Modern Romance June 2016 Books 5-8. Tara Pammi

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СКАЧАТЬ sat on the bed, his head in his hands almost in grief, and though he spoke he did not turn towards her.

      ‘Go to bed, Anya.’

      She did not.

      She stayed.

      He had taken off his shirt and was wearing only black trousers. Every inch of his body Anya had thought she had known, yet the livid scars on his back proved her knowledge of Roman to be flawed. She let out a small cry and it seared through him.

      He did not want her to see them, for he knew they would cause her pain and yet there was this odd relief that she knew now.

      She climbed onto the bed and touched his back. ‘What happened?’

      ‘Just leave it for now.’

      ‘You could have died and I would never have known!’ she sobbed, and he just sat with his head in his hands as he remembered how close he had come to just that as Anya spoke on, her anger and desperation evident in every word. ‘I waited for you, and I feared for you,’ she wept, and everything she was trying to hold back from admitting started to pour out. ‘I was scared for you in war zones and I grieved in case you lay dead. And yet I hoped and prayed that you were safe and that one day you would come for me, and while I did all that, you took her as your wife.’

      He stood and for the second time that night he picked her up and put her over his shoulder. She kissed the scars on his back as he carried her back to her room. ‘I don’t want to play coy,’ Anya pleaded. ‘I want your bed.’

      ‘When we are capable of an adult discussion about Celeste and...’ Roman too was not ready, he could not even say Mika’s name. He pulled back the covers that were littered with the foil of her chocolate cups and popped her in. ‘We can reward ourselves later.’

      ‘I’ll never be able to speak of it nicely.’

      ‘Then you’ll never get your reward.’

      ‘Oh, so you’re on a sex strike?’ she scoffed. ‘We’ll soon see who gives in first.’

      ‘You don’t know the life I have lived,’ Roman said. ‘Believe me, I know how to go without.’

      He did not walk out but closed the shutters and drapes and then came and sat on the bed.

      ‘It is too beautiful not to look at,’ he said of the Eiffel Tower. ‘You need to sleep.’

      ‘I have class at eight.’

      ‘That’s not long from now.’

      She looked at his shoulder and it too was scarred, and she put her hand up to it.

      ‘Tell me.’

      ‘Shrapnel.’

      ‘How bad was it?’ she asked.

      ‘It was fairly bad,’ he said. ‘I had a punctured lung.’

      ‘Could you have died?’

      He nodded.

      And she wanted to ask if he’d thought of her then, but Roman was so honest that she was scared to ask, in case she did not like the answer.

      ‘My comrade was worse, though,’ Roman said, and her hand remained on his shoulder, feeling the muscle and the ridges of the scars. ‘I tried to keep him conscious.’

      And he told her how Dario had spoken of the stock market and the rules to which he had been unable to adhere.

      ‘I could, though,’ he said. And he told her about his rehabilitation in Provence. ‘I was going to come out of the legion after five years, but they were good to me there and when my contract came around again I felt it right to serve for another five years.’

      He told her how he had started to make his money, and then she believed that it was all his own.

      ‘Your comrade?’

      ‘Dario,’ Roman said. ‘He is still in the legion.’

      ‘Do you keep in touch with him?’

      ‘I do,’ he said.

      He turned off the light, gave her a brief kiss on the lips and then left. She lay in the dark, and slept. A sleep so deep that when she awoke Anya took a moment to realise where she was.

      The previous night’s events felt like a dream.

      She went into her bag for her phone to find out the time, but remembered that Mika had it. She went into the bathroom and freshened up.

      Did she dress for breakfast?

      Was it even breakfast time?

      She pulled on her robe and hurried out. She had class at eight and then rehearsals.

      ‘Bonjour, mademoiselle,’ Josie called out.

      ‘Bonjour, madame,’ Anya called back, and then wandered out to the balcony where Roman sat, reading the newspaper.

      Actually, he lounged in a chair.

      He was wearing only black jeans and he hadn’t shaved and when he looked up and gave her a smile, Anya had to fight not to go and sit on his lap and kiss him.

      ‘What time is it?’ she asked.

      ‘It is almost seven, I was going to get you up then,’ Roman said as she took a seat at the breakfast table. There were flowers in a vase and baguettes and pastries and a large silver jug, presumably coffee.

      ‘How did you sleep?’ Anya asked him.

      ‘I always sleep well,’ he told her. ‘So you don’t have to ask. If that changes I’ll let you know. What about you?’

      ‘I never sleep well,’ she answered. ‘But I did in the end. My room’s beautiful. You didn’t choose the furnishings, I take it?’

      Roman shook his head. ‘The apartment came as it was, even the staff! That was one of the most appealing things about it. I would have had no idea how to decorate it.’

      ‘Well, it’s perfect,’ Anya said, and reached for the coffee pot to fill her cup, and then frowned when delectable hot chocolate poured out.

      ‘I would like green tea,’ she said, cross with him for the temptation.

      ‘Sure,’ Roman said, and went to call out to Josie, but she was already there, bringing out some yoghurt and fresh berries, which she added to the collection of food on the table as Roman put in Anya’s order.

      ‘It might be a while,’ Roman said when Josie left. ‘She will have to go to the shop to get some.’

      ‘Oolong tea, then, or just—’

      ‘Do I look like a man who keeps a herbal tea collection?’ Roman interrupted.

      ‘I’m СКАЧАТЬ