Page 4 of Roque

“I took them from her apartment. She’s been running from me for years. I almost captured her once, three years ago in Spain. Her neighbor tipped her off that three large mafioso looking men ransacked her place.

“You stole her diaries! That is so wrong!” Chloe taps her foot angrily.

I arch a brow. “So, I did. Do you want to read her words and I’ll read mine?”

“Like reading a play?”

“I guess,” I shrug.

Chloe gingerly takes the stolen diaries from my hands. “Did you only love,her?Was she the only one?”

“I wouldn’t call what we had love. It was more of an obsession. At least I was obsessed. She… I don’t think to this day she even knows what she felt for me. I have met two other women over the years that I thought maybe there could be something…”

“What happened to them?”

“Other men found them first.”

“Ouch.”

“Exactly.”

“You could’ve taken them. I know it. Every woman who sees you wants you for herself.”

“Maybe. But I never fully pursued either. Not when the ghost of the girl I really wanted was always there lingering in the cold shadow of my frozen heart.”

“Write that down! It was brilliant!”

“Teenagers,” I mumble, but do as she says.

“So, are we doing this fucked-up Romeo and Juliet story or what?”

“Umhummm,” I clear my throat, almost smile and roll my eyes at myself for turning into such a pussy. But I begin, “Long, long ago in a land far away there was a little girl named Romina…,” I lift my hand indicating she should start with the first faded cracked leather book in her hand…