We drove about a mile farther down the road, deep amongst the cotton fields, when a small, one-storey dark wood log cabin came into view. The truck skidded to a hard stop and Romeo wrenched his door open and stormed into the cabin, flicking on a low light. Crashes and smashing noises ensued.

I stayed motionless in the Dodge. I didn’t want to go inside. For the first time ever, Romeo’s outburst scared me. I didn’t believe he’d hurt me, but I also didn’t want to be around him right now. He was more unpredictable than I’d ever seen him before.

My head fell in defeat against the cold windowpane, and I stared at the millions of stars in the dark sky—I always felt small and insignificant in the vastness of the universe. Not tonight, though. No matter how small I knew our problems were in the grand scheme of things, I couldn’t help but replay over and over what happened only minutes prior.

Good God, I’d never known anything like it.

The Princes hated Rome. His parent’s genuinely loathed him and they seemed almost proud of that fact. They hit him, threatened him, and verbally tore me to shreds.

How did he cope with that all of his life?

I may have had a difficult time losing my family, but I knew love, unconditional love. I was never mistreated. Life for Romeo must have been an absolute living hell.

Guilt cascaded through my body when I thought of how he’d spent endless weeks helping me, telling me I was brave and strong and coaxing me out of my shell. When in reality it was his strength that was inspiring. He needed the support.

As time passed, the night grew eerily silent. I knew that I needed to be with him, to comfort him, show him I hadn’t given up, and tell him, at long last, just how much I loved him.

18

The rickety cabin door creaked open, the tiny room boasting uneven stained floorboards, an old worn brown sofa, and a dusty two-person table as its only features. Romeo was on the farthest side of the small, dusty room. His head was flush against the wall and his shirt was un-tucked, sleeves folded to his elbows, and the collar was still askew from where his daddy had wrenched it aside.

I knew he’d heard my entrance as his back muscles bunched. I shut the door and when I turned around, Romeo was fixed my way, animosity distorting his beautiful face.

“You should never have made us come here!” he shouted, my body jumping at the volume and intensity of his words. “I warned you! I told you they weren’t happy about us, but you didn’t listen to me. You told me it’d be okay, that they would see us together and realise what we meant to each other. But no! Instead, you agreed to your own f**kin’ execution. Christ, Mol! The way they treated you…”

I let him pour it all out. I didn’t say a thing, but held my head high and allowed him to vent.

Marching towards me, he stopped only feet away. “I told you they hated me, that they would hate you too. We set ourselves up for a fall, and now I’ve lost you. You’re leavin’ me, aren’t you?”

“Rome—”

“I could’ve stopped it—should have! I knew what they were capable of and still I trusted that you could handle it. But I saw your face in there, Mol—you f**kin’ checked out on me!”

I held out my hand, placating him. “I don’t care about what they said to me, but I care about what they are doing to you. Why do they hate you so much, Romeo? There has to be a reason? That was beyond brutal. What kind of parent hates their child for no reason?” I wrapped my arms around my waist, feeling cold with sorrow. “Your mother, the way she hit you, how could she treat her only son that way?”

Romeo’s rigid fingers clawed through his messy hair. I could tell he was fighting against telling me something.

Eventually, he reached forward, grasping my shoulders in desperation. “Because I’m not hers!” he screamed so loudly that I felt ringing in my ears.

“W-what?”

“Because. I’m. Not. Hers. You wanted to know so badly why they hate me. Well, that’s why.”

“No…” I whispered, softly.

He released me from his hold and rubbed his hands down his face, pacing on the old worn yellow rug. “Momma was barren. The f**kin’ bitch was barren. The one thing she needed to be able to do as the perfect wife was breed and she couldn’t deliver, couldn’t give the great Prince Oil tycoon of Alabama an heir.”

“Ohmigod, Rome—”

“They couldn’t adopt, ‘cause that would be an embarrassment, right? They couldn’t get a surrogate and risk all of Tuscaloosa knowing that she was unable to have kids. But, hey, fate decided to intervene just in time.”

My heart broke with every heartbeat, listening to Romeo crumbling in confession. I couldn’t speak. I felt helpless to do anything but watch him unload years of crushing burden off his chest.

“One of my daddy’s many paid whores turned up on their doorstep, pregnant with a child she sure didn’t want but was willin’ to hand over at its birth to his biological father… for a good price.”

My heart plummeted.

“Yeah, Mol. It was me. My father got a private paternity test and I was his, the f**kin’ heir to his fortune. The whore had one stipulation, though. They had to keep the name she’d given me. She wanted control, to play some sick twisted game with her most frequent customer, probably pissed that she would never be more than a f**k to him. My name was a lifelong reminder of where I came from, and my mother despised it, despised me on sight.”

“Romeo,” I surmised.

“Romeo.”

He scratched his fingers across his dark, stubbled chin. “So there you have it. I’m the illegitimate child of my father’s slut on the side, but they had to have me, didn’t they? The fact of the matter was my father wanted to keep his assets in the family. He was expected to have children, an heir. My arrival ensured that could still happen. They paid for the whore to have me in secret. Then my folks disappeared for a year, you know, off on some bullshit cruise, and they returned with a new baby—and of course, the great billionaire’s lies were believed.”

Seeming a lot calmer, Romeo rested against the back of the sofa, head drooping low. “My momma f**kin’ hates me. I’m a livin’, breathin’ reminder that my father was a cheat. But that’s not the only reason they’re like this. They expected a docile, obedient child, who, when they said jump, would ask how high. But not their letdown of a son, right? I ended up being freakishly good at sports and I had my own mind and own dreams—unacceptable for a Prince!