“Is it me?” he asked.
I shook my head. “No. Actually, you are the only thing about this entire situation that seems right. But even you aren’t strong enough to make me not want to run. Something inside of me is screaming for me to flee right now.”
Roman didn’t say anything for several minutes. The awkward silence had me racking my brain for something more to say. I didn’t want to hurt him. Far from it. But I feared I had.
“Roman… I’m sorry—”
“Do you remember our first kiss here?” he asked, cutting me off.
“Yes.” It was a moment I would never be able to forget. I don’t think any woman forgets her first kiss, but mine had truly been magical. We’d both been so timid and uncertain, but the minute our lips had connected, I’d known it was right. Everything had been so, so right.
“I knew then I would marry you,” he said. “And not because we had been told that we would wed most of our lives, but because I fell in love with you that day.” He turned his head to look at me, and our eyes locked. “Maybe that is sappy as shit, but it’s the fucking truth, and I’m not ashamed to admit it.”
“I knew too. Because I loved you,” I admitted softly, not sure if he even heard my tiny voice.
“And I understand why you had to leave. I hated it. I hated that you didn’t say goodbye. But I understood it. You needed to find yourself”—he ran his hand through his hair—“hell, I had to find myself too. We were kids, and in no way were we prepared for marriage. But it’s different now. We are adults and—”
“Yes, but have we found ourselves? Really? I don’t think I have. I think I’m more confused and lost than I was the day I left this city,” I confessed.
“Who’s to say we can’t find ourselves together?” he asked, determination in his eyes. “I’m not going to lie and tell you that I haven’t been with a lot of women. I have fucked more than I can count. I’m not ashamed of it one bit either. I needed to so I would be ready for you. I know you are the woman I am to marry just like I knew when we stood on this same dock and had our first kiss so many years ago.”
I didn’t like hearing of him being with other women, and the green-eyed monster threatened to take over, but I had to shove the jealousy away. I wasn’t exactly pure and virginal either.
“This just isn’t me. I’m not cut out for everything you need out of a princess. A wife.” I had to be honest, and these were the fears banging against my skull and ringing in my ears.
“Why? Because assholes want to take pictures of us? Because we have to show up at parties and shake hands with people? Is it all really so bad that you have to walk away from us? Away from what we could have?” He took hold of my hand. “I’m not going to be king. I have older brothers for that. So, the spotlight is not going to be all that bad. And the main attention I currently get is being the bad boy prince. But once we are married, and I settle down, a lot of the paparazzi attention is going to die down. I’m not going to lie to you and tell you that I love it all either. I fucking hate it at times. But rather than focusing on the negative, I choose to concentrate on the positive.”
“And the positive is what?” I asked. “Don’t even say money and notoriety because I hate that shit.”
“The positive is you. I concentrate on you.”
His words were like a punch to the gut. Roman truly did care about me. I could see it in the way he looked into my eyes. And when he took hold of my hand and turned me so that we were both facing each other, I could feel the love between us. It had never left. I could put continents between us, but it had never left.
“But if you don’t want to marry me, and if you want to leave on the next plane”—he took a deep breath—“I won’t stop you. I won’t force you into this.”
“Silas said that you own my mother’s house and that—”
“That was to get you here,” he interrupted. “And though it wasn’t right, it was the only way I could think of. But that wasn’t the reason I bought the house. I felt I owed that to you. I didn’t want to see your mother lose everything. Especially when it was a problem that was so easily solved.”
“So if I said no to all this arranged marriage stuff right now, you wouldn’t make my mother leave her house?”
He shook his head. “She’ll never be asked to move, and the monthly stipend will not go away either. She’s been good to my family, and good to me. She’s owed it. There’s a cost to loyalty. A cost I’m prepared to pay.”
I turned, feeling as if a huge weight had been lifted from my shoulders and stared back out to the sea. No matter what I chose, my mother would be fine. My choices would affect me only. “I thank you for that. For taking care of her.”
“But I do hope you won’t leave. I hope you will stay and not run away this time.”
“And marry you?” I asked.
“Yes, and marry me.” Roman tugged on my hand that he was still holding. “Come with me. There is something I want to show you.”
I walked beside him, hand in hand, as he led me down a couple of stairs to a dock that housed a bunch of luxurious yachts.
“Where are we going?”
“To my boat.”
“You finally bought a yacht? Are you going to be part of the races?” I asked, though I knew Roman had always wanted his very own when he grew up. He hated asking his father for permission to use his.
“I did, and maybe with you by my side.”
“What did you name it?” I asked as I scanned the names of the boats we approached, wondering which one was his.
“Popped Cherry,” he said with a devilish smirk. “Since I popped your cherry and all.”
I stopped walking and yanked my hand away from his in a huff. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
He began to laugh. The same kind of laugh that started in the depths of his belly and reminded me of our childhood. “I’m kidding! Kidding!” he said with his hands up in surrender. “I thought about it,” he said between his laughter, “but decided on My Cheri instead.”
Right as he answered the question, he turned and pointed to the large white boat bobbing in the harbor behind him. I saw My Cheri written in elegant royal blue script, beckoning me to come see it. “Oh, it’s lovely.” I was drawn to the magnificence of the ship, and started walking toward it, just dying to hop on board. I had always wanted a yacht, and seeing my name on one was… well… the royal treatment.
“Do you like it?”
“Roman, it really is gorgeous,” I said as I still walked toward it, almost in a daze. “May I go on? Will you show it to me?”
“Of course,” he said as he walked up to me and put his arm around my shoulders.
As we boarded the vessel, I could tell that no expense had been spared. It wasn’t garish or over-the-top like some yachts I had been on, but it had excellent craftsmanship. We turned a small corner, and I stopped dead in my tracks. There was a bucket of ice with champagne chilling. Two flutes surrounded by scattered white feathers were next to it. I looked up at Roman to make sure that we hadn’t walked in on someone else’s romantic party.