by Nikki Ashton
‘I know the children thing is going to be hard and heartbreaking, but I wouldn’t want anyone else holding my hand while I go through all of that,’ I replied. ‘I know you’re my future and, as long as you want me, I’m yours.’
‘That’ll be forever then,’ he said.
My heart stuttered and a rush of excitement filled me as Roman stared down at me, his eyes full of love.
‘Just because I told my dad to shut up, it doesn’t mean that I don’t agree with him about marrying you one day.’
‘Really?’ I asked around the ball of emotion in my throat.
Roman nodded. ‘You’re my life. You’re the one I want to fulfil my dreams with; the one I want to wake up to every day for the rest of my life. The one I want to laugh with and the one I want to cry with. So whatever life brings us, we’re doing it together, okay?’
Roman’s eyes were bright as he looked down at me with a heart-stopping smile. His love was evident, and we would get through whatever life threw at us, just as he’d said— together.
‘Deal,’ I said and stuck out my hand. ‘But, beware, once we shake on it there’s no going back.’
‘Of course, that’s a given,’ he laughed and shook my hand.
As we hugged, a small knock sounded on the door.
‘Ro.’ It was Tiffany. ‘Sorry to interrupt you, but Doolittle has been sick in the hall. I think Dad gave him lime pickle chutney.’
Roman sighed, looked up at the ceiling and then cursed under his breath.
‘Okay, Tiff. We’ll be one minute.’
‘Well, the bloody trouble you get yourself into,’ Twinkle said as she handed Roman a cup of the coffee I’d just made. ‘I never have any trouble with Tiffy, it’s always you.’
Roman grinned at me over the rim of his mug and collapsed back into the sofa.
We’d finished our meal and were now all back in the lounge, everyone listening to Roman telling them about the bare-knuckle fight that he almost took part in.
‘Well, at least you got that contract back, Roman,’ my dad said.
‘Yeah, and at twice the price now.’ Roman grinned. Alan Cromwell had been so desperate for Roman to take the job back, once Jack was arrested, that Roman had had no qualms about upping the price. He’d got The Palisades almost back on schedule too, so things were a lot easier business-wise.
‘Poor Summer,’ Twinkle sighed, ‘she must be wondering why on earth she got herself caught up with you.’
‘That’ll be because of my huge penis and bedroom skills,’ Roman whispered so only I could hear.
I slapped at his arm and leaned into him, kissing his bicep. The same arm came up and hooked around my neck and started to tickle my neck. I wriggled and giggled, causing Doolittle to start barking and jumping up, wanting to join in the fun.
‘Doolittle,’ Roman commanded, ‘be quiet.’
Doolittle stopped, stared at Roman, and I’ll swear he smiled, and then started again.
‘Doolittle,’ Pete bellowed. ‘Shut the fuck up, you little fucker!’
‘Oh,’ Mum gasped.
‘Dad,’ Roman groaned.
‘Well, he is a little fucker,’ Pete complained.
‘Peter Holliday, you foul-mouthed little man. How many times do I have to tell you to watch your language?’
‘Probably every day for the rest of our lives, Twink. If I’m being honest.’
‘Women, hey, Pete,’ my dad said, earning a nudge from my mum. ‘What? Oh damn it, I’ve spilled my coffee now.’
He jumped up, pulled a hanky from his pocket and started to dab at the front of his trousers. Suddenly, Doolittle jumped up at my dad and started to lick the crotch.
‘Oh fuck me,’ Roman muttered under his breath. ‘Someone help me, please.’
I looked around and simply laughed from the pit of my belly. Who cared that a scruffy dog was attracted to my dad’s groin, or that Pete had a foul mouth, or that my mum looked like she’d eaten a lemon plus the pips and the peel, or that Twinkle was simply batty? The main thing was I was happy, I had Roman, and we were going to live a beautiful life together.
‘Summer where the hell are you?’
I rolled my eyes as Roman’s dulcet tones thundered down the hall, up the stairs and through the bedroom door. I stormed out of the bedroom to the top of the stairs and looked down on him.
‘Why are you home so early?’ I asked, thrusting my hands to my hips.
