Chapter 12

After my marriage was finalized, I had gone to a therapist. One of the first things was to set up the rules for my personal life. Learn to say no.

"No." I said.

"What do you mean no?" Finn asked.

"I'm not going to the ceremony."

He opened his mouth but didn't say anything at first. Of course the only reason he was there first thing in the morning was because of Roman.

"I understand that Roman wants to prove he's different from Tanner. I know he and AJ are friends and all but I need to decide, Finn."

He sat across from me on the bed. Both of us sitting Indian style, my hands tracing the design in the covers and Finn was looking at me with a deep frown. Finn had come over early in the morning, no doubt having been told by Roman what I said the night before.

"I know you want to decide, Delaney." I shivered as he said my name in his thick Irish accent. "But you have to understand that all we are doing is looking out for you."

"You've already proven that I can trust you with my life. But how do I know I can have that with Roman? When he said I belonged to him, it was like hearing Tanner say all those things all over again. I was his, I am his, I belong to him, it was like I was hearing Tanner say them again. I will never be anyone else's. But what about me belonging to me?"

I had to straighten out my left leg, the pain was shooting into my hip and my toes were tingling. Finn grabbed my ankle and pulled me closer him, my leg resting over his lap, his hands on my hips. He leaned forward and kissed my forehead.

"You will always belong to you, Del." He pushed my hair from my face. "I just wish we'd worked out. Maybe you wouldn't feel this way. I'd make you happy."

"We can't live in the past forever, Finn. We've tried twice and both times it never seemed to work out. You need to find someone you can protect. Not just me."

"Yeah, do you know anyone that needs protecting?" He asked.

I shook my head, looking down at his arms. "You'll always be my foreign brother, my Irish Bubba."

"Yeah, I know." He sighed, leaning his forehead so that it rested on mine. "You'll still be my Lego buddy, though, right?"

"Of course." I answered.

We stayed like that for a while, in this awkward lap hugging thing that felt normal for me. It wasn't the first time I had ever ended up in Finn's lap, but at least I could forget about my problems and focus in on Finn's calm demeanor, his beard scratching my skin as he shifted or me tracing the veins of his arms.

"I need to talk to Roman." I said as I rested my chin on Finn's shoulder.

He hummed, more than likely an agreement on the issue.

"Do you still want me to be with him?"

"Yes." He finally said. "If he makes you happy, but don't move on it too fast."

"You're the one that tricked us, remember?"

Of course he remembered the mean trick he pulled when Roman and I had to share a room together. He knew it was pushing my boundaries, he was doing it on purpose.

"Yeah," he sat back, his hand still resting on my hip. "But it was to see if you would end up running to me or to one of the guys."

"Why?"

"If it had bothered you too much, you would have sought me or one of the guys out to switch rooms. It was all a part of my master plan, Del. I knew Roman liked you, even before you did. There was no mistaking the way he would watch you as you walked by or talk to one of us. I saw him, I saw him watching you but he never made a move."

I swallowed, but waited.

"I knew he wanted to get to know you, so...I sort of…" he sighed.

"What?"

"It was something that I came up with when I hung out with Bayley and Sasha. I was depressed to see you without someone to light your eyes again. Banks offered to help me out."

"You wanted Banks to run into me that day?"

He bobbed his head. "Some plan, huh."

I pulled away from him. "Yeah, some plan."

"Delly, please." He reached for me. "Banks was just doing me a favor. She only did it to prove you are getting better. Delaney, please calm down."

"By tormenting me, making me feel like I was some sort of freak, a goblin?"

He frowned heavier. I got off the bed and walked to the door.

"You need to leave, Finn. I can't believe you would do something like that."

The heat in my eyes flared worse as he came closer to me. I grabbed the doorknob but I was wrapped up in a hug from hell. He held me, like always before, like the worst night of my life. He held me and I cried. I screamed obscenities at him, things I would have never called him.

Liar was just one of the worst, because Finn never lied to me. Even while I pushed at him, pushed and telling him those hateful words with every ounce of venom in my mouth that I could as I wept in misery.

"Shh, shh," he held me up as I started to go limp. "Delaney, come on, my sweet little thing." He murmured. "I only did it for you."

"It hurt!" I didn't care if I screamed in his face. His strength became mine as I turned my head to look at him. "I felt worse than ever with everything she said."

"It was never worse than with Tanner." He reminded me. "I made a bad judgment, Delaney. I wanted to help you."

