The Virgin’s Guide to Misbehaving (Bluebonnet #4)(65)
Author: Jessica Clare

Her face flushed hot. Rome. So even Colt had noticed he was missing. She got up and headed to the kitchen to avoid a painful conversation, even as she heard Brenna casually say, “Oh, he bailed on us. Grant was being a dick.”

“Oh no,” Beth Ann murmured.

Oh yes, Elise wanted to say, but she kept heading firmly toward the sanctuary of the kitchen. Once there, she began to clean up, throwing away paper plates and rinsing out beer bottles for recycling. Sadness threatened to overwhelm her. If it weren’t for everyone thinking that she needed protecting from the world, Rome would be here. Why did everyone think she was so fragile that she couldn’t make decisions on her own? Why did they have to run off a man who desperately needed a home and a place to call his own, and a family of his own?

Rome was lonely. She knew that now that she’d talked to Jericho and put all the pieces together. He’d had no one and nothing he could depend on, and Grant had made him leave it all behind again. Frustration at her brother welled up and she closed her eyes, willing herself to calm down.

The truth was, she was filled with envy.

Three couples were out in the living room, laughing and talking and leaning on each other, having a great time. They’d each go home tonight and cuddle in the other person’s arms, content in their love and the fact that life was wonderful and secure.

Meanwhile, Elise would go home to an empty bed and Rome would be . . . she didn’t know. Wherever he could find a roof over his head.

Heart aching, she pulled out her phone and checked it for the millionth time. No messages. Are you there? she sent. I miss you and I want to talk to you. It’s so important. Please.

He didn’t respond. He never did. It was like he’d taken his word to Grant at heart. After that wonderful weekend in Galveston, he’d cut all ties with her. She’d even tried calling him from Brenna’s phone, just to see if he’d answer it. But he didn’t. Rome had truly left everyone in Bluebonnet behind for good.

Elise had to think of a way to get him to respond. Somehow.

• • •

In the next week that passed, she kept herself busy so as not to feel the aching loneliness and hurt of Rome’s abandonment. Did he miss her like she missed him? Sometimes she wondered. If it was so easy for him to cut her off and cease all communication with her, maybe she’d misread things entirely. She didn’t know what to do.

So, she worked.

Upon Grant’s suggestion, she moved temporarily into the extra cabin at the ranch. She’d have to vacate it in a month or so when they found a new instructor to take Rome’s spot, but until then, Grant explained, she could live there rent-free and not have to worry about living quarters while she set up her business. She spent her time cashing out some money from her savings, purchasing equipment and furniture for her storefront, and renovating the inside of the small building. She had a sign made and purchased advertisements in local newspapers to run in a few weeks, and took photos. When she wasn’t taking photos, she was printing them, framing them, and hanging them on the wall to display to customers. In the window, she’d put one of Brenna’s playful pinup photos, and one of the engagement shots that she’d finally gotten done. Both Grant and Brenna were laughing in the picture and looked so incredibly adorable. She’d also done photos of Beth Ann and Colt and then Miranda and Dane, all free of charge as long as she got to hang them on her shop wall.

And she checked her phone every thirty seconds, hoping with each buzz that it was Rome. That he was looking for her because he was coming home and coming back to her.

But it was never him.

• • •

“I don’t know what to do,” she confessed to Beth Ann, Miranda, and Brenna over breakfast. They all sat at the big kitchen table at the Daughtry Ranch, ready to head out for a day of painting. Miranda had liked the new paint job on Elise’s little studio so much that she wanted to paint the kids’ books section of the library to make it more inviting, so the girls had volunteered to help out. It’d be fun with a few friends, and Elise had been looking forward to it . . .

Except she was getting desperate to hear back from Rome. She’d dreamed about him last night, terrible dreams of abandonment and prison, and she’d woken up with her heart pounding and tears in her eyes . . . and in a foul mood.

“And you tried calling?” Miranda asked. “What about email?”

“Daily calls,” Elise said. “It sounds psychotic, I know. The longer he ignores me, the more I wonder if it was all in my head how things were between us.”

“Nope,” Brenna said, pointing a cereal spoon at Elise. “I saw the way he looked at you. It was like how Grant looks at me. Or like how Dane looks at, you know, anything vaguely muddy and camping related.”

Miranda snorted. “Thanks.”

“Honey, I don’t know what happened, but maybe he doesn’t want you to contact him because he wants to move on?” Beth Ann suggested in a gentle voice.

She’d thought about that, too, and discarded the idea. “But he wants to move on for the wrong reasons,” Elise protested. “Doesn’t he at least deserve to give ‘us’ another chance if he knows the truth?”

Miranda patted her hand sympathetically. “You would think so, wouldn’t you?”

“Well, there’s one way to make a man come running,” Beth Ann mused. “The ‘p’ word.”

The table was quiet for a moment.

“Perpes?” Brenna asked, all fake innocence. Miranda snorted another laugh.

Beth Ann gave Brenna a quelling look. “Pregnancy.”

“Lie to him?” Elise choked on the words, thinking of Rome’s reaction. “Won’t he be furious?”

“He will be until you confess the truth and then give him a chance to correct the situation,” Brenna said with a wink. “You know, tell him he can really make you pregnant.”

“It sounds like a terrible plan,” Elise murmured, wiping her mouth with a napkin, no longer hungry. She wasn’t pregnant. She’d gotten her period just last week . . . but Rome wouldn’t know that.

God, could she be that evil and lie to him just to flush him out? Would he forgive her?

Then again, what did she have to lose? If he grew mad and refused to talk to her again . . . she’d be exactly where she was.

Elise considered it all day. That night, lying in bed—Rome’s bed, her mind noted—she picked up her phone, steeled herself, and texted him.