‘Charming greeting after being away,’ he said mirroring my stance. ‘And why haven’t you been answering your damn phone? I’ve been calling you for the last hour.’
He had been away for a few days on-site at a new job that had just started. We were building a small estate of fifteen houses, and while it had a brilliant site manager, Roman always liked to keep an eye on things.
‘Stop!’ I cried holding my hand up. ‘Don’t come any closer.’
Roman stopped and heaved a sigh.
‘What’ve you done, bought or broken that you don’t want me to see?’
‘Nothing.’ I couldn’t help the little smirk that twitched at my lips. God, when he decided to be a grump, he was damn good at it, but I loved him for it.
‘Summer,’ he growled as a warning and took another step up.
‘Please, just give me two minutes.’ I held up two fingers and gave him my poutiest, pleading look, adding an eyelash flutter for good measure.
‘Two minutes.’ His eyes twinkled and I knew he was desperately trying not to smile. That look nearly always got me what I wanted, and he knew that when I did get my way, he was rewarded handsomely later.
I quickly scooted back into the bedroom and sighed contentedly. My life was so good, there were days I wondered whether it was all a dream.
Roman and I were married only six months after everything happened with Caroline and Jack. Once he asked me, we didn’t want to waste any time. There was a slight hitch when Roman asked my dad for permission. Apparently Dad thought that it was a little too soon and tried to persuade Roman to leave it for at least a year. According to my mum, Roman listened to Dad’s reasons, then thanked him, but said, while he didn’t want to disrespect Dad, he was going to ask me anyway and the only decision that mattered was mine. Mum, unbelievably, was on Roman’s side and told Dad all she’d ever wanted was for her kids to be happy and Roman made me happy. It was at that point that Dad seemingly gave a long sigh, shook Roman’s hand, and welcomed him to the family.
The proposal itself was beautiful, to me it was, anyway. There was no fancy dinner, or treasure hunt to find the ring, and he hadn’t written a poem or a song as a way of asking me: it was simply Roman. We were at home—as I’d moved in with him by then—and we were watching a wildlife programme about swans. The voice-over artist was talking about the fact that swans mate for life when Roman turned down the sound and turned to me.
‘That’s us,’ he said quietly.
‘What is?’ I asked.
‘We’re like swans. I only ever want you for the rest of my life,’ he said giving me a beautiful smile.
‘Ah Roman,’ I sighed, ‘that’s such a gorgeous thing to say.’
He brushed my hair from my eyes and then kissed me gently.
‘Will you marry me?’
After taking a couple of seconds for Roman’s question to sink in, I threw myself at him and showered his face with kisses, alternating each one with the word ‘Yes’.
Afterwards, Roman did tell me that he’d planned to ask me at Bennett’s, where we’d had our first date, but doing it at home in front of the TV just felt right. Bonus: we went to Bennett’s anyway to celebrate.
Our wedding was beautiful. We got married in the evening, by candlelight, at the local church, and I wore a stunning 1930s-inspired silk sheath dress with halter straps and a deep V at the front that was beaded at the edges. The skirt skimmed my hips and then fell into a beautiful swirl around my legs: I felt like a Hollywood siren at a red carpet event.
Roman … well, he took my breath away. H
e had his usual two-day groomed stubble, his hair was cropped short at the sides and sexily ruffled on top, he wore a pair of black wing-tipped brogues, a sharp, grey suit with a deep heather-coloured waistcoat and a crisp white shirt, open at the neck. When I saw him I practically ran down the aisle on my dad’s arm, and was glad that I’d been practising walking in my Freya Rose ‘Valena’, silver leather shoes that Roman had bought for me.
After the ceremony, during which Twinkle had read one of her own poems—it was actually quite sweet, even though she rhymed ‘wedding’ with ‘bedding’—we went to Darrington Hall where Holly and Liam Robertson gave us the best wedding reception ever. It was by far the most amazing party I had ever been to, and the bar bill, which Roman paid for, vouched for what a good night it had been.
Our married life then started with two weeks in Bermuda, and it was absolute bliss.
