Branded as Trouble

Once Valerie and she had been close, too, since Vita had raised Valerie as her own. But it didn’t matter that Mila had once thought of her as a sister because she hadn’t seen Valerie in years. That didn’t matter to Tate, either. He just seemed to want a connection with anyone who was blood kin with his mother.

Something Mila understood, because she missed having that with her father.

Plus, Tate knew that Mila kept a spare key in the verbena plant so he’d be able to get into her house. She checked, and it wasn’t there now.

“I’m going inside to see if he’s here,” she assured Roman.

Mila got the door unlocked as fast as she could, and her gaze fired all around. Her house wasn’t that large—two bedrooms, a living room, kitchen and bath. So, it didn’t take her long to check out the place.

And spot him.

Tate was on the sofa, asleep on top of her Buttercup dress.

“He’s here,” she told Roman.

Roman said something she didn’t catch. Profanity mixed with a prayer, maybe. “Put him on the phone. I want to talk to him.” That didn’t sound like a prayer, though. More like the profanity tone.

Mila was about to tell him to take it easy on the boy, but she froze. “Oh, God.”

That’s because she spotted something else. Something in Tate’s hand.

A bottle of pills.

Tate didn’t have a firm grip on it. In fact, he didn’t have a firm grip on anything. His hand was limp, the bottle resting on its side in his palm, and he was as white as a sheet of paper.

“Call an ambulance,” she managed to say to Roman.

Mila dropped the phone and ran to Tate.

CHAPTER THREE

THAT WHOLE LIFE flashing before a dying person’s eyes applied to fathers, too. Roman now had firsthand proof of that.

In that moment when Mila had shouted for him to call an ambulance, Roman saw it all. His childhood on the ranch. His screw-ups. His arrest for underage drinking. Another arrest for reckless driving only a year after that. The arguments with his parents those things had caused.

He was probably being punished for all the crap he’d done, but Roman wished to hell that the powers that be had taken that punishment out on him instead of Tate.

In that life-flash, Roman had seen Valerie telling him that she was pregnant. They’d both been just eighteen and in their senior year of high school. He’d felt the sickening feeling of dread that this was yet something else he had screwed up. The feeling hadn’t lasted though, not after Tate had been born. The moment Roman held his boy in his arms, he knew he’d never love anything or anybody the way he did his son.

And now he might lose him.

Tate was breathing, that much he knew, and Mila had said something about Tate holding a bottle of medicine. Roman didn’t know what he’d taken or how much, but he knew what this meant.

His son had attempted suicide.

Hell.

Roman was damn perceptive when it came to his job, but he hadn’t seen that his own son was on the brink of doing something like this. It made the fight at school and being expelled fade way, way to the background.

“How far out are you now?” Mila asked from the other end of the phone line.

Roman wasn’t sure he could speak because his chest and throat were so tight. “About five miles. Anything from the doctor yet?”

Though he knew the answer to that. If there’d been something, anything, Mila would have told him. After he’d called the ambulance about thirty minutes ago, he had called her right back. She hadn’t gotten off the phone with him since then and had been updating him every step of the way.

The ambulance’s arrival.

The drive to the hospital, which thankfully was only a few minutes from her house.

And Tate and her going into the emergency room.

The medics had immediately whisked Tate away, but they hadn’t allowed Mila in there with him. Instead, she was outside the examining room.

“Nothing yet from the doctor, but I’m certain that Tate will be fine,” Mila said. It was hard to tell if she was BS-ing, but Roman decided to take her at her word. He just couldn’t wrap his mind around anything else right now. “Focus on your driving,” she added. “Make sure you get here in one piece because we don’t need another Granger in the hospital.”

That was for sure. One was more than enough.

He wanted to know if Mila had learned what meds Tate had taken. Or where he’d gotten them. But again, if she knew something she would have told him.

Unless it was bad, that is.

People kept all kinds of old meds in their bathrooms. Maybe Tate had even gotten into the Percocet that was left over from when Roman wrenched his knee. Or, hell, he could have gotten it from some kid at school or stolen something from the nurse who’d been cleaning his busted lip. Tate could have taken something that could kill him.

Roman heard his too-fast breath, felt himself losing focus, so he forced himself to keep talking to Mila. “Were you able to get in touch with Sophie and Garrett?”

