Page 40 of Still Yours
“Nah.” His head pops into the interior, and I hear an added, “You’re good.”
“Little fucker,” I mutter, but get back to work.
“Put your back into it.” Rome comes up behind me, and I jolt.
“I thought you’d gone.”
“The stealth I used to steal us beers from my pop’s cooler never left.” He tosses another pitchfork he pulled from somewhere between his hands.
“Funny. I was just thinking about our youth.” I toss more loose hay into a pile that a handy machine will collect later. I could use this moment to ask why we aren’t using machines to pile hay bales onto the truck, but I assume Rome has me doing manual labor as passive-aggressive punishment for not coming around more often.
It’s a legitimate grudge, so I keep my mouth shut.
Better than facing the agony etching across Noa’s face when she confirmed she’ll never forgive me.
“We had some good times,” Rome says as he arcs a tangle of dried grass onto the growing mound. He glances over his shoulder. “Not like these soft jellyfish men who think online comments hold more power than good, honest work.”
I allow a gruff laugh. “You sound like your pops.”
“Shit,” he drawls, then sticks his pitchfork into the dirt. “I do, don’t I?”
“He harped on us all the damn time for being boneless fuckheads who’d rather chase girls than muck horse stalls.”
“And look where it got me.” Rome spreads his arms. “A farmland all to myself and my best buddy mucking stalls for me.”
“You better be joking.”
Rome chuckles. “Today, I am. Go on with Devon. You should learn the ropes at unloading at the Merc since I heard you’ll be here for a while.” The laugh lines around his eyes and mouth, deepened by his constant presence under the sun despite his relatively young twenty-seven years on this earth, soften. “I’m real sorry about your ma.”
“Yeah.” My ego deflates. “So am I.”
“I had no idea. Otherwise, I would’ve found some way to let you know.”
I nod, believing him.
“Though you’re a hard man to contact these days with all those suits surrounding you.”
“Those suits are a lot, I know, but they allow me to keep my private moments private.”
Rome’s easygoing stare narrows. “From what I’ve read, you’re making your teamwork overtime. What happened over there? Did it become too much for you?”
Deflecting, I say, “I didn’t know you kept up with the gossip.”
“Nice try. I may be a lowly farmhand, but I can read you as easily as I could a decade ago. What’d you do?”
“Got a bit too public with my irritation.” I shrug it off, handing him the pitchfork. He takes it willingly enough but keeps his stare pointed.
“I admit, I worried about you when I heard. Your infamous temper and all that.”
“They don’t see much of it over there. Don’t worry about it.”
“Oh yeah? Because here it was a real problem.” Rome slides his gaze to Devon and back, then steps closer. “I took Devon under my wing after he got too into drugs and fuckin’ flipped a switch in his personality. His momma—Serena Lanson, remember her? She couldn’t find him one night after one of these kids’ stupid ragers at an abandoned barn on the outskirts of town. Dogs from a search party found him sleeping by thecreek with a nice purple egg on the side of his head from falling and hitting it on a rock. I offered to take him in, teach him the ways of old, and get him away from temptation. Kind of like what I have to do with you now.”
“I’m not a dumb kid experimenting with illegal narcotics. I can handle myself just fine.”
“It’s not my responsibility to keep you on the up-and-up.” Rome’s gray eyes harden into metal. “I’m doing your lovely ma a favor, a lot like I’m doing for his. You’ll forgive me if I add that if you fuck around enough, I will be forced to fuck you up.”
“You’re serious?” I set my jaw when Rome doesn’t smile. “You really think I’ll lose my mind if I evenwantedto fuck over this hick town again, with what Ma’s going through? And Noa, too? Who do you think I’ve become, Rome? I’m not leaving her until Noa all but tells me to get lost, and even then, I’ll be damned if I leave. I’m not some unhinged kid, and I’m sure as hell not some heartless asshole willing to put them through hell.”
