Practice Makes Perfect (When in Rome, #2)

by Sarah Adams

I practically run to the driver’s side and hop inside. Worst-case scenarios are flying through my head. And then when I twist to fully look at her, and I take in her crumpled expression, fury and rage overtake me. “What did that asshole do to you? Did he hurt you? Was he inappropriate? I’m going to kill him!” I say,

“I needed to get to the truck so I could cry.” “Because you hate the tattoo?” Her smile widens, big tears pooling in her eyes. “No. Because I love it so much—and I’m so proud of myself for getting it. Thank you for making this happen, Will.” I expel a breath as the tension in my shoulders releases.

I put my hand against Annie’s jaw and chuckle, wiping the tear from her cheek. “I would have committed murder for you just now.” “I do appreciate it,” she says with a laugh too. We’re both laughing and she’s crying and I’ve never experienced this kind of emotion with anyone else. It’s so fragile and vulnerable. I feel guilty that I’m the one who gets to experience it with her. And yet I’m greedy for it at the same time.

And then my breath catches as she tugs the neck of her shirt down, revealing her beautiful bare shoulder. Well…her bare shoulder inked with the cutest small tattoo I’ve ever seen. “I got a book,” she says,

“I wanted something special to me. Just me.”

Instead, I pull away and gently pull her shirt back up over her shoulder. “It’s perfect, Annie.”

“She’s not available for photos today,” I say, cutting him off with finality. He smiles shyly. “No…sorry. I didn’t mean with her. I meant with you. I saw the BuzzFeed article, and I’m a huge fan of…well, your face.” He blushes. Behind me I hear Amelia stifle a laugh.

“Thank you, I’m flattered, but I have to decline. Have a nice day.” “I understand.” He turns to walk away and then whirls around briefly. “Can I just take a candid one from a distance?” Amelia peeks around me. “Yes, but please only photograph him from the left because that’s his good side. Gotta have the tattoos in the picture.” I turn a slow glare down at Amelia. She laughs. Dude takes this moment to snap a picture and then scurries off. “If I weren’t tasked to protect you right now…” Amelia gives me a smile that’s the equivalent of the little yellow smiley emoji baring all its teeth. “Now that the major threat is neutralized, it looks like you can say hi to Annie.”

“I remember that being easier when I was sixteen.” My eyes widen. “You snuck through windows when you were sixteen?” “You didn’t?” And then his eyes drop to my PJs and his grin widens, confirming the answer to that question for him. “You have bananas all over your pajamas.” I clear my throat lightly and regret all of my life choices. “Uh, yeah. Well, I wasn’t expecting company, so I got ready for bed as usual.”

“Your usual being banana-printed sleepwear?” He doesn’t say it in a mean way. More as a curiosity than anything. “My full name is Annabell. So my siblings call me Anna-banana. I have an entire drawer full of banana-themed PJs.” And underwear. “It’s basically the only kind of sleepwear I own. Is that pathetic? Should I burn them all?” I’ve always loved my banana PJs. I generally like who I am as a whole, but standing here in front of Dark and Mysterious Mr. Tattoo has me feeling the need to defend myself.

“Anna-banana,” says Will quietly. He couldn’t help trying out my nickname at least once. His eyes pop up to me, and I see something compellingly honest in them. “Promise me, no matter what you decide to change about yourself, this will not be one of them.” I let out a sigh of relief and then laugh before I realize his solemn expression. He’s dead serious. Not laughing in the least. He wants me to promise I’ll never stop wearing these bananas. Will a contract be drawn up next?

And…how did you know this was my room?” Will releases the hem of my shirt and steps back. “I didn’t,” he says with a crooked grin. “Every other room in the house was dark, though, so I thought I’d try my luck with this one first. It was a gamble.” “What would you have done if this was Emily or Maddie’s room?” He shrugs. “Pretended to be drunk and lost.” I laugh. “You really gave this some thought.”

“That’s the last photo that was taken.” Will looks down at me over his shoulder and his gaze holds mine. “I’m sorry, Annie.” I shrug. “It was a long time ago.” “But I’m sure it still hurts.” I breathe in—trying to push away the sudden rush of emotions his words rip from me. I don’t want to cry in front of him. Actually, I don’t cry in front of anyone.