Mila didn’t jump to answer that. Something that caused Roman’s chest to tighten even more. “Yes, Sophie’s here,” she finally said. Then Mila hesitated again. “You want me to put her on the phone?”

It was tempting because he loved his sister, and it might have soothed him to hear her voice, but Sophie was mega-pregnant, and there was nothing in his own voice that would soothe her. He damn sure didn’t want her going into early labor because she was upset.

“No. I’m taking my exit now,” Roman told her. “I’m almost there. Meet me at the ER doors so I know where to go. Oh, and try to get Sophie to sit down or something.”

He hit the end call button and started the last couple of miles. They crawled by. Too bad, though, that his thoughts weren’t crawling. Apparently, the life-flash was the only thing that was going to fall into the fast category today because his truck suddenly felt as if it were in snail gear. It didn’t help that Mila was right. He had to focus on his driving because it wouldn’t help anyone if he got in an accident.

It was the second time today that he screeched into a parking lot, and he hit the ground running as soon as he brought his truck to a stop. It took another lifetime for him to run to the ER, and just as he had known she would be, Mila was there.

“This way,” she said, and he pulled her into a quick hug as they ran. “The doctor is still in there with him.”

Roman got another hug from Sophie, who wasn’t sitting but rather pacing outside an examining room while she had her hands on her back. Roman didn’t knock. He just threw open the examining room door and went in.

Only to see Tate barfing into a bedpan.

His son was alive, conscious and sitting up. Roman wasn’t sure how many prayers of thanks he said in those next few seconds, but he had to have set a world record.

Tate wasn’t alone. In addition to the doctor, a nurse was there. Wanda Kay Busby, and she immediately smiled and winked at him. Roman hoped she had something in her eye to make her do that, because the last thing he wanted right now was a flirting nurse.

Or a cop.

There was one of those, too. His brother-in-law, Chief Clay McKinnon, was in the corner of the room, his back against the wall. Maybe Clay was there as family, but it was also possible he’d been called in because this was a suicide attempt.

Roman went to Tate and put his arms around him. He couldn’t tell if Tate was glad to see him because he was still heaving.

“Does your son have any known allergies?” the doctor asked. His name was Alan Sanchez, and Roman had known him most of his life. In fact, Dr. Sanchez had stitched him up a few times.

Roman shook his head and tried to think. “Sometimes dairy upsets his stomach.” Which probably wasn’t relevant here, but Roman’s thoughts were all over the place. He sorted through the tornado in his head and came up with some questions for Tate.

“Are you okay? What did you take? And why the heck did you do this?”

Tate couldn’t answer because he was still barfing.

Dr. Sanchez pulled a medicine bottle from his pocket and showed it to Roman. Not prescription stuff, but rather over-the-counter meds. Cramp Relief Nighttime, Roman read from the label. Beneath it was something that got Roman’s attention: “Nighttime relief of menstrual discomfort, PMS, bloating and headaches.”

“Tate took period medicine?” Roman asked, certain that he’d missed something.

“Well, it’s also a general painkiller,” the doctor explained, “and it has a sleep aid in it. A medicine similar to Benadryl. That’s why Mila wasn’t able to wake him when she found him in her house.”

“Period medicine?” Roman repeated. That told him just how bad off Tate was for him to down something like that. “Why did you do this?” he said to Tate.

Tate lifted his shoulder, which wasn’t an answer. At least not the answer Roman wanted to hear.

“He’ll be drowsy for a while,” the doctor went on. “We pumped his stomach, but that was just a precaution. We think he only took three. While that exceeds the recommended dosage, it’s not enough to be life threatening.”

All right. That was an answer Roman wanted to hear. Tate was going to be okay. The relief flooded through him, but it was quickly followed by another emotion.

Anger.

This was intentional. If he’d simply had a headache, he could have almost certainly found something else to take care of it, and he wouldn’t have needed three pills.

“Any idea how Tate got that cut on his mouth?” Dr. Sanchez asked.

That didn’t help with the anger that was quickly eating up the relief. “School fight.” Roman wouldn’t mention the other stuff about Tate being expelled and running away. No, that was something he would discuss with his son as soon as he quit puking.

“Why don’t we step outside and go over some paperwork?” the doctor added. “It’s going to be a while before Tate feels like talking.”

Yeah, and he might never feel like talking to his father. Well, that was about to change, because Roman was tired of sweeping all that teenage angst under the rug. It had brought them here, to this, and it was going to end.

