Roman starts pacing. Even though bringing up these old wounds is making my still-shattered heart feel like each bruise is fresh and new, my lips quirk into a tiny smile to see him freak out as he’s caught in the mess he caused. His hands are running through his hair as he’s muttering curses. Suddenly he stops, turns to me, and brings a hand to his chest, whispering one word in the most reverent tone I’ve ever heard. “Harper.”

“What?” I snap, looking away, unable to handle the pain in his eyes. I’ve always taken on his emotions as my own. I felt his pain more than my own—each time we found his mother passed out on a park bench or stumbling her way out of the county jail.

“I don’t know what girl you’re talking about.” I see him take a step toward to me in my periphery as my heart starts to pound. Agony and anguish are rolling off of him. It takes every ounce of strength I have to not turn to him and comfort him. “Sugar, please look at me. Please.”

I take a deep breath, biting my lip, trying to keep my tears at bay. My eyes look toward him, but I don’t meet his eyes yet. First, they fall on his down-turned lips before skating up to his crinkled eyebrows. After I look at every centimeter of space on his face, I finally meet his eyes. The brown that plays amongst his impossibly dark eyes seems dull as his eyes beg for forgiveness.

He releases a shuttering breath and takes a step forward. I let him open my legs as he steps between them, placing a fist on either side of my hips and resting his forehead against mine, breathing in deeply. Roman leans back, looking into my eyes before he starts speaking. “I don’t know what girl you’re talking about. I don’t, Harper. What you’re describing though, that shit isn’t me. I wish you knew that. I’d give anything to go back and not hurt you so much. I could never do something like that to you. I wasn’t with any girl while we were together, and after I broke up with you, I still couldn’t be with another girl. I fucking belonged to you. I belong to you.” He rests his forehead against mine for another long moment.

I don’t say anything, trying to process everything. I can’t find the lie in his words but why break up if he “belongs” to me? That doesn’t make any sense.

He continues speaking without any urging. “How could I not know you were there? Fuck. I’m going to find out who that bitch was. Fucking Kiernan.”

I feel defensive when he brings up Kiernan. Kiernan’s the only reason we’re even having this conversation, at least he thinks I should be told things about my own life. Instead of the man in front of me, content to control my life and leave me hanging and alone in the dark. “Kiernan has nothing to do with this.”

Roman glares at me, clenching his jaw. “It was one of his girls, I’m sure.”

“He was your roommate? Doesn’t matter. He didn’t make her say those things to me, and I doubt he told her any of the things she knew about me. Only things you could have said.”

Roman’s hand comes up, cupping my jaw and bringing my eyes back to his. “I’m going to figure this out, Sugar. I don’t know what happened, I wasn’t with anyone around that time. If you believe anything I say, believe that.”

I swallow before nodding and getting completely lost in Roman’s gaze. His next question pulls me from my stare, surprising me. “Did Santiago know that you came to see me?”

“Yes,” I answer, confused by his question. “He’s the one who called to tell me about my parents and sister.”

“He called me, too. I came to the funeral.”

Bomb.

Explosion.

My ears are ringing after the bomb Roman just dropped on me.

I hear his voice off in the distance, but my mind is spinning and I can’t process his words.

I think back to the day of the funeral. Three funerals rolled into one a few weeks before my eighteenth birthday and a few months before my high school graduation. Uncle Santiago stood on one side of me with my hand wrapped tightly in his large, tan, rough hand. Daniel, a new, good friend stood on my other side with his arm wrapped around me. I couldn’t look at the three glossy, black coffins in front of me. I stared at the tree line in the distance, pinching my thigh, begging to wake up from this nightmare. Go back in time. To when my family was alive. To when Roman was mine. Roman. I stood, in agony that I should’ve been with them. Instead, I was trying to get a boy’s attention. A boy who left, a boy who didn’t love me, a boy who made fun of me while some other girl was in his bed.

“Harper.” Roman’s fierce voice breaks me from my reverie.

“You weren’t there.” I state in a blank tone.

“Yes, I was. You were wearing a black dress with a pink bow. The same color pink of Sadie’s room.” Roman looks down after saying my little sister’s name. When he looks back up at me, there’s pain all over his face. Roman loved my family like they were his own, and they loved him. Sadie thought of him as an older brother, and he was protective over her, just like a brother would be.

“Santiago was next to you and you were in the arms of some guy. I sat in the very back of the church and snuck out before you walked down the center behind the caskets. I watched you get in the limo with that guy. I watched him hold you at the cemetery. I was a coward. I couldn’t bring myself to walk up you and tell you how much I regretted. I was there.”

Each time I think my heart can’t possibly break more, I’m proven wrong. My heart keeps breaking, finding new pieces to completely shatter and turn to dust. Each breaking piece fills me with rage. I angrily look up at Roman, making eye contact. “I hate—”

Roman’s hand covers my mouth. He leans in, his eyes matching my rage. “Don’t you dare say that to me. It’s not fucking true and you fucking know it, Harper.”

I rip my head away from his hand, even angrier that he’s right. Even after all he’s done to break me, I’ll never hate him. I could never hate him. My heart will always be his.

“Well,” I start, flustered, searching for something to say. “I don’t like you.”

Roman leans, in kissing my cheek, and whispers in my ear, “That’s fine. You don’t have to like me, as long as you’ll always love me.”

His lips slide over my cheek until they reach my lips, placing a searing and hard kiss there. He breaks the kiss just as quickly as he started it. “We’re going to figure this shit out, Sugar.”

“Why didn’t you come up to me? I needed you, Roman.”

“I was an idiot boy. I’ll never make that mistake again, no one and nothing will ever be in our way.”

“He was just a friend,” I whisper, looking down.

Roman sighs, bringing his arms around me and wrapping me in a hug. “It wasn’t just that there was a guy next to you. Fuck.”

Tensing in his arms, I try to prepare myself. I don’t want to break any more. “What?”

“Harper, I broke up with you because I didn’t want you to wait for me.”

I lean back, looking at Roman’s face, searching for something in it. For what, I don’t know. Clarity, maybe. “You didn’t,” I whisper.

“You would have followed me anywhere.”

He’s not wrong. It’s true, I would have followed him to any town, city, or country. “You had no right to make that choice for me.”

“Harper, we can’t keep going round and round like this. I couldn’t think about you giving up your dreams to be with me.”

“I wouldn’t have had to give anything up,” I insist, even though deep down I know it’s a lie. “I could still have my store and you.”

“You still have me.”

“No, I don’t.”

Roman slams his mouth down on mine, done with speaking, pouring every unspoken word into this kiss. My entire body engulfs in flames as he kisses me. Passion. Heartbreak. Love. Forgiveness. It’s all in this kiss, warring with the other, desperate to see which will come out on top. He’s pleading for my love, my forgiveness. Atoning for his mistakes. I’m trying to mend my heartache, giving into the passion I’ve always felt. I don’t know how long he’ll be here. I won’t let my heart get involved this time, but his kiss and hands feel too good to pass up. I’m aching for a release, the kind only he can give me.