He sets the frame down and looks at me. I’m scared he’s going to ask if I’m okay, which I really hope he doesn’t because I will absolutely cry. I’m usually the one who provides comfort in my family—which is, honestly, fine because it’s a role I chose when I was very young and my siblings were all falling apart and I didn’t quite understand why. They knew my parents better than I did—so it became my self-appointed job to lessen their pain. I could hug them. I could make them feel better. I could make sure that I never did anything to add to their worry. And then that, in turn, made me feel better.

Just when I think Will is going to make me talk through my feelings, he lightly grasps my bicep, pulling me into his chest. And that’s it. No prodding questions. He wraps his big arms around me and holds me here in my room until my body melts against his. It feels so good to be held by him. To breathe him in and feel his heart beating against my chest. Too good.

“What are you doing here, Will?”

He releases me. “I’m going out of town for a few days with Amelia for work.” I’m surprised at how disappointed I feel by this news. Which is ridiculous. Absolutely absurd. He continues, “And I realized I don’t have your phone number.”

Instead, I create a new contact and type my number in and quickly hand his phone back. He frowns lightly at the contact name and deletes Annie Walker and replaces it with Annabell. We’re not even going to acknowledge the obscene surge of butterflies that rushes through my stomach when he does.

I walk back toward the window and open it again. “Okay, well now that you have my number, feel free to…” my words trail off when I turn around and find Will toeing off his shoes and sitting on my bed “…stay.” Will leans up against my headboard, shoes kicked off, long legs stretched out, and one ankle crossed over the other. Will is in my bed. In. My. Bed! “Is that all right? If I stay?” he says with the confidence of a man who already knows the answer.

“Of course. But…why?” He came here for my phone number, and he got it. Task accomplished. He should be on his way. Will smiles at me—bemused. “To hang out with you.” “I repeat, why?” “Because you’re fun to hang out with.”

“Are you going to stay all the way over there?” he asks. I look up into his playful sparking eyes. “It’s not way over here. You make it sound like I need a map.” “Annie.” His tone is gently inquisitive. “Is something wrong?”

“It’s making you nervous that I’m on your bed, isn’t it?”

“All right. Yes, I guess it’s freaking me out a little.” I gesture between us. “I’m not good at all of this, remember?” “All of this?” “Yeah…the socializing. Friendship. Secret late-night meetings.” I pause and then add quietly. “Men in my bed.” “Right. Well, lucky for you, there’s only one man in your bed tonight. The others won’t be here until tomorrow.” We both grin. “Seriously. It’s just me. No need to be nervous. But if you want me to leave, I will. I never want to make you uncomfortable.”

He swallows, lightly clears his throat, and then turns his eyes away—searching. Most unfortunately, they land on the book that I left open on my bed. He picks it up and to my horror, starts reading it right there in front of me. Unacceptable. Because I happen to know what was written about on the page I was reading when he arrived: the couple’s first kiss. And that may sound sweet, but that’s only if you’ve never read a historical romance before.

I need to think of a discreet way to distract him. Something really casual and easy so that he sets the book down but isn’t suspicious. “Stop reading!” I blurt. Super. Really discreet. Will’s eyes flick to me, and then a grin that I’ve come to know all too well spreads on his face.

“Why, Annabell? Something wrong with me reading this book?” His eyebrows lift. “Wilton, put the book down.” His expression says it: not a chance. And then—the jerk—cuts his eyes to the page and begins reading. Aloud. “A growl sounded from the back of Captain Cutler’s throat as he stared down at Lady Eloise’s full, erotic mouth…” Without thinking, I leap onto the bed. “Oh my gosh, stop reading!” I try to yell in a whisper at Will, who then hops off the other side of the bed.

“Oh my gosh! Don’t say erection!” “Boner then?” he supplies—knowing full well that word is not better—while

“He’s a pirate! He’s used to pillaging and murdering! I’m not sure that consent is on his radar!” “And that makes it okay?” he asks, still laughing at my attempts to get the book. “No—definitely not. In real life I’d be horrified. But this is a book. And books are…different.” That last word comes out like a grunt as I manage to latch onto the book and valiantly rip it from his hand. I hold it over my head—breathing like I just finished a triathlon. I smile victoriously. “You lose!” And then we both realize I’m straddling him.

