Carlene

He said he wanted to make love to me.

Rome has never mentioned the word love in that context. He always refers to it as “fucking.” Is he trying to tell me something? Once again, I had to stop him earlier.

Tonight—I’ll enjoy him once again, and then I’ll head home and get that distance I need to really understand where my head and emotions are at. Then we’ll see if it’s real.

These are all the thoughts peppering my brain while I walk beside Rome out to a car. I really wish this was our hotel. Rome had been adamant about showing me the best of everything in the time we have. It has been the same since I arrived in America. It’s all about the quality with Rome.

He wants to make love to me?

Round and round those words swirl in my mind.

How will this be different to what we’ve previously experienced together?

Off to the side of the hotel’s concierge area, he pulls me into his arms and starts slowly kissing me.

Right away, I’m lost. The feeling of his lips on mine, his body pressed up to me. It feels so good, so Rome. Like magic, everything else disappears when he touches me.

My blood heats even further at the raw sound of his voice.

His lips are just about on mine once again when his head snaps up, and his attention shifts to someone approaching.

“Rome, is that you?”

I manage to decipher the woman’s words through my Rome-filled haze.

His body goes ramrod straight in an instant, and he drops his hold on me. Suddenly, I feel adrift and cast away. The undeniable connection between us when we were touching is snapped like a brittle twig. His whole body now on the defensive.

He clears his throat. “Good evening, Francesca.”

I guess the woman to be in her late forties, although it’s hard to tell with all the make-up and the cloud of highly sprayed blonde hair. The fake tan is a tad too orange to look natural, and don’t even get me started on the silicone marvels overflowing the red sequin encrusted dress she’s wearing. She is the epitome of “mutton dressed up as lamb,” and I’m not the type to be judgy on peoples’ dress sense.

“Fancy seeing you here. I thought you weren’t working anymore.”

Two things simultaneously dawn on me. I’ve never seen Rome look more uncomfortable, and this woman is surely a client.

Rome’s jaw is locked tight, and instead of the easy air he normally has about him, every muscle looks like it has turned to stone.

“You’re correct. I’ve not been working for some time.”

Why is he lying? I’m a client, just like she’s obviously been.

“But you’re working again now?” She waves her hand at me, and her words came out more as a statement than a question. “I want to book you. Nobody can get me off like you can. I need some Rome magic.”

I’m sure Rome doesn’t miss the over exaggerated eyelash flutter. I add ridiculously oversized eyelashes to my mental inventory of everything unattractive and false about this woman.

She smiles brashly at Rome and gives me a conspiratorial wink, like I know exactly what she was driving at. The problem is, I do, and suddenly, I feel all kinds of cheap. I’m just like her, a woman who pays for a handsome man like Rome to show her a good time in and out of bed.

Is she the sort of woman he usually escorted?

Francesca is awful, outrageous, and desperate.

I hate myself for judging her, but the whole thing just cuts too close to home for me.

Where does this leave me?

Am I just like her only not cognizant of it?

“I’m sorry, Francesca, but you’re mistaken. I’m not working again. Carlene is a very close friend of mine.”

She looks between us, and I feel her suspicion hit overdrive. Why is he lying? He’s said we were friends, but I am most certainly a client as well.

“That’s a damned shame. I was suddenly all kinds of excited.” She drops another wink at me before her over made up face moves into an exaggerated pout.

I can tell Rome is fast losing patience and is looking to get away from her as quick as possible.

“Call the agency. I’m sure Roxie will be able to set you up with a man to your tastes.” He’s trying to be polite and obviously keep a client. It is business, after all.

“But I have a taste for you, sugar!”

The car Rome ordered fortunately pulls up, and the driver comes around to open the door for us.

Ever the perfect gentleman, Rome speaks up, “If you’ll excuse us, Francesca, we have another engagement to attend.”

He guides me into the back seat of the car and hastily follows me in.

Neither of us say anything as the driver pulls out into the traffic.

Once we’re underway, Rome angles his body to me, and I have no problem reading the apprehension rolling off him in waves.