Clay stayed put with Tate and the nurse, and Roman let the doctor take him by the arm and lead him into the hall. The moment the door opened, Mila was right there. No Sophie, though.

“How is he?” Mila immediately asked. “God, Roman, I’m so sorry. I swear, I didn’t know he would do anything like this or I wouldn’t have left that spare key in the verbena.”

Roman waved off her apology. “Thanks for finding him and getting him here. Where’s Sophie?”

Mila tipped her head to the other end of the hall. “Cafeteria. She’s getting a snack. But she’ll be back in a few minutes.”

Good. Then he’d make her sit. Maybe even talk her into going home with her husband. That would clear out the cop along with getting Sophie into a more comfortable place where she could get some rest.

Roman turned to the doctor. “Did those pills damage Tate in any way?”

“Probably not. At most he’ll have an upset stomach and be sleepy.” He looked down at a tablet where it appeared he’d made some notes on a medical form. “But I do need to keep him at least overnight. Tate will also need a psychiatric evaluation.”

Those two words felt like a punch to the gut. Obviously, the doctor thought this was more than teenager angst to request something like that.

“You’ll want to give Tate some time, too,” the doctor went on. “He seemed scared of what your reaction would be. Terrified, actually. When he first woke up, he asked me not to tell you. In fact, he said he didn’t want to see you.”

Roman felt Mila’s hand on his arm, probably because he was breathing like an asthmatic. His son was terrified of him. Great. Something else to add to his résumé of shitty screw-ups. He’d been right to worry about that when Valerie had told him she was pregnant.

“He’s a teenager,” Mila whispered to him. That was likely meant to comfort him and explain all of this away, but nothing could do that right now.

The doctor wisely gave him a moment by looking over his notes again. “It’ll take me a while to set up the psychiatric eval. A while to get him into a room, too. In the meantime, if you want to check on your mom, the nurse will stay here with Tate.”

Because Mila still had her hand on his arm, Roman felt her fingers tense. “I didn’t tell him,” Mila jumped to say. “I thought he already had enough on his mind for the drive here.”

Roman huffed. She was right, he had had enough on his mind, but he wasn’t someone who needed sheltering. “What’s wrong with my mother?”

Even now, just saying the word mother caused him to have a bad reaction. That’s because there’d been bad blood between them for so long that Roman’s go-to expression upon hearing her name was to scowl.

“Sophie brought her in a little while ago,” the doctor explained. “Belle was having chest pains, shortness of breath—”

“A heart attack?” Roman interrupted.

The doctor shook his head. “It’s called stress cardiomyopathy or broken heart syndrome.”

Roman just stared at him, wondering if this was some kind of sick joke. Apparently not. On the day his son had swallowed PMS meds, his sixty-year-old mom had had a broken heart reaction.

“It happens to some women her age,” the doctor explained. “We’re not sure why, but I’ll be keeping her for a day or two, as well. She’s in room 112, and you can look in on her now if you like.”

That was an offer that most sons could answer with a resounding yes, but he hesitated. “She doesn’t always have a good reaction when it comes to me. I don’t want to upset her.”

Again, like his son.

Roman was seeing a pattern here.

The doctor made a sound of agreement because he almost certainly knew all about Belle’s and his parting of the ways. A feud that’d come to a head when Roman and Valerie had refused to get married just because she was pregnant. His mother had considered that an embarrassment and a “slimeball” thing to do.

Her exact words.

It hadn’t helped, either, when Valerie had run out and left Roman to raise Tate alone. Ditto for not helping—the fact his mother and he were both mule-headed. But, by God, Roman had gotten plenty tired of having her judge him.

The doctor made some more notes. The way this was going, he might be scheduling a psych eval for Roman, too.

“Hold off on seeing Belle, then,” Dr. Sanchez said a moment later. “She might ask about Tate, and it’s not a good idea to tell her about him just yet. Let’s wait a few more hours until I’m certain she’s stabilized.”

Good idea. A few more hours might give Roman a chance to find level ground. The tornado was starting to spin in his head again.

The doctor looked at him. “I’ll need you to fill out some insurance paperwork.” He pointed to the reception desk at the front of the waiting room. “Just see the woman who’s seated there and she’ll get you started.”

Dr. Sanchez walked away, leaving Roman alone with Mila. He was too exhausted to figure out the right thing to say to her, but it was obvious she was worried.

