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“Oh.”

“Rome stays busy creating and testing products. And Lorenzo is always in the middle of ten meetings at once. They work hard as fuck and I like knowing they’re good, even when they forget to be good to themselves.”

“You’re their center.”

His brilliant smile brightened even more and I couldn’t help but notice how straight his white teeth were. The man was criminally easy on the eyes with the most soothing energy to match. “I’ve never thought of it that way, but yea, I guess I am.”

The rest of breakfast was pretty quiet. I didn’t eat anything else, but I couldn’t pull myself away from the table. I was too enraptured by their familiar dynamic. The way they finished each other’s sentences. The way they refilled each other’s drinks. The way Romeo got up and cleared everyone’s plates without aword, and the way Enzo thanked Sincere for making breakfast with the most tender kiss I’d ever seen before he got up to answer a call.

My mind was so caught up in everything they were that I forgot everything I wasn’t. Well, almost.

Until Sincere cleared his throat and I came to the realization that it was just the two of us in the dining room now. I’d been zoned out and he was watching me with a playful smile. “You aight, love?”

Honestly? No, I wasn’t okay when he called me love and looked at me like that.

And that was how I knew I needed to get the hell out of dodge. This man was very happily married and I was sitting here all giddy and flustered from a friendly smile. He was not flirting, yet my synapses weren’t firing the way I needed them to, so that message got lost in translation. “Yep, perfect. I should be going.”

Sincere nodded, his gaze still locked on mine. “Enzo has a meeting and I need to call our supplier to get the window fixed, so Rome is going to drive you back into town before he heads to his shop. Is that okay?”

Call our supplier to get the window fixed. I gulped as guilt speared through me. Those words were the exact reminder I needed about my place in all…this. I was an intruder. I didn’t belong here. And the sooner I got that through my head, the better.

It didn’t matter how nice they’d been to me or how good it had felt to feel like I was a part of something. This wasn’t real and I needed togo.

Patiently, Sincere waited for my approval, genuine interest shining in his brown eyes as he waited for my response.

“Sounds good,” I managed tightly, hating the lump in my throat. “Thanks again…for everything. You really didn’t have to.”

“It was my pleasure, Goldyn.” He hesitated like he wanted to say something else, but thought better of it at the last minute. Then he stood, rapped his knuckles against the solid wood table and disappeared.

A sense of loss washed over me the second he was gone. I looked around the dining room like someone who’d just been left at a party where they knew no-one. I needed to leave…if for no other reason than to get away from this feeling invading my senses.

The feeling of being alone in a space where everyone else felt welcomed. Of being the spare. Of being here because I was tolerated and not actually wanted.

Everything in me told me to run. So that’s what I did.

I pushed my chair away from the table, grabbed my purse from the arm of the couch and tried to walk out of the front door for the second time that morning.

This time I didn’t even make it to the door before Romeo’s presence at my back stopped me in my tracks. He hadn’t said a word and his energy alone had made me freeze in place.

“Trying to escape again, thief?”

“Not escaping, just getting out of the way.”

Something in my tone must have been cold enough for him to drop it because all he did was grab a set of keys from the brass hook on the wall.

“Let’s go,” he said gruffly, and left me with no choice but to follow him out the front door, down the stairs and to a violet BMW M4 I hadn’t seen last night.

Romeo opened the passenger door for me, waited for me to get inside and then closed it before walking over to the driver’s side. I observed his confident gait as he walked and gulped when he sat in the car beside me.

His earthy, masculine scent clung to everything inside the vehicle and made me feel surrounded by him on all sides.

How did that simultaneously rile me up and calm me down? It didn’t make sense.

God, his jawline was sharp enough to chip ice. I was sure of it as I watched the muscle at the base tick. Unlike Sincere and Enzo’s low-cut Caesars, Romeo’s hair was long on top and tapered short on the sides. And he was so fine, it broke my brain a little bit.

Forcing my eyes away from his profile, I took in the pristine interior of his car. Nothing was out of place and there was even an oil diffuser in the center console, emitting mist as he expertly found his way through the woods and back to a main road.

When we did reach the road, I squinted, realizing we were on a completely different side of the mountain than where I started yesterday.