Romeo: Unraveled by Marti Shane

Author:Marti Shane [Shane, Marti]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-01-05T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

Romeo liked that Bella only focused on him as she crossed the courtyard in the wake of facing her past. He’d suspected she didn’t trust herself, or rather her mouth, in front of Bev’s child. Once Bev had insisted on facing Bella, he knew thirty seconds would be more than enough. He reached an arm around her, hauling her to his chest.

“How we doing?” he asked, hating the shadows beneath her eyes.

“Fine. I’m not the one who needed something out of that.”

He pulled out her chair and stole a kiss when she sat down. His phone rang with the ringtone assigned to Dante. “I’ll be quick,” he said before answering. “Hey.”

“Where the hell are you?” Dante asked.

“Out. What’s up?”

“Out where?”

“Did you get access?” Romeo asked, trying to speed him up. They would be working into the night on Jack’s finances, and he wanted this time with Bella first.

“Just now. I’m getting started. Are you going to be around later?”

“Yeah. Your place?”

“Bring food. Seriously, where are you?”

“Out,” he repeated. “See ya in a few hours.” He pressed End, seeing Bella spoon some caramel and whipped cream. Her eyes weren’t on him, and he missed it. He watched as she looked out over the water and took her first bite. “How is it?”

She met his gaze, an insecurity he hadn’t seen before taking up residence in her pretty features. “Out?”

“Dante,” he explained.

“It sounded really evasive.”

“It was. I wanted to get off the phone.”

She pretended to accept his defense with a rock of her head back and forth, but her look was impassive. “Okay.”

He didn’t like the almost accusation but considered that she’d just seen her ex and needed the reassurance. He placed his phone on the table, pressing Dante’s contact so she could see the name. The phone rang aloud on speaker.

“What?” Dante answered.

“I’m out with Bella,” he reported.

After a beat of silence, Dante laughed out loud. “Am I on speaker? Hey, beautiful.”

Bella didn’t respond, her teeth sinking into her lip with the look of slight regret he’d seen before. She was not sorry.

“She doesn’t want to talk to you. Neither do I.” He pressed End and picked up his spoon. “You’re not a secret, Bella. I just wanted to be brief.”

She nodded. “You guys are working on something tonight?”

“We are.”

“And you can’t talk about it?”

“Correct.” He spooned some of his ice cream, determined not to let one phone call derail their time.

“Did you know that was my ex?”

“Bev and Tony,” he confessed, taking his first bite while she registered the fact that he’d snooped into her past. The roasted espresso fused with the warm vanilla flavor was worth savoring. “How’s your ice cream?” he asked again.

“As someone who likes toppings more than ice cream, I’m digging the rolls. “The caramel drips into every layer.”

She slid her cup over to him. “Live a little, vanilla. Try mine.”

He dipped through the caramel, thinking it would be too sweet. The caramel mixed with the saltiness of the pralines and followed with a crunch. Surprisingly, it wasn’t sickeningly sweet and was worth an extra bite.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.