One Step At a Time

Chapter 25: Cat Scratch

"Hello?"

"Hello Beautiful." Romans husky voice reaches my ears. The sound of his voice automatically has me calming down. "What are you doing right now?"

"Nothing, I was just about to start a movie and settle down for the night." I tell him, shuffling back into the kitchen to finish making my hot chocolate.

"Sounds fun."

"Spit it out Ro, I can tell your dying to ask me something." I grin, squeezing my phone between my shoulder and ear.

"I just miss you." He blurts out, "and I wanted to come over."

My grin only grows as he tells me this, "you miss me?" I tease.

"Fuck yes, I want to hold you, it's been too long."

"Such a drama queen." I say, but in the back of my mind I'm thinking the exact same thing. It's been a week since me and Roman have last hung out. And I have thought about what happened between us at least twice a day since then.

We both have had super busy weeks, Roman is training for a match coming up next week, and I had three photo shoots this week, so we haven't had any time to see each other this week. Except for the nightly phone calls, and even then they are only brief because of how tired we both were.

"Shut up," he grumbles, "so can I come over?"

"Sure." I sigh, pretending to be annoyed.

"Good, because I'm already in the car, five minutes away."

"What," I laugh, "what were you going to do if I said no?"

"You could never say no to me Love."

"That is so not true."

"Alright, I would have come anyway."

I scoff and hang up on him, popping a handful of mini marshmallows in my hot chocolate. I wait to settle down, knowing as soon as I do he will ring my doorbell.

I quickly change into an oversized shirt and pajama shorts. Not wanting to answer the door practically naked.

I walk over to the door, once I hear the doorbell go off, and undo all three locks. I constantly make sure I have all three locks locked when I'm home so that I don't get to paranoid about him coming back.

No matter how many times I remind myself that he's locked up for a long, long time, i can't help but be scared.

I open up the door, a small smile on my face when I see Roman. He grins, showing off his perfectly straight teeth, and immediately pulls me into a bone crushing hug. He buries his head into the crook of my neck, breathing in deeply.

I sigh, my body sagging against his. He smells
like he just stepped out of the shower, and by the looks of his messy wet hair, he definitely did.

"No." Roman pouts as I try to pull away, hugging me tighter. He shuffles us back, closing the door behind him.

He eventually eases up on his hold, but not by much. "How are you?" He brushes his thumb across my cheek, twirling a loose strand of hair that fell out from my ponytail between his thumb and pointer finger.

"I'm good." I lie.

Like I said, this week has been rough. My business is just beginning to become successful, and I'm not used to the huge work load. I haven't been able to sleep through the night because of nightmares, or eat three meals a day. Plus I started my period yesterday, so I'm just exhausted.

"I'm not to sure your telling me the truth here Belle." His voice calm, as he forces me to keep eye contact.

"It's just been a rough week, that's all." I shrug, pulling away from him and walking back towards my kitchen. My drink probably cold by now. I hear all three locks click before he's stepping in front of me.