“Bad day?” she asked. She didn’t crack a smile. In fact, Roman wasn’t sure he’d ever seen Mila smile. But this seemed to be some attempt at humor.

He didn’t smile, either, but yeah, it’d been a bad day. His son’s life was a mess, and Roman wasn’t even sure how to fix it. Now, his mother was having heart problems. A problem with a weird name, at that. And even though it was minor in the grand scheme of things, his side was hurting—bad.

“Maybe this means you’ve gotten all the awful stuff out of the way,” Mila added. “That’s what my mom always says, anyway.” She made a face. “Except she says you have to flush the toilet to get rid of the poop and have clean water. My mom says a lot of weird things,” she added in a mumble.

She looked at him, her expression changing, and Mila reached out for him. Not as some kind of comforting gesture, either, but with both arms. And she lurched toward him. At first, Roman didn’t know why she’d done that.

Until somebody turned off the lights in his head.

And he dropped to the floor like a sack of rocks.

CHAPTER FOUR

“I DON’T WANT whipped cream in my boxer shorts,” Roman mumbled. He wasn’t sure why, but it was hard to speak.

“All right,” someone agreed. “Seems like a reasonable request to me.”

It took Roman several moments to process the comment. It wasn’t easy because, in addition to it being hard to speak, it was also hard to think. His head was whirling like an F5 tornado. But, despite the whirl, he thought he might recognize the voice. Not Tiffany Ann, standing in his living room.

But rather his mother.

Hell. Even in a dream he didn’t want to talk to his mother about whipped cream sex, so Roman forced himself to wake up. Maybe there was glue or something on his eyes because he had to struggle to get them open.

Bad idea.

The light stabbed in his eyeballs and therefore his head. In addition to the whirling thoughts and dreams, he was also in pain.

“Would you like whipped cream somewhere else?” she asked. “Maybe like in some hot chocolate or on a piece of pie?”

Definitely his mother.

Roman got his eyes open again, expecting the remnants of the dream to vanish. It didn’t. His mother was right there, standing next to his bed. Except it wasn’t even his bed. Not his room, either.

“Where am I?” he asked.

“The hospital. We both are.”

That’s when he noticed his mom was indeed wearing a hospital gown. And he remembered. She’d been admitted for the heart problem with the funny name. His son was here, as well, and that caused Roman to jackknife to a sitting position so he could check on Tate.

Another bad idea.

Because the pain wasn’t just in his head. It was also in his side where the bronco had kicked him. His mom caught on to his shoulders and eased him back down on the mattress. Roman was already going in that direction, anyway, because he didn’t have a choice. He had to get control of the pain before he could walk.

“Your appendix ruptured a couple of hours ago,” Belle explained. “You had surgery.”

Yes, he remembered falling. Remembered the concern he’d seen on Mila’s face. But he didn’t have a single memory of the surgery. Later, he would want to know more about that, but for now there was something a lot more pressing.

“Where’s Tate?” he asked. “I want to see him.”

“He’s with the doctor right now, but he’ll be done in a few minutes.” Belle motioned toward the two other beds that were to Roman’s left. “Doc Sanchez fixed up this room for all of us. Isn’t it nice? It used to be two rooms, but it had one of those squishy dividers that he pulled back. This way we can be together but still have two bathrooms.”

Maybe it was the fog in his head or the pain, but Roman didn’t get it. “All of us? Here? Together?”

Belle nodded, smiled. “He thought it would be a good idea for you, me and Tate to be close to each other.”

It wasn’t a good idea at all. “He knows that you and I don’t get along,” Roman reminded her.

Belle shrugged. “Maybe he thought it’d be good therapy or something.”

Well, it was or something, all right. It was stupid.

As soon as he could, Roman would request another room. Better yet, he’d get out of here the moment he could stand up. No way did he want to be trapped with the woman he’d left town to escape.

“You want me to see if the nurse will bring you some whipped cream now?” Belle asked. “That’s all you’ve been mumbling about since they brought you in from recovery.”

Hell’s bells. He hoped he hadn’t said too much. Of course, unlike Tate, his mom probably didn’t know what a Brazilian strip wax was.

“But I have to tell you,” she added. Any time she started a sentence with those six words, Roman knew that nagging would shortly follow. “I think it’s a bad idea to eat all that sugar right after surgery. Of course, you always were a rebel like that even when it wasn’t good for you. I don’t think you can argue with me about that.”

