Chapter 29 29
Roman's POV
Angrily I walked away from Harmony's building with my hands in my hoodie pocket, still turning over everything she had said in that kitchen.
What bothered me wasn't the rejection. I had been rejected by her before, and I had survived it. What bothered me was the way she had looked just before she started talking. Harmony Sinclair felt things deeply, I was certain of that. She just refused to let anyone in long enough to see that part of her.
I was angry, and I was not sure if it was at her or at myself. Hadn't she felt what I felt last night? Because what I felt had not been nothing. Last night had been mind-blowing. Surely, she couldn't just throw all of that away and pretend it didn't happen?
But she had, hadn't she? She had practically walked me out of her apartment, after telling me that that staggeringly incredible sex last night was nothing but a time well spent.
I pushed those gloomy thought aside and pulled out my phone to text Miles.
ME: Where are you? Sorry I left you at the party.
MILES: Are you really sorry tho? I'm two blocks east of the party. Come get me, I have party leftovers.
I found him on the corner of a deserted street, leaning against a wall with a bag that clinked when he moved. He looked annoyingly alert for someone who had spent the last several hours at a frat party, and he was grinning widely before I had even pulled up properly.
He got in and dropped the bag at his feet. "Way to abandon your best friend at a party, Foster."
He reached into the bag and pulled out a bottle, examining it in the passing streetlight. "You disappeared for a very long time at that party. And judging by the female company you had with you, I'm guessing you either had the best night of your life or got into a fight. Given that you're not bleeding anywhere, I'm going to assume it was the former."
"Drop it, Miles." I warned.
"Gladly." He put the bottle back. "I'm just saying, good for you."
"Miles." I glanced at him. "Don't talk about her like that."
He went quiet for a second, then nodded twice. "Okay."
We drove in comfortable silence for a few minutes, the city thinning out around us as we got closer to Wicker Park.
"So what do you think Sarah will do to you when she finds out you're not in bed at—" he checked his wristwatch, "—seven thirty on a Monday morning?"
"She works for me," I replied. "I'm practically her employer. She can't actually do anything to me, can she?"
"You're forgetting that she is employed by your mother. Your mother is her employer. You are the patient she is responsible for, who snuck out of his apartment at nine o'clock at night on a busted knee." He counted on his fingers. "She can absolutely do something. Specifically, she can call your mother."
"She wouldn't."
"She one hundred percent would." Miles laughed as he replied. "Your nurse is loco."
"I'll handle Sarah," I replied, with more confidence than I felt. "She's not going to make a big deal out of this."
Miles raised a skeptical eyebrow at me, then turned his head to look out the window. I turned into my apartment complex and slowed down looking for parking, and that was when I saw something that made my heart plummet into my guts.
There was a sleek black Audi parked directly outside my building. Even if I didn't recognize it, there was no way in hell I wouldn't be able to recognize the person inside it. Bruno was behind the wheel, visible through the windshield. His hands were wrapped around the steering wheel.
I stopped the car. "Holy shit. I'm fucked."
Miles leaned forward and looked through the windshield. Then he sat back slowly. "Okay so, I was right. Sarah called your mother."
"Sarah called my mother," I repeated.
I sat there for a moment, looking at Bruno's silhouette in the Audi, and thinking about what was waiting for me on the other side of my front door.
I was twenty years old, I reminded myself. I could go to a party with no consequence. My mother surely wouldn't whoop my ass just because I did what many other college students do.
"You could come in with me," I said to Miles.
He was already opening his door. "I was going to whether you asked or not." He grabbed his bag of stolen bottles. "But just so you know, if it gets really bad in there, I'm going to pretend I don't speak English."
"You're Colombian, man!"
"Exactly, so it'll be convincing." He got out and waited on the pavement while I eased myself out of the car, favouring my good leg. The knee had held up better than I expected this morning, which was one point in my favour, though I doubted my mother was going to lead with that.
I straightened up, looked at the entrance to my building, and exhaled.
"Let's go," I said.