We were happy. Yes, we bickered a lot, but we laughed and loved an awful lot too.
There were some difficult times in the beginning, when Roman would go quiet and moody if he thought about Caroline and Jack, or someone mentioned them.
Jack had gone to prison for his part in beating Alfie up, and for aiding and abetting Caroline in stealing from Roman. She not only took the money from Roman’s safe, and his laptop, but also a Rolex watch that had been his grandfather’s. And the bitch had taken a pair of leather Tom Ford boots that I’d left at the house. I’d loved those boots, but I could never wear them again once we got them back from the police.
Caroline pleaded guilty and was only given a short prison sentence. She was now living with her parents who took care of Maisie while their daughter was locked up. They were all living in Jersey now, so, I suppose, you could say Caroline nearly got to France in the end.
While Roman missed a lot of sleep over the fact that he nearly lost everything because of Caroline and Jack, and he hated them with a passion because of it, most of his anger was because they’d dragged Maisie into it.
While Caroline was in prison, we’d regularly visited Maisie at her grandparents’ house and taken her out for tea or ice cream. We loved the time we spent with her, but once Caroline was freed, she didn’t want us to have any further contact with Maisie. Roman was going to fight her decision, but legally he had no rights. The guardianship papers had simply been part of Caroline’s plan to get closer to Roman. They’d never been filed, so Maisie disappeared from our lives. It hit us both hard, but Caroline’s mother still sent us the occasional photograph of Maisie. She looked healthy and happy, so we had to be content with that.
But thoughts of Caroline and Jack, and how they nearly ruined Roman were surfacing less and less. When he did think about them, it took a lot for him not to go and punch a wall. Luckily for our walls, he usually went down to the gym in the basement of our beautiful new Victorian house—which, I have to boast—is in the same village as a couple of the members of the megastar band, Dirty Riches. When he was in the gym, Roman took a whole lot out on the punch bag, then came back upstairs looking damn sexy, all sweaty and breathless—I know it’s bizarre to fancy a sweaty man, but he is awesome!
Pippa was okay and had now settled down with a really nice guy called Jacob. He loved her but didn’t pander to her ‘princess’ status, and so was really good for her. She was also back working for Niall Devine, after much grovelling, and was working towards becoming a paralegal.
As for Dylan, he still liked to say he was playing the field, but we all knew that he’d been seeing a girl called Katie for a couple of months—a lifelong commitment in Dylan years. She was lovely and sweet, and he seemed absolutely smitten. Tiffany was still single, but seemed happy just dating and enjoying life; thankfully, she never did take my brother up on his offer of some ‘amazing sex’.
‘Okay,’ I shouted. ‘You can come up now.’
I heard his work boots pounding up the stairs and then across the landing as he looked in our bedroom, then back across the landing towards the room that I was in.
‘Fuck,’ he whispered as he stopped in the doorway. ‘Summer?’
I chewed on my bottom lip and gazed at him through tear-filled eyes. I’d been sure that I’d keep it together, but now he was here and seeing what I’d done, the enormity of everything hit me.
‘Oh my God, does this mean what I think it means?’ Roman asked.
I nodded as a tear dropped off the end of my chin. ‘Yep.’
The room was painted in white and cream, and halfway up each wall was a frieze of teddy bears. There was a white chest of drawers and, at the large bay window, were cream-and-white gingham curtains. In the corner, sitting on a deep cream-coloured nursing chair, was a huge cuddly bear that matched those on the frieze.
Roman took two long strides and pulled me into his arms.
‘Are you sure?’
I nodded, unable to speak because I knew if I did I’d cry. I reached into the pocket of my trousers, pulled out the pregnancy test stick and passed it to Roman.
He stared down at it, looking at the word ‘Pregnant’ in awe.
‘We did it, Sum’,’ he whispered. ‘Shit, a baby.’
I gently stroked away the tears on his cheeks and kissed him gently. After eighteen months and two previous rounds of unsuccessful IVF we were finally pregnant. Third time was definitely a charm because we’d agreed to give up if this session didn’t work. Roman hated what I had to put my body through, and we both hated the effect the stress of it all had had on us mentally.
