, holding hands, and I swear something within me changed right then. I realized I didn’t need the controlling fucking all the time with Mol; it could be different… I trusted her enough to relinquish my controlling tendencies.

“That’s the softest you’ve ever made love to me. It felt so different,” Molly whispered into my hair falling over her face. Pulling back, our foreheads touched and she smiled. “I loved it.”

“You’re carrying precious cargo now, baby. I need to be more careful with you… with you both.”

A wave of happiness seemed to settle over us both and I sloped to the side, pulling my girl to face me, her eyes bigger than normal behind thick brown frames. I’d been so worried before I hadn’t even noticed that her contacts were gone.

“You look like my old Mol with these glasses and your hair like that. The girl I looked at months ago, on her hands and knees, cussing in that fuckin’ hot accent in humanities block, wearing neon-orange shoes, and I knew, without a shadow of doubt, that she would one day be mine.”

“One day,” Mol teased with a smile, referring to my tattoo.

Swallowing, I confided, “I always wondered if one day I’d have a family, if I’d ever be happy enough with someone… with myself, to have a child.” It was true, but with Molly by my side, the thought didn’t scare me quite so much.

Reaching out and gripping my hand, panic set in Molly’s eyes and she admitted, “Romeo, I don’t think I can be a mother. We haven’t had normal families. We have no idea how to be in a normal family! How the hell can we bring up a child? We’re far too young. What do we have to offer a baby?”

“Something we never had.” Her eyes were as wide as saucers. “Listen to me. Together we can do it. Together we can do anything. We can be good parents.”

“But your football…”

“So what? I’ll get drafted in April and you’ll come with me, with our son or daughter. You can still do your PhD and achieve your dreams. We can have it all. Just please… don’t destroy our child, our first child.” I knew we could make it work if she would only let me try.

“Rome—” She sighed, defeated.

Shaking my head, I covered her mouth with my finger. “I could’ve been destroyed, but my birth mother didn’t. She had me.” I took her hand and laid it against my chest, right above my pounding heart. “I’m here because she chose me, even if she didn’t actually want me. Yeah, my family did a real number, but I got through it and it led me to you, my smart English girl—the girl that saved me. The girl who showed me how to love.”

Her frown line softened and she said, sadly, “Your parents will think I’ve done it on purpose to trap you.”

My parents.

Shit. Just the mention of them had my protective instincts roaring into the stratosphere. “I don’t give a fuck what they’ll think. In fact, I’ve no intention of ever telling them. I was serious when we left their house that night. I’m done with them. You’re my life now; you’re my everything. You and our baby.”

She simply nodded, but I couldn’t get the worry of my parents out of my head. I hadn’t heard from them for months. We’d broken all ties, but if they found out about Molly being pregnant, I didn’t know what they would do.
If
they would do anything. Maybe they wouldn’t; maybe they really were through with me…

We couldn’t hide it. Hell, Shelly lived in this sorority house. It was rare that they were ever around one another, but they did bump into each other now and again, and when Mol was heavily pregnant, it was going to be kind of hard to ignore a huge belly. And that bitch would go straight and tell my folks. I had no doubt about that.

I knew one thing, and that was that those sadistic fuckers wouldn’t get within a mile of my child; they would never get a chance to sink in their claws. A fleeting thought suddenly made me stiffen.

Mol looked up and narrowed her eyes. “What? What is it?”

Breathing deep, I asked, “What if I turn out like my folks? What if I’m ingrained to be a horrible father? You can’t fight genes, Mol. What if I’m like my daddy? What if I let our child down?”

Pressing a kiss to my lips, Molly pulled back, reassuring me. “You’ll be perfect.”

“But you don’t know that, do you?” I argued, my stomach churning, a sickening fear taking root.

Taking my hand and laying it flat to her stomach, she said softly
, “I have also seen children successfully surmounting the effects of an evil inheritance. That is due to purity being an inherent attribute of the soul.”

“Who said that?” I asked, the sincere sentiment from Molly’s lips meaning everything to me. She had complete and utter faith in me and anything I did.

“Gandhi,” she announced and breaking a grin, play punched my shoulder. “And you call yourself a philosopher!”

“Em, no, smartass. I take philosophy as a minor. I’m a business major… and a damn good one too.”

“Whatever, not everyone can be as spectacular as me!” she quipped and then burst into fits of giggles.

“Maybe not, and you’ll be a hell of a spectacular momma too.”

“You really believe that?” she asked nervously.

“With all my heart.”

25

“Is it done?” I asked Diana, the manager of the Tide club shop, as I entered.

Face lighting up, she beamed. “Sure is, honey. It’s so damn cute I almost died!”

Leaning on the counter, I waited as she disappeared out back, then came back holding it up proudly for me to see.

“Jesus Christ,” I whispered, and pride burst into my chest.

“Hey, no blaspheming!” Diana joked. “But yeah, I get why you said it. Adorable, ain’t it?”

“It’s perfect,” I replied, pretty damn speechless.

Wrapping it in tissue paper and putting it into a white gift box, she looked at me and asked, “So who’s this for, darlin’?”

“A relative,” I answered, not even missing a beat. No one could know yet.

Smiling wide, she giggled. “Well, you’ll be their favorite person in the whole damn world giving them a gift as good as this!”

“Yeah, hope so.”

Taking the gift box and hiding it in the back of my truck, I pulled out onto the road to pick up my girl. It’d taken a few weeks to get the appointment, but I’d secured the best ob-gyn in all of Tuscaloosa, and we were heading there now for our first appointment.

We’d been advised to come in early due to Molly’s momma’s condition. Hearing that conversation on our initial meeting with the GP nearly had me going insane. As if the worry of my parents finding out about our little angel wasn’t enough, finding out that Molly’s momma died of something called severe preeclampsia almost had me collapsing to the floor. We’d been advised to choose an ob-gyn as soon as possible due to this, and Dr. Adams had requested an appointment immediately.

Fucking preeclampsia—just one more worry to add to the already sky-high pile.

I knocked on Mol’s front door and she answered with a nervous smile and immediately moved in for a hug.

“You okay, baby?” I asked, rubbing her back.

Looking up, she answered, “Just nervous, I guess.”

Holding out my hand, I tipped my head toward the truck. “Let’s go.”

“You must be Molly. I’m Dr. Adams.” He introduced himself, standing to greet us.

“Nice to meet you, Dr. Adams.” Molly shook his hand and turned to me, laying a hand on my arm. “This is my boyfriend, Romeo.”

The doctor sent me a huge smile and shook my hand, saying, “Nice to meet you, Bullet. I’m a big fan—season ticket holder.”

“And I recognize your face, Miss Shakespeare. The good luck charm that’s going to help Bullet here lead us to the championship again.”

I watched Mol blush, still hating the attention, and I pulled her into my chest. “She sure is. Thank you, sir.”

And then he asked the one question I really didn’t want him to. “Any news on the draft? Seattle Seahawks are dying this season. Their quarterback was forced to retire early through injury, and you’re a sure win for first draft.”

I flashed a panicked glance to Mol. The day I’d learned Seattle was looking like an option, Molly found out we were pregnant, and I hadn’t dared bring it up with her since. I wasn’t sure what my future held for us now. We hadn’t even talked about our next step beyond making sure she and our baby were healthy.

Shifting uncomfortably, I answered, “I know as much as you, sir, but from what I’ve been hearing from my coaches, Seattle is a big possibility for me.”

We sat down, and I got the meaning of Molly’s long hand squeeze. We would be talking about Seattle later—great.