Oh, he could, but Roman chose not to.

“No whipped cream,” he assured her. He glanced down at her arm and realized she had an IV pole next to her. An IV needle in her arm, too. Roman had one, as well, but he wasn’t standing. “Shouldn’t you be in bed?”

“Probably, but when you started talking, I thought we should have a little chat first before Tate gets here.”

Roman groaned. “I don’t want to hear anything from you about Valerie and me not getting married—”

“Agreed.”

It was a good thing Roman was lying down because he would have collapsed from shock. In the past thirteen years, his mother had never passed up an opportunity to harp on him. Maybe she was drugged up or something.

Heck, maybe he was drugged up.

“Tate needs peace and quiet right now,” she went on. “I’m supposed to have that, too. And I’m betting the doc won’t like it if you’re all agitated and wanting to eat whipped cream. Might cause you to pop a stitch. Anyway, I thought we could each come up with a safe topic to discuss like the weather or whipped cream. We could even have our own safe words.”

“Safe words?” Maybe his mom would have known about a Brazilian, after all. Mercy, he hoped not. He had enough unresolved issues with her without putting that in his head.

“Yes, you know like bumfuzzle or Dippity-do,” Belle explained. “Words that we wouldn’t normally say. We could say one of them if the conversation is taking a direction that might hit one of our hot buttons. Then we would immediately stop talking about whatever it is we were talking about. I mean a complete verbal shutdown on the subject.” She paused. “You don’t use Dippity-do in conversation, do you? Because if you do, we could go with another word.”

Roman was certain that even with the pain and fog, he managed a blank stare. “I don’t use Dippity-do. I don’t know what the hell it is.”

“Hair gel,” she said as if the answer were obvious. “And bumfuzzle is when you’re confused. My granddaddy used to say it. But I have to tell you, Roman, you’ve got more hot buttons than I do. Any little thing will tick you off. You’ve always been that way, and I think it’s gotten worse—”

“Dippity-do,” Roman snarled through clenched teeth. He didn’t expect it to work. But it did.

Belle hushed—a complete verbal shutdown on the subject—but she did add an indignant wobble of her head as if disapproving of the shushing.

“Well, this was your idea.” He stared at her, daring her to disagree with that, or with anything else he might add to it.

“Bumfuzzle,” she mumbled.

Good. They’d reached a truce. A weird one with words he didn’t especially want to say aloud, but the truce was in the nick of time.

Because Tate came into the room.

His boy looked better than he had when Roman had seen him earlier. Tate wasn’t throwing up at least. But he was in a wheelchair, and Sophie was pushing him. That caused Roman to try to jolt from the bed again to help her, but Sophie waved him off.

“Don’t even think about getting out of that bed,” Sophie scolded Roman. “You scared the living daylights out of all of us when you collapsed. How’s your head? You smacked it pretty hard when you hit the floor.”

Roman touched his fingers to his forehead. Yep, that was the source of the pain, and he remembered hitting it. Also remembered Mila trying to break his fall.

Sophie maneuvered the wheelchair close to the middle bed, and Tate got out of the chair and onto it.

“Are you okay with this sleeping arrangement?” she asked, glancing at all three of them.

Roman would have slept in a pit of rattlesnakes if he could be near his son. Since there was a sudden lump in his throat, he settled for nodding. Tate nodded, as well. Maybe because he figured Roman wouldn’t chew him out in front of Belle. He wouldn’t. But not because Belle was there. He needed to have a long, serious talk with Tate, but he had to keep his temper out of it.

Even if he was hurt and furious that Tate had done what he had.

“Are you okay?” Roman asked him.

Tate shrugged and grunted. It was more of a response than Roman normally got so he’d take it.

“The doctor said he’d be in soon to talk to you,” Sophie explained. “And a nurse will be by to take Tate to meet the therapist.”

Tate grunted again, a sound that could have meant anything. Roman hoped it was a sound of approval because Tate certainly needed to see someone.

“Garrett and Nicky will be here in a couple of minutes,” Sophie went on. She dropped down into the wheelchair and rubbed her belly. “Clay’s on his way, too. They won’t stay long, though, because visiting hours end at nine.”

Roman tried to check the time, but he wasn’t wearing his watch. He didn’t have his phone, either. But since it was dark outside, it had to be past eight.