‘Did Mr. Henderson call you?’ he asked. Mr. Henderson was our consultant, and he’d been with us every step of the way: from our first consultation right through to both of those awful, sad meetings when he’d had to tell us we weren’t pregnant.
‘He rang the morning you left to go on-site, he couldn’t wait for our appointment next week. So I rushed out and bought a pregnancy kit and everything else.’
‘Shit, Summer, why didn’t you ring me? I’d have come straight home.’ Roman hugged me tightly against his chest, and I heard him take a long, ragged breath.
‘Because I wanted to surprise you. So I rang Emma and Henry, and they both spent the last couple of days helping me to do all of this. I know it’s early days, but I have a really good feeling that everything is going to be fine. I just know it.’
Roman started to laugh and loosened his grip on me so that he could look at my face.
‘You couldn’t just tell me like any other normal person, could you?’ His smile was dazzling as he looked around the room.
‘Nope, you know me, it has to be a grand gesture.’
I smiled as I thought about Emma and Henry helping me to pull everything together. Sadly, they weren’t a couple any more. Henry had called things off two months ago because the club was so busy, he hardly had time to breathe, never mind spend time with Emma. They were still great friends, though, and if the very long, sexy, lingering kiss I’d seen him give her yesterday was anything to go by, I’d say they’d be back together soon.
Emma loved him still, and he’d told Roman that he was still madly in love with her. Apparently he’d said he just couldn’t do a relationship and the club justice. I believe Roman told him to ‘grow a pair, man up, and get his woman back’.
Roman sighed and kissed the top of my head. ‘Who else knows?’
‘Apart from Emma and Henry, no one, but I have invited our families around for a take-away so that we can tell them together. I told them it was an early birthday treat for you, seeing as we’ll be in Paris on your actual birthday. In fact,’ I said, lifting my arm to look at my watch, ‘they’re all going to be here in about half an hour.’
‘Really?’ Roman asked incredulously, ‘all of them? Tonight? On my first night home?’
‘Sorry, I was just so excited, and you’ve only been away two nights.’ I giggled at his pouty mouth.
‘I know, but I want to show you how much I love you.’
His mouth was on my neck, dropping soft kisses along it and down to my collarbone. All the time he
had one hand on my hip, while the other laced through my hair. My pulse started racing and the blood in my veins began to heat up.
‘Oh you can show me,’ I moaned as he nipped at my earlobe. ‘You’ll just have to be quick.’
‘Okay, Mrs. Holliday, quick it is, but later when we’re alone it’s going to be long and slow. You okay with that?’
‘Oh God, yes. The longer and slower the better.’
As Roman led me to our bedroom, I knew that whichever way he showed me, it was going to be epic. Roman Holliday never did anything half-heartedly and was completely awesome all the time, even if he did have a stupid name.
Seven months later
‘No, mother, we are not calling her Sabrina, Regina, Holly or Eliza,’ Roman grumbled at Twinkle, his eyes never leaving the beautiful round face of our daughter, lying asleep in his arms.
‘Well, if not after an Audrey character, what about Audrey herself? That’s a lovely name.’
I nearly burst out laughing as I heard my own mum almost choke.
‘Nope, not that, or any type of holiday either. She’s going to have a normal name.’
‘I agree with Roman, Twinkle,’ my mum said somewhat apologetically, ‘a nice normal name that she won’t get embarrassed about.’
‘Like what?’ Twinkle demanded. ‘And are you trying to say my children are embarrassed by their names?’
‘Oh goodness, no, I just think that … well …’
Mum looked to me for help, but I was having far too much fun watching and listening.
I’d just spent the last nine hours pushing another human being through my fandango, so this was a nice relief.
‘Roman is right, Twink,’ Pete said, resting a hand on his wife’s shoulder. ‘She should have a lovely normal name—I’m not saying our kids don’t have normal names—well, okay, they don’t really … but Roman and Summer, well, they have enough to put up with …, you know, …with their own names.’
We went by the name Hepburn for business, but to everyone else we were Roman and Summer Holliday.