Submission Moves: An MMA Romance (19 page)

“That sucks,” he said. “Must’ve been weird growing up with a different last name from the rest of your family.”

“When I was young, I used to write ‘Rose Connelly’ over and over again on the back of my notebooks the same way other little girls write the name of their crushes,” she said in a soft, sad tone he’d never heard her use before.
 

He quietly played with a lock of her hair as he listened. He didn’t know what to say to that sad scrap of family history. He just pulled her closer, offering belated comfort.
 

“When I was young, my mom always used to say ‘remember who you are, you’re a Shannon,'” Rose continued. “I never understood what it meant or why she thought it was so special. I think she’s hoping that I’ll one day take my place and marry into Chicago society. You know, do what she never got to do. I mean, Pat’s rich. But he’s a self-made man from a working-class background. My mom’s a bit of a snob, and she cares about pedigree and all that.”

“Is that why you’re so prickly with men? You have daddy issues?” Nick said. He looked and sounded sympathetic, even if he didn’t exactly know how to finesse his words. Rose had spent enough time with the Rossi brothers to know that their gruffness often belied good intentions.

“I don’t have daddy issues. Pat is my dad. We have a great relationship.”

“This Rob guy your mom mentioned, is he some rich shithead she’s hoping you’ll marry?” he asked, teasing but with no hint of jealousy, nothing she could detect anyway. A wave of desire washed over her.
 

Her whole life her mother tried to drill into her that the fragile male ego needed constant stroking and coddling, and if Rose ever wanted to land anyone, she better learn to do it. Before Nick, she’d never come across a man who seemed to be above that. He was so entirely secure and confident. Call it ego, call it confidence, but it was sexy.

Or maybe he wasn’t jealous because to him she wasn’t worth getting jealous over. That realization soured her mood. “Do I look like trophy wife material to you?” she asked, getting testy.

Nick took the change of her mood in stride and made a good show of inspecting her. “You look it. But you don’t have the temperament for it.”

That made her laugh. “Damn right I don’t.” Was it so wrong that she felt flattered that he thought she could be a trophy wife? Not
his
trophy wife, but someone’s. Rose shuddered inwardly at that thought.

“I’ve been meaning to ask you something,” he said after taking a deep breath, “but you might get offended and bite my head off.”

She sighed in resignation. “Go ahead. Ask. I’m too tired to bite anyone’s head off.”

“What you said before, about how most women will experience some form of sexual violence at some point…” he trailed off.

Her hand paused at the idle scratches she was making on his chest and she peered up at him. “Yes? What about it?”

“I was just wondering if you’ve…if something had happened to you, maybe…” He couldn’t finish the question, not just because he couldn’t find the right words but because just thinking about it gave him an ugly twisting sensation in his gut. He couldn’t breathe, much less speak.

“You mean have I been raped?”

He tensed, waiting for an answer, offering up a silent prayer.

“No.”

The air rushed back into his aching lungs. This woman was making him feel all weird—possessive, protective, tender, and helpless all at once. A big pile of messy emotions he’d never felt before, not all at the same time, anyway. And not all for one person.  

“I just wondered. Because you’re very sensitive about…you know.” He shrugged and moistened his lips.
Shit, this is awkward,
he thought. But he couldn’t pussy out of having difficult conversations with her, not if he ever wanted her to take him seriously.
   

She pulled back so she could look at him. “Don’t you think it’s worth getting sensitive about?”

“Yeah, I guess. Can’t say I ever really thought about it before though.”

Rose nodded in acceptance. “I don’t imagine you would. You’re a man and…” she gestured to his body. “You’re huge. So you probably don’t go around worried for your safety or feeling generally intimidated or dismissed. But believe me, all women have experienced varying degrees of sexism and misogyny, some more insidious than outright violent. That’s our reality. So if most times I come off as sensitive or even angry, well, it’s because I am.”

“Tell me something that’s happened to you.”

She shook her head, reluctant to continue. “It would feel wrong to complain about my experience when every day I work with women who’ve had it much worse.”

“It’s not complaining. I just want to hear about it. I wanna understand. Tell me,” he said.
Tell me, please.
Nick needed for her to confide in him. Not even because he thought he could help. He just needed to know that she trusted him enough.

“I guess I’ve had assholes yell gross things to me on the street, or tipsy guys at parties who get too touchy, or not-so-accidentally brush up against my chest.” She said it with a shrug meant to appear dismissive. “Weird thing is, I usually won’t think twice about yelling at the guy and shaming him if it’s right in the middle of a busy street.” She leaned back into his arms and cuddled close. She seemed to be able to speak more freely that way. Maybe it was because she didn’t have to look at him or maybe because she found his nearness comforting. Nick wanted to believe it was the latter.

“But when it’s someone I know, an acquaintance maybe, it’s a lot harder. I end up making excuses for them or telling myself to just let it go. It’s just easier not to make a fuss if it happens with someone I’ll have to see again.”

Mentally, Nick went through all the times he’d touched a woman casually, wondering if he’d ever made anyone feel that way. Ego aside, girls had always seemed receptive. But he’d heard other guys brag about getting to cop a feel from unsuspecting women. Now he wondered if any of them were ever unsuspecting. They all probably just quietly endured it, and like Rose, decided it was easier not to make a fuss.

“When I was in seventh grade, I had these C-cups that boys in school tormented me for,” she continued.
 

Nick’s hand had been resting on the side of her breast. He pulled it away, feeling guilty.

Rose chuckled, took his hand, and put it back where it was. She made him squeeze her gently, letting him know that his touch was more than alright.

“Boys can be pigs. Especially at that age,” Nick said, ashamed for the horny teenager he once was.