“Is Clay gonna arrest me?” Tate asked.

Sophie glanced at Roman and Belle again, maybe to see if either of them had put that idea in Tate’s head. Roman certainly hadn’t. Belle shook her head, as well, and got back in her bed.

“No, of course not,” Roman assured him, and Clay had better not try, either. He wasn’t sure if attempted suicide was illegal or not, but it didn’t matter. “Any idea how long we’ll all be here?” he added to Sophie.

“If she doesn’t have another episode and agrees to bed rest at home, Mom will be released tomorrow. Tate will stay until you’re discharged. That’ll be two or three days, depending on how you behave,” Sophie quickly added when Roman opened his mouth to complain that he didn’t want to spend that much time in a hospital. “If you try to rush this, you could mess up your stitches.”

That bit off whatever complaint he was about to make. Plus, there was a silver lining to this that he was just now seeing. Once Belle was discharged, Tate and he would be in here alone. Where they could maybe talk.

There was a soft knock on the door, and since it was already open, Roman saw Mila. Her expression was as tentative as the look in her eyes. As it usually was whenever she was around him. She was already nibbling on her bottom lip.

“Come in,” Sophie insisted. She went to Mila and pulled her into her arms for a hug. They’d been best friends for as long as Roman could remember, and it was clear their friendship was still strong.

Roman wished he could feel the same way about Mila. After all, she’d been damn good to Tate, and today she’d probably saved his life. He owed her for that, but sometimes when he looked at her, she reminded him of Valerie and the heart-kicking he’d taken from her.

When Mila and Sophie finished the hug, Mila lifted a bag. “My mom sent gifts. Sorry,” she immediately added. “They’re wrapped so I don’t know what they are.”

She took out a pink box for Belle, a blue one for Tate and a bright red one that she handed to Roman. He was a little surprised that Vita would remember to include him in the gift giving. Or, for that matter, that she even knew he was in the hospital. Of course, everyone in town probably already knew. If they’d had a local TV channel, it would have been on the news.

Belle opened her box right away and took out what appeared to be a small jar of ointment. “It says on the label it’s for healing.” She unscrewed the lid, smelled it, and some of the color blanched from her face. She quickly resealed it. “Well, it’s the thought that counts. Please tell your mother thank you.”

After the face his grandmother had made, Tate was a little hesitant opening his. He touched it the way a person might if they were trying to avoid poison ivy. But there was nothing smelly inside. He took out a yo-yo. Tate glanced at him, Belle, Sophie and then Mila as if they might have an explanation for the gift choice.

None of them did.

Roman wasn’t sure Tate even knew what it was, but his son forced a smile. “Please tell Mrs. Banchini thanks and that I like it.”

Mila smiled, not forced, and all attention then turned to Roman. He nearly feigned being too weak to deal with opening presents, but one of them would just open it for him. He was going to have to man-up and deal with whatever Vita had given him. Considering, though, that the woman put curses on people, he approached his with the same caution that Tate had.

There was a gold foil wrapper inside.

At first, Roman thought it was candy, but no, it was a condom.

He quickly shut the lid, cleared his throat. “It’s, uh, personal,” he said because everyone was clearly waiting for the big reveal. “Tell Vita thanks,” he added, and hoped it sounded sincere.

He wasn’t.

Did the woman expect him to be having sex while he was in the hospital? Good gravy. He really had to do something to tone down his badass reputation.

“Is it an egg with poop on it?” Mila asked. “Because my mom likes to send stuff like that. She gave me chicken poop earlier when—” She stopped and suddenly got very interested in looking in the empty bag that had once held the gifts.

Roman didn’t think there was anything else interesting in there, but he did wonder why Mila hadn’t finished. And why Vita had given her chicken shit. He had no intention of asking her either of those things—he could probably find out from Sophie, anyway—and besides, they were interrupted.

A nurse stepped into the doorway. Not the Busby sister, but it was someone Roman knew well. Alicia Dearman. He’d lost his virginity to her way back when, and judging from the smile she gave him, she was remembering that in great detail. Roman remembered, too, and it wasn’t something he wanted to repeat.

He could almost feel his testosterone levels drop with that thought.

Still, Alicia was a barracuda in bed. And yes, teeth were involved, and even if he hadn’t just had surgery, he wasn’t looking for sex. He wanted to focus on his son.