His hands are on my hips now—fixed there, unmoving. “Annie…” Will says quietly. “I need to ask—you’re a virgin, aren’t you?”

“You were so responsive, like you were experiencing passion for the first time. It was incredible.” My face heats and I drop my gaze. But Will touches my face, angling it back toward him. “Is there a reason you’ve been waiting?”

“I’ve been waiting because I’ve been too scared.” I say those words out loud for the first time in my life, never really knowing until this moment the reason why. “Actually, I’m not even sure scared is the right word. I’ve just never known anyone who made me feel safe enough to share that part of myself with them.”

“If you want to kiss me again, Annie, I want you to. Take as much as you want, and I’ll keep my hands right here”—he grips my hips again—“unless you tell me to move them.”

“Kiss me, Annie. Please.”

Before I lose the nerve, I tip forward and press my lips to his. We’ve kissed before, but this is different. It’s intimate and loaded.

Normally, by now, I’m bored in a relationship. This isn’t even a relationship with Annie, and I’m clawing out of my skin with a need to be more for her. To always be around when she needs me. To be the kind of man I never saw modeled growing up.

It was a bad idea to ever come back to Rome. To let Annie touch me. Kiss me. Turn me inside out. It was so much easier when I thought I wouldn’t like a relationship and that I didn’t want to run the risk of ending up in a position similar to my parents’. Because what other option is there for someone who endured eighteen years of a hate-filled marriage between his parents? When infidelity and emotional abuse were all I saw? There was no tenderness. No patience. There were insults and harsh reprimands and me wondering if that night was going to be the one when all their yelling was going to end with my dad hitting my mom or her leaving us for good to sleep with some other guy.

But when I look down, trying to assess the best way to extricate myself, instead of moving away, I watch my fingers curl tighter around her side. I notice everything about Annie that I shouldn’t. Like how her eyelashes curl on the ends and are blonde at the base. How she has lots of small freckles across the bridge of her nose. And I notice the way she curves into me perfectly. I honestly didn’t take Annie for a snuggler. “I always keep my hands to myself…. But with you…” Those words echo loudly in my head.

I glance at Noah and back at Jeanine, wishing I didn’t have to put my order in with him listening. “Uh, coffee too.” “Black?” “Yep.” I lean forward slightly. “Plus cream and sugar.” I catch Noah’s grin. “Shut up,” I tell him and he raises his hands. “I didn’t say a thing.” “Your smirk did. It’s sexist of you to think I can’t be manly and also enjoy cream and sugar.” Noah cuts his eyes to me, still holding a look of complete disinterest. “I can’t work in a pie shop, wear an apron every damn day of my life, and also be sexist.” “I’m starting to think it’s all a front. You and your black-as-tar coffee are sexist as shit.” Jeanine chuckles and turns toward the coffeepot to pour our drinks. “Aren’t you two just bursts of sunshine this morning?”

“So…” Noah’s voice pulls me from my thoughts. “You spent the night with Annie, huh?” I choke on my coffee. A full-on coughing, eye-watering, gasping-for-air choke. Noah—the asshole—laughs. “Calm down. I didn’t mean it to come out like a threat.” He’s maybe the only person in the world who could make me feel threatened. I’ve stared down some pretty terrifying people, but Noah has this quiet confidence about him that tells me he could make my life hell if he wanted to.

“Annie is a grown woman. I don’t need to keep tabs on her or monitor who she does or doesn’t date.” Noah turns his casual gaze to me and tips a shoulder. He takes a drink of his coffee, and then sets the mug down and stares into it. I’ve seen him and Amelia together and it’s hard not to root for them. To be wildly jealous of them. They’re good for each other. Would I be good for Annie?

