Always And Forever

Chapter 18

At the sound of hearing his voice, I quickly pulled down my shirt, covering up the bruises, but I think he had already seen what I was trying to hide. He tossed his towel on his bag and rushed over to me.

"Kiran, lemme see that right now." His tone was serious, looking me straight in the eyes.

I looked away from him, "It's nothing, Ro, just leave it."

"Kiran I'm not going to ask you again, let me see it if it's nothing."

If I were able to get up and move — I would have. But my body was so sore that I didn't have that option. He moved my arm away from my waist, giving himself access to my tank top. He lifted it up slowly, just uncovering my stomach area and examined the bruises for a few moments with a blank expression while gliding a hand over it. After seeing that look on his face I slowly pulled my tank top down again.

"Shit.....baby girl....I...I'm so sorry for this...for everything." He leaned forward and held a kiss on my head for a few seconds. I felt a droplet of water fall onto my face which caught me by surprise. I looked up and realized Roman was trying to hold back tears but one managed to escape.

Gosh, it kills me to see him like this...

I raised my arm up to touch his face but the shooting pain in my ribs caused me to curse under my breath. I tried my best to not make my pain obvious in front of Roman — he would only feel more guilty.

"Roman, please don't hurt yourself like this." I thumbed away another tear which was threatening to fall from his watery eyes.

"I fuckin' hate myself so much for doing this to you. You can tell me if you hate me too, I deserve to hear it."

Wrapping my arm around his, I leaned my head against his shoulder, "It was an accident Roman....I can't hate you even if I tried. I just wish we could go back to the way things were before between us."

He managed to pull a small smile on his face as he leaned over to gently press his lips against mine.

[ROMAN POV]
I got off the bed and grabbed Kiran's bag from the floor, pulling out her "Coca Cola" t-shirt and some short shorts.

"Want me to help you change?"

She looked shyly at me, mumbling "I guess so..."

I could tell she was uncomfortable having to change in front of me which was not my intention. I went over to the light switch and flipped it off. There was just the faintest moonlight coming from the window above us, enough to see eachother's silhouette in the dark. I carefully helped her with her clothes, making sure not to hurt her in anyway. Once she was done, I felt her arms go around my waist, placing her warm lips on my neck.

"That was really sweet of you. Thank you for being so caring." She whispered to me in the dark.

"Anything for my babygirl."

She laid back against the pillows and drifted off to sleep. I pulled the blanket over her and left the room.

[DEAN POV]
I noticed Roman furiously typing away on his phone with a bottle of something in the other, apparently he was drowning out his problems with alcohol again. He had gone through half the bottle before I took it off him.

"Dude you need to just fuckin' chill! Talk to me, what's going on?"

"Gimme the bottle back Dean!"

He tried grabbing it out of my hand but I pushed him away. "What will Kiran say if she sees you drinking like this?" I was hoping he wouldn't start fighting with me over the bottle but instead he went to the lounge area and grabbed my pack of cigarettes off the table, lighting one up in his mouth. I decided to give him some time to himself and just cool off while I went off to my bunk. Seth was already in his bed and out of Roman's way for the night.