The only time I had dealt with Sasha Banks, I had come out on top. The first time was meeting Roman and Seth, both of whom helped me out. Then in the boutique, when she made those comments about me, I stood up to her. I stood up to her and won, even if she was made to look like the bad guy.

"Don't do that ever again." I gripped his forearm. "I don't want to go through that again. It's bad enough that AJ likes showing me off on his public Facebook account. I don't want to deal with words she used on me."

"I promised, I won't let that happen again." He pushed the hair from my face so that he could kiss the side of my head.

We looked at the door when there was a knock. I glanced at Finn and he released me. Straightening out my hair and my shirt, I went and opened the door.

Roman, Roman stood there.

"I heard you crying, Delaney. Are you okay?" He asked.

Of course, his room was basically across the hall from mine. He had changed rooms with Seth, so it he could have heard me in my little freak out mode.

I wiped at my eyes. "Yeah, I'm good." I said. "Now, right now I mean. I just, Finn told me something that I hated."

He looked behind me. Finn stood there with arms crossed, his gaze fixed on Roman.

"What?"

"You know the Sasha Banks problem I had?" I asked.

"Yeah, I do."

"He fixed it up so she would say that stuff to me."

"Oh, I see." He said in a low voice.

"But, even though it pissed me off, I did come out with a stronger sense of self, of self worth. And you proved to be a nice guy for helping me with my dropped papers."

That slow grin came back, it spread up to Roman's gray eyes while he looked down at me.

"I'll leave you two to it." Finn announced. "But remember, we're all looking out for you, Del. Brothers have to watch out for their little sisters, to protect them." He rubbed my back. "That's all I was doing."

"Yeah, just go, Finn. I think Roman and I need to talk for a little bit." I wiped my eye again.

"I'm her Irish Bubba, remember that, Reigns." Finn said before walking out of the room.

"Yeah, I got it." The Samoan man said before he turned to me with raised eyebrows.

"Just a reminder of where we are as friends." I stepped back so he could walk in.

He stepped into the room and I closed the door behind him. Just as I was about ready to turn around to ask him a question, it was quickly forgotten.

What I did remember was his body flushed up against mine, pressing me into the door and his mouth on my. My hands were trapped between us, my fingers closed around his Adidas shirt and his knee was between my legs, nearly holding me off the floor. Ever smell receptor was firing off at the spice of his cologne, his fresh manly smell filled my nose, which entered into my lungs anytime I tried to breathe through my nose.

He bit my lip, and growled. His large hands speared their way through the strands of my hair, or what he could get to because my head was pressed so hard into the door that it was a wonder it didn't crack.

Just as sudden as that passionate kiss was, it was over. My mind whirled with electric impluses, the taste of Roman's tongue danced across mine as I continued to hold onto his shirt as if holding onto a life raft.

"Delaney, I'm so sorry for what I did." Roman said, his head pressed to mine was he leaned on his left arm over my head, using his right to push my hair back from my face.

"What did you do?" I asked like an idiot.

"Last night, what did I do that you didn't like?"

"I'm not yours." I answered.

But of course he would pull away at that. I missed the heat that his body covered mine with. His soft skin moved away from mine and I was able to stand on my own two feet.

"Is that what it was about? Because I said you were mine?"

"Yes." I looked down at his sneakers. "I was always someone's something, someone's wife, someone's sister. I just felt that I didn't belong to me anymore."

He took my chin in hand and forced me to look up.

"You won't be mine, if I'm not yours in return. Equal and united."

"We're not getting married, Roman. You made it sound like we are."

He laughed as I batted his hand on my face. "Yeah. But let me know what you want between us. I already know your brothers don't mind me being with you."

"So you did talk to AJ? He agreed that it was okay for you and me to be together?"

"I've talked to all of them, and they all agreed that I was worthy to have you as you are. That smile that lights up, those ocean blue eyes."

"Roman," I sighed.

But he continued. "The beauty that you are. I want you, but only if you will have me in return. A divorced man with a daughter back home, a heavy schedule and a more than average public image to uphold. You'll have to deal with all of that and then some."

He had a lot going for him, he had a lot on his plate. He had a lot of problems himself. I didn't see it. I only saw mine.

So I was just going to complicate it even more.

"No sex," I said. "Sex only makes things more uncomfortable. And this only stays within The Club, I don't want anyone outside our immediate group knowing." I said. "Just for right now, I just want to get to know you better, get to know your daughter and work on whatever attraction we have, that isn't sexual."

He didn't nod, he kissed me.


Well that took a turn I didn't expect. What did you guys think?