Bane (Sinners of Saint #4)(57)

Not until now.

Three years ago, Pam had gotten me a bow bracelet from Tiffany’s for my seventeenth birthday and Darren had shelled out the big bucks for a weekend on a yacht for my friends and me. I invited fifty kids to the party, and some of their parents attended as chaperones, too. “For mingling and networking purposes, although making sure no one gets pregnant is also a priority”—Pam had giggled plastically, feeling blue-blooded like the people of Todos Santos for a hot minute. I was dating Emery back then, and I remember how triumphant she’d felt. She even went back to letting me calling her Mom.

It was the year when, for the first time, I skipped visiting my dad’s grave and placing the Kit Kat we used to share every morning on his tombstone.

It was the first and last year I truly felt normal, accepted, and popular.

Now, for my twentieth birthday, I decided to go back to the basics and celebrate by munching on a Kit Kat bar in my room, reading a book that Mrs. B had loaned me.

I opted for not leaving my room, since I didn’t have a shift at Café Diem today. Pam and Darren texted me their banal happy birthday wishes. Their messages remained unanswered.

Hannah slid her annual birthday card under my door, and Mayra called. I answered, but only because she monitored my moves so closely, I was afraid she was going to tell Darren and Pam I wasn’t making progress and they would insist on upping my sessions with her.

Bane hadn’t called, and I tried not to let it affect me. I tried, but I failed.

At 9:00 p.m., I was already in my bed, my face buried in Whitney, My Love by Judith McNaught. I thought I heard something—a soft thud. I looked up from the page. I’d been stuck on the same paragraph for half an hour, because my mind kept on drifting toward Roman. How I’d let him drag me back into the world too quickly, too recklessly, and he hadn’t even bothered to wish me a happy birthday. I listened closely to the silence. Nothing. My eyes dropped back to the page.

Click.

I glanced at the window. The usual oak tree stood there, staring back at me. I flipped a page, knowing I should pay more attention, and that the juicy part was unfolding in front of my eyes, when…

Click.

This time I stood up.

Click. Click.

I paced to the window, climbed on the window seat on my knees, and yanked my window up, slanting my gaze to the back of our garden, which was overlooking Mrs. Belfort’s maze. I saw a shadow of a man standing under the tree. His face was turned down, and he was wearing a ball cap. But the stance, height, and attire seemed familiar: Cargo pants and a faded black surfer shirt with holes in it.

“Roman?” My eyebrows collapsed into a frown.

“You asleep?”

His voice in my ears felt like a sweet promise, and that’s when I realized how much I’d missed him. How much I’d needed him to acknowledge my existence today, of all days, even though most time, I didn’t want to remember I was still alive.

“Reading.” I cleared my throat, trying to sound indifferent.

“On your birthday? Very rock ’n roll.”

My heart began to drum faster. He’d remembered.

I noticed he was swinging a bag in his hand, but didn’t want to be presumptuous.

“Why don’t you go back to bed? All this rebelling must be exhausting.” He was bouncing on the balls of his feet, looking less than his pissed-off, take-no-prisoners self. I wanted him to look up and drink me in with his green eyes no less than I wanted my next breath.

“What?” I snorted.

“Go back to what you were doing, Jesse, and pretend I’m not here. I just wanted to make sure you were in your room and that your window was not closed. Giving you a heart attack for your birthday is memorable, but kind of crappy, even by my very low standards.” His face was still down, and that damn ball cap denied me my current favorite view.

I knew I needed to keep my emotions in check with him, but it was easy to slip into infatuation with Bane. All the ingredients were there: funny, charming, confident, and hot as sin.

“You’re weird,” I grumbled, walking backward, my butt hitting my bed.

I heard him hop onto the metal barbecue grill outside, his boots producing a thump Pam and Darren would never hear, because their room was on the other side of the house. I bit back my smile and settled in bed, picking up my book despite knowing I’d never be able to concentrate.

A boot slid against the glass of the kitchen window. I realized that he was climbing up to my room, and my heart was doing an insane dance in my chest, completely drunk, and I wanted to yell at it to stop before we were both going to be sorry.

“Oh, shit.” He chuckled breathlessly, and the exclamation was followed by the sound of scrabbling hands against the side of the house.

My smile crumbled. I set the book down. “Are you okay?”

Another puff and scrape. “Fine. My pants are slipping down, though, and my ass is making a grand appearance. Hopefully Mrs. Belfort is not in the mood for some maze-watching.”

I giggled. “Classy.”

“Hey, you haven’t seen my ass, lady. Don’t slam it before you try it.”

“Was trying your ass ever an option?” My heart somersaulted a thousand times a minute. Maybe I was having a heart attack after all. What was happening in my chest didn’t seem natural or familiar.

“Close your eyes,” he commanded, his voice booming all over my room, so I knew that he was close. I did as I was told. This year, I’d told Pam and Darren not to get me anything. They hadn’t. I couldn’t fault them for following my request. Besides, last year Darren had tried to give me something—a new flat screen TV for my room—and I’d respectfully declined. I’d called Hannah’s son and had him pick it up, since I knew she’d never accept the gift. But whatever Roman wanted to give me—I eagerly wanted to own it.