Always And Forever

Chapter 7

It was a little past midnight when we reached our hotel. Seth had gotten here before us. He was on the couch busy scrolling through netflix. He looked up at us for a second and then went back to the screen. Dean went into the kitchen to grab an ice pack for Roman and handed it to me.

"Hey Ro, how're you doing now?" He casually asked, without making eye contact.

"Just fine." Roman snapped back.

"Come, let's get you settled in. You need to rest and get some ice on that eye." I pulled him along to his room before things got tense.

"Can you shut the door, I wanna talk to you for a second, but first help me out of this?"

I went over to help him get his shirt off over his head — being cautious not to let it touch his eye — then went back to close the door.

There was an awkward silence as Roman studied my face, trying to figure out what was on my mind.

He let out a deep breath, "You know ever since I got hurt, you've been unusually quiet. Wanna tell me what's going on?"

I wanted to tell him that Seth purposely hit the chair, but that would have been heavily consequential. Roman's eye looked pretty bad. There was no telling how far Seth could go to try and hurt him.

"I'm fine — I guess after seeing all that blood, I got a little worried."

"No, you know that's not it. You're in sports medicine, and blood doesn't scare you. There's something that you're not telling me."

"Look — it can wait. Right now, you need to lie down and put this ice on your eye." I propped up a pillow against the headboard for him.

"Wait, I need to change these pants." Roman slowly stood up, kicking off his shoes, and winced in pain as he struggled to undo his belt. He couldn't see what he was doing properly because of the swelling and looked at me for help.

"Uhh — wait here, I'll go get Dean." I was turning around, about to head to the door when Roman caught my hand.

"Kiran, I don't think Dean wants to help me undress. Quite frankly, it sounds weird just saying that." He scrunched his face.

I couldn't help but laugh at his words as I helped him loosen the buckle of his Armani belt. He changed into his shorts and tossed the other clothes over his bag.

"Come and lie down now." I helped him on the bed once again and put some of his pillows behind him. "Here, let me put this ice on your eye."

Roman moved his head away, "No — stop."

"Why? What's wrong?" I asked, raising my brow at him.

"It's too cold, I don't want it." He was more afraid of the ice pack than he was about getting stitches.

Roman's stubborness was unbelievable. I picked up his shirt from the edge of the bed, which he had taken off, and wrapped it around the ice pack.

"If you refuse me now —" I warned him, trying to keep a straight face. He continued to squirm around as I brought the ice pack closer to his face.

"Ah shit... that hurts!"

Without thinking, I cupped the side of his face with one hand. He immediately calmed down and locked eyes with mine for a good few seconds.

What the fuck am I doing? I immediately pulled back "Sorry..."

He took my hand, placing it back on his face and then closed his eyes. That same smug smile cracked across his lips. I carried on gently icing his eye until he knocked out.