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“Is everything alright? You seem… squirrelly.”
“I’m fine. Pearl’s fine. Everything is fine. How was your trip?”
Roman isn’t going to be dissuaded. “Have you and my sister been…?”
“No!” The denial isn’t all that much of a surprise, but it still hurts to hear him say we haven’t been doing exactly what my brother thinks we have been doing. “No…I…it’s not Pearl.”
It’s not?!
“It’s not?” My brother echoes my question. Is Spade trying to say he slept with someone, but it wasn’t me…because Roman asked? Does he want to hide us from Roman? Is there even an us?
“It’s not…,” there is a silence that makes me think Spade is whispering something to my brother. I rush to my room and grab the first thing I can find, which happens to be a pair of leggings, before shoving them on and going back out into the hall to hear what is being said.
“…you don’t know about Pearl, Roman.” Oh God! Oh God! Is he…?
I come stumbling out, almost killing myself in the process of trying to get to the two men before Spade can tell my brother the secret I told him. Both men turn to look at me like I might be drunk. I look from one to the other and then back at Spade with hurt in my eyes. Why would he say something about The Secret?
Roman gives me a big grin and comes over to drop a kiss on my cheek before pulling away from me. I turn worried eyes up to him. “Spade told me everything.”
“He…he did?”
“Well, not everything.” Spade’s voice cuts through my worry and makes my stomach roll.
“Not everything?” What the hell is being said now? Roman asks the question out loud but I am screaming it in my head. “But you already told me about her not wanting to go back to school because she wants to write. What more could there be?”
What? I shake my head trying to figure out what just happened. It wasn’t what I thought happened.
“She’s found a new place to live.”
“She has?” “I have?” Both me and Roman say the words, as Spade nods.
“Where?”
Yeah, where?
“With me.”
My heart starts thumping faster and a sense of hope rises up inside of me. Is he asking me to stay…with him? Like officially and all that?
Hope swells in my chest so much it takes me more than a moment to realize Roman is not having the same reaction I am over the news.
“You see, when you came in and asked if I had been with your sister. I said what I said because I didn’t want you mad at Pearl. She didn’t do anything. I did everything. It was me. We…we’re together.”
“You bastard! You…”
Roman goes after Spade but I’ve already flung myself in front of him. “No!” I turn to Spade after I'm sure Roman isn’t going to try to take a punch at him. “I was just as responsible as Spade over what happened so if you are going to be mad at him, you have to be mad at me too.”
Roman looks from me to Spade for a long time. I hold my breath until I think I am going to pass out from air deprivation and then….
“Do you love her?”
“I do.” I gasp and turn to stare at Spade. He didn’t hesitate or stumble at all.
“You do?”
“I do. I want… forever with you. It might have taken me a long time to realize that. I might have held back for a long time because I didn’t want to lose my friendship with your brother but…I love you, beautiful.”
“I…I love you too.” I wrap my arms around him and kiss him hard. “I thought…I’m sorry. I thought you might have told him about…I should have known you would never hurt me like that. Not you.” I untwine myself from Spade and turn to face my brother, “Which is why I am going to tell him myself so it never comes up again.”