“Yeah, well, this one guy in particular was a bigger pig than all the rest. He would taunt me, whisper lewd things to me, and snap my bra whenever I walked by. He would always stand too close and try to look down my shirt. I thought if I ignored it, it would stop. But it only got worse.”

“What happened?”

“When I couldn’t take it any longer, I told Chris about it,” she said. “My mom sent me to this ritzy Catholic school, different from my brothers, because this never would’ve happened if they’d been around in the first place. Anyway, the next day, Chris picked me up from school with my four other brothers in tow. Five beefy jocks, all over six feet. Imagine what an intimidating sight that made,” she said with a fond smile in her voice. “They kinda gave the other guy a staredown. And Rob never bothered me again. Not in school, anyway.”

“Wait, Rob? The same Rob your mom mentioned?”

“The very one,” she said with derision. “My mom and Rob’s mom belong to all the same charity boards. She’s a sweet lady. They’ve been trying to pair us up for years. I don’t have the heart to tell her her son’s a douchebag.”

“Didn’t you tell
your
mom what happened?”

She shook her head. “No, but one of my brothers did. She said Rob just probably likes me but didn’t know how to show it. Boys will be boys, she said.” Her laugh rang hollow in Nick’s ears.
 
“I think she was actually thrilled her only daughter was being harassed by someone from such a good family.”
 

She tried to be droll about it, but he sensed a current of resentment and disappointment in her. With a mother like that, it was little wonder Rose grew up to be a staunch feminist. He knew she was sincere in her beliefs, but he couldn’t help wondering if it had all started out as filial rebellion on her part.
 
“I’m sorry,” he said, feeling inept.

Suddenly, Rose pushed off him and straightened her clothes. “I have to go.”

He glanced at the clock. They still had plenty of time. “Don’t just run off after all that,” he said.
 

She gave him a withering look. The post-sex vulnerability was definitely gone now, and she was back to wearing that guarded expression that told him he shouldn’t have pushed.
 

“Oh, sorry. Did you want more sad stories?” she said dryly. “Were you expecting me to cry in your arms because we’re
friends
now?”
 

Fuck, this woman is stone cold.
Nick caught himself mid-thought. He liked to think he knew her a little better now and understood her somehow. Her blustering no longer fooled him. “You don’t have to cry, Rosie. I hear being all nasty and sarcastic works too,” he said with an indulgent smile.

He watched as different expressions chased themselves across her face—irritation, surprise, shame, then contrition. She took a deep breath. “Sorry. I know I’m a bitch—”

“I don’t think that,” he said. Funny how he was the one with the violent job, but it was her who had a short fuse and who seemed to have a lot of deep-seated anger. Nick knew that for a handful of guys in his sport, if they weren’t beating up other men in the cage, they’d probably find other, more dangerous outlets for their rage. Perhaps Rose should take up boxing so she could whale on an actual punching bag and not on people around her.
   

“You’re just…” He paused and shrugged, struggling to come up with a diplomatic way of putting it. “Every rose has its thorn…”

She burst out laughing while he half-sang the rest of the chorus of the cheesy eighties ballad.
 

 
“You’re so lame,” she said, wiping her tears of hilarity with the back of her hand.
 

Nick just grinned at her.

“Are you doing something tomorrow night?” she asked casually after an awkward pause. Too casually, in fact. She avoided his eyes while she slipped her shoes back on.

“Maybe. Why do you ask?” Nick already had a pretty good idea of what she needed from him, but he couldn’t resist teasing her.

“Do you want to go with me to the country club thing my mother mentioned?” The words came out of her with great difficulty.

“Black tie?”

“Yeah. I’m sorry. It’s too short notice, isn’t it? Never mind—”

“Don’t be silly,” he said, cutting her off.
 

“I don’t want to bother you with your fight so close, but I really need an escort to this stupid thing. I could ask someone else if it’s too much trouble. But you said we shouldn’t see anyone else. So it’s your fault, really.” She shrugged, trying and failing drastically to appear nonchalant. Her cheeks turned pink and she still couldn’t look at him.

“It’s no trouble. It’ll be nice for you to see me in something besides training clothes,” he said with a big smile. “Just you wait, I’ll knock your socks off. I happen to clean up real good.”

“Whatever.” Rose rolled her eyes, her lips turning up in a reluctant grin. “I’ll text you the details.”

“It’s a date.”

“It’s not,” she frowned.

“It’s a date.” Nick said with finality, cutting off her protests with a quick kiss on her lips. “See you tomorrow, sweetheart.”

CHAPTER 19

The sight of Niccolo Rossi in a tux had to be as lethal as his famed left hook. Rose was willing to admit, at least to herself, that she’d underestimated him. His tuxedo fit his broad shoulders and the rest of his magnificent body like it was made especially for him, which of course it was.

Trying to deny her attraction to Nick was an exercise in futility. She finally owned up to that fact after leaving his gym yesterday. Right there, in the parking lot of Rossi Combat Sports Gym, she said “screw it” and, though she wasn’t at all the hippy-dippy type, she decided that the most efficient course of action was to just “go with the flow,” so to speak, and let whatever it was between them run its course.

When her novelty wore off for him and when she started craving something beyond great sex, they could part ways as friends. Or maybe he’d do something to set her off and his patience would finally run out and they’d end up bitter and angry with each other. Both scenarios were equally possible and equally sad to contemplate. She felt a bewildering pang in her heart and rubbed at it idly, chalking it up to premature nostalgia for what was likely to be the best sex of her life. Because, honestly, what were the odds of someone like her meeting, let alone bedding, another well-hung professional athlete with mad skills in the sack? It was pretty much guaranteed that she had been ruined for all other men.