“Carlene, I’m so sorry. That’s never happened to me before. I can’t believe it. She was so…”

“Brash…crass—honest, perhaps?” I offer in my best bitchy voice. I know logically it isn’t his fault, but that doesn’t help me at all with how I’m feeling now. He’s become more to me than a service I pay for. He’s become a real person, one I suspect I care for deeply and Francesca has brought it all back to reality for me.

Tarnished what we might have.

His jaw falls open, and I read defeat in his eyes. Everything his words of only a few minutes ago promised is gone.

“Carlene, I don’t know what I can say to you. Just that, I only ever saw her once before I stopped escorting, and I vowed never to accept another engagement with her.”

Anger, hurt, and embarrassment are careening through my veins. I believe him. I have no problem recognizing the sort of woman Francesca is, but I just can’t stop myself from lashing out.

“Well, regardless, you must have made quite an impression. She certainly seemed to know exactly how good your skills are.”

He reaches for me, and I pull away. I don’t want his touch right now. Maybe I never will again.

There will be no “making love” tonight.

“I did the job she paid me to do. I didn’t enjoy it, but I did my job. And I vowed never to repeat the experience with her again. In fact, if memory serves me correctly, she was one of my last clients, until…well, you know.”

“Say it, Rome. It’s the truth. Until me, your next client.”

His face becomes a picture of pain. Good, it matches the feeling in my heart.

“What can I say or do to make it up to you?” He’s pleading with me.

What could he do?

The answer is simple.

Nothing.

Escorting women is his job, and I realize now, whatever crazy fantasies I had of Rome and me being together, have just been that—crazy fantasies. While he’s still escorting, it will define or at least influence him and the person he is. I can’t stomach the idea of sharing him with any other woman.

“There’s nothing you can do, Rome. This is your life, who you are. I don’t know what you think is between us, but I can’t do it. I couldn’t cope with the idea of you spending time with other women, particularly when I know exactly what that entails. I’ll just come right out and say it…I’d be a jealous wreck. I couldn’t live with knowing other women were enjoying you intimately.”

His shoulders slump, and he seems to slide down into the seat.

“I’ve lost you,” he murmurs to himself. The pain in his eyes tears at my heart, but truth and common-sense need to prevail. Neither of us are inexperienced kids, playing with first love.

“You never had me, Rome. Let’s remember it as it should be remembered—a beautiful interlude. A couple of weeks out of our lives. Weeks I’ll always treasure and remember fondly.”

“What can I do? Surely, there must be something?” he pleads.

I sigh, and a huge lump forms in my throat. Tears threaten, and I want to be strong to get through this.

Actually, it is more than that.

I need to be strong, because there’s a big part of me that wants to let go and just chase the rainbows Rome has been teasing me with. It would be so easy, nothing at all to stop me.

The practical me wrestles back control. Don’t be stupid, Carlene.

He isn’t the man for you, regardless how you feel or what he says. I acted rash at eighteen. I won’t let myself make that same mistake twice.

I take a deep breath and brace myself for the words I need to say. “Rome, I just can’t…I can’t be with you when you do what you do.” I didn’t say the word escort. It would sound so offensive, and I don’t want to hurt him anymore than I am, by reminding him of the truth.

“There is no future for us, regardless what we both might want or hope for. It’s the way it is. It’s your job, your lifestyle. I’m sorry, but Francesca confirmed what I’ve been trying to tell you. It’s the life you’ve chosen. I can’t make it mine. I’d never cope with the thought of you with other women.”

I watch my words hit him like blows. I don’t want to hurt him. I really don’t, but it’s not fair to lead him on.

“You asked before what you could do.”

Hope flares in his eyes for a moment, and his head raises a fraction—I’m about to crush him again. “Once we get back to the hotel, you can arrange a car for me to the airport. I’ve decided to leave immediately from Vegas rather than LA. I think it will be best on both of us.”

I watch the light go from his eyes, and I feel the kick to my guts. I turn my head and stare out the window, unable to look at Rome suffering the pain I’ve just delivered. My throat is stinging from the tears I refuse to shed. If I turn and look at him, I’ll crack and give in—I have to be strong.

My decision is brutal but for the best—for both of us.

We are done.

My time is up.

I’m going home.

Back to safety, sense, and loneliness.