“Quit shaking.” Noah tips his mug up high, gulping down the last bit of coffee and then turning toward me on his stool. “I like you, Will. I always have. I know I’m supposed to be the protective older brother who warns the guy with the reputation to stay the hell away from his baby sister, but that’s just not how I work. I swear I’m not trying to threaten you—because like James said, my sisters will do that just fine without my interference. But more than that, I trust my sisters to know what they need better than I do. And the fact is, whatever is going on with you and Annie, I support it.”

Noah stands and faces me. “To be honest, I’m more worried about you than about Annie.” “Why’s that?” I say, even though I agree wholeheartedly with him. “Because I can guarantee you’ve never met anyone like her,” Noah says ominously and then turns to leave,

“For what it’s worth,” James says around a bite of eggs, “I do plan on threatening you.” He aims his smile at me, and suddenly it doesn’t look quite so sunny anymore. It has the same glint a sword has. “Hurt her, and I’ll kill you and bury your body as fertilizer for my plants.” I nod once, slowly. “Noted.”

“When did they all have time to do this?” “About thirty minutes ago at their impromptu town business owners’ meeting. There’s one in each establishment.” “Of course there is.” And this would explain why it was a ghost town out there today. They had all gathered to make a petition to keep me and Annie apart. Across the top in bold letters it reads: We, the town’s people, demand that Annie Walker and Will Griffin hereby forfeit their new relationship on the grounds of Annie Walker being a sweet darling and Will Griffin being…not a sweet darling. Below that, there’s a pretty nice little slander campaign that lists all the reasons I’m not to be trusted (see the grainy copy and pasted BuzzFeed article) followed by all of Annie’s superlatives. I’m impressed that she led the children’s literacy fundraising campaign at the library. But not surprised. And getting Harriet’s market to switch from plastic to bring-your-own reusable bags is cool too. At the bottom there’s a plug for Davie’s Print Shop. Nice.

“So if you want to marry Annie, you better put your best foot forward and show us you’re worth it.” I groan. “I don’t want to marry Annie! This is one big misunderstanding.” A ridiculous one that’s quickly getting out of hand. He looks back down at his eggs with a smile. “Sure you don’t.”

Mid chip to mouth, our front door opens and Emily storms in. “You!” she yells, pointing at me. “You and Will Griffin have a thing going on and he slept in your room last night and you didn’t tell us!”

“That man was under our roof last night in your bed deflowering you, and you never thought we should know? I’m disowning you! I can’t believe I had to hear it from Holden Jones that Will was sneaking out of your window at sunrise!” I raise my brows. “Holden? Wow. Made it all the way over to the library?” “Yes. And he heard it from Cathy Bryant—” “Lee now. She got married last month, remember?” “Who heard it from Harriet when she was spouting off about your decaying hussy’s soul in the market, who heard it from Terry, who saw the whole thing with his own eyes when he was making his morning newspaper rounds and caught sight of Will climbing out of your window!” Emily is fuming. She hates being the last to hear about anything concerning us siblings. I half expect to find a tracker planted on my person one day. I would open my mouth to reveal the truth, but I know it’s no use. My sisters need to get their words out first, or they’ll combust. “Harriet said what about Annie?” says Maddie,

“Don’t worry, I already went by the market to give her a piece of my mind. But Mabel beat me to it. She was laying into Harriet when I walked in, so I just grabbed the dishwasher pods we needed, signed the petition, paid, and came home.”

“Wait, wait, wait. It’s a relationship now?” Maddie dives her hand through her hair. “My head is spinning. Are you telling me that you and Will are dating? You were too shy to talk to Hot Bank Teller, so you bypassed him and went straight for Sexy Bodyguard? I need all the details.” My sisters stare at me expectantly. I know that this is the moment I should tell them the truth. I should burst out laughing and explain that Will is just my practice person. But for some reason, the words won’t come out. Because right now, my sisters are looking at me like I’m the opposite of boring. Like I’m maybe…fascinating. Like I’m not their sweet baby sister, and maybe there’s more to me than they realized.

And that’s why I lie. “Yeah. It’s not a big deal,” I say, looking down to scoop another chip in an attempt at looking casual. “He came into the flower shop the other day, and we hit it off, and…now we’re…dating.” Oh gosh. What are you doing Annie? Will is never going to go for this. “It’s just casual, though. Could end any day really.”