Why Romeo Hates Juliet (6 page)

“Why not? You’re mad at me because you think I broke your stupid TV and you want to scare me by pretending that you’re hurt.”

“Pretending? Does this sweat on my forehead look like I’m pretending?” he yelled, as he wiped the droplets with his hand. Romeo didn’t think he could be any angrier at a human being than he was at this very second. How dare she accuse him of ‘faking’? He turned his furious eyes back onto her sweet face. “Get me that beer so that I can kill the pain with booze,” he gritted through clenched teeth. “Better yet, get me the vodka. It’s on the coffee table.”

Sighing, Juliet got up from her crouching position and retrieving the bottle, brought it back to him. Ungraciously, he yanked it out of her hand and tried to twist off the cap. “Ahhhh,” he yelled, as shards of pain shot through his back again. He took a couple of deep breaths to ease the throbbing before handing the bottle back to her. “I can’t - I can’t do it. You do it,” he huffed.

“This is ridiculous. You need to go to the emergency room and if you drink this, it might interfere with any medications they may give you,” Juliet sensibly advised.

She bit her lip as she began to worry. He should have gotten up by now and yet he was claiming he was still in pain. Maybe he had truly hurt himself? At first, she’d thought he might have been dramatizing the situation, but now she was having some doubts. After all, he had hit that screen pretty hard.

Romeo, on the other hand, had no intentions of going to the hospital. If he went, word would certainly get out that he was there and within hours, the news would be all over the tabloids and the internet. He’d come to Prince Edward Island to relax and party, and he didn’t want the media to know where he was. He certainly didn’t want any paparazzi to come swarming down here and disturb his privacy, and finding out that former A-lister Romeo Boyd was in the hospital would bring them out in droves. Those sharks loved to kick a star when he was down.

“Are you going to open that damn bottle or not?” He glared up at her.

Sighing in resignation, Juliet crouched down beside him and went to twist off the bottle top. But for some reason, it wouldn’t budge. Putting more pressure into it, she huffed as she tried opening it again. “It’s stuck.”

“Put some muscle into it,” he instructed.

Taking in a deep breath, she put all her strength into it and with one good yank, the top suddenly gave way - only - she had put too much force into the motion and the extra momentum traveled from her wrist, up into her arm, causing her elbow to shoot back - right into Romeo’s left eye.

“Ahhhh,” Romeo screamed, as his hands flew up to his eye. “My eye, oh God, my eye.” Juliet gasped, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do that.”

“I think you did. In fact, maybe this is how you get your kicks. A little bit of S&M before the show? Is that how it works?” he shouted, as he used one hand to cup his injured eye and the other one to snatch the now opened vodka bottle out of her hands. Bringing it to his lips, he downed a long swig of the potent liquid.

still crouching in front of him, Juliet sat back on her haunches and frowned. “You’re becoming hysterical. You’re not making any sense. I didn’t mean to hit you, you know.”

“I wouldn’t put it past you,” he accused, before taking another strong measure of the vodka. “I’m going to have a black eye from this.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. My elbow barely grazed your eye.”

“Grazed my eye? Are you kidding me? I’ve been in bar fights with guys twice my size that have hit me with less force than you just did.”

“Bar fights? Why am I not surprised?” Juliet mumbled, as she looked around at the frat-boy style furnishings in the house.

“Man, this hurts. What if I lose my eyesight?”

“Oh, stop being such a crybaby and let me see.” Losing patience, Juliet tugged at his hand that was covering the injury but he resisted, continuing to glare at her with his good eye instead. Changing tactics, she dropped her tone of voice to one of a mother speaking to a child and began to cajole him. “Come on now, show it to me and I’ll tell you what I see.” His good eye narrowed even further on her face and he remained still.

She gently tugged at his hand again. “Come on, let me see.” He resisted for one second more before she felt him give up the fight and allowed her to pull his hand away.

Coming forward a few more inches and putting both hands on either side of his face to steady him, Juliet began to study the eye. But as she did so, a sensuous light seemed to pass between the both of them and she felt a tingling in the pit of her stomach. Even the air around them seemed electrified. Gasping, she yanked her hands away from him.

He frowned. “Is it that bad?”

“N - no. I just got a shock from the carpet, that’s all,” she lied. What was wrong with her tonight, Juliet wondered? She gave herself a mental shake before refocusing on his injured eye, but this time she didn’t touch him.

She could see his beautiful piercing blue orb peering intently at her, but she could also see a horrible, purple bruise beginning to form all around it with an added swelling that would make it more pronounced as the hours wore on. Oh yeah… that baby would definitely be black by tomorrow morning and possibly swol en beyond recognition by the afternoon.

“Well?” he prompted.

She stood up and shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t see a thing. Not even a scratch.” Romeo’s eyes narrowed on her lying face. “Oh really? Then how come it hurts like a mother?”

“What can I say? You have sensitive skin.” She gave him a quick smile. What could she say? That the eye would be twice its size by morning and the color of black tar? He’d find out soon enough and she really didn’t want to be around when he did. Truly, she did feel bad about this but everything that had just happened had been an accident. It wasn’t her fault.

Romeo knew she was lying. He knew what a black eye felt like. He’d had enough of them in his lifetime to know that, and judging by the pain that was still shooting out from it into his skull, this one was promising to be a whopper. Yes - she was out and out lying to his face. Probably worried about how this was going to affect her fee and tip. After all, she had gone to all the trouble of coming out from New York City to strip for him and she didn’t want to go home empty-handed.

“I want to see for myself. Help me over there.” He pointed to a large mirror positioned over the couch.

“Why don’t I get you a wet washcloth? We’ll put that over it and…”

“Are you going to help me or do I have to hobble there on my own?” he challenged. Romeo was determined to call her out on her lie. She wasn’t going to get the better of him tonight, although she had damn well near killed him already.

“Alright, fine,” she conceded. Putting her shoulder underneath his armpits again, she began to pull him up slowly.

Using the wall as leverage and Juliet as a crutch, Romeo gingerly began to get up, but waves of pain were still shooting out from his back and he scrunched his face up in a grimace. He drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly.

“Is your back still sore?”

“Take a good look at my flat screen and then ask me that question again,” he snarked back.

Juliet’s eyes flew to the TV and saw that the glass had shattered like a car windshield that had just been in a major wreck. Yes… he’d definitely hit it pretty hard when she’d pushed him away.

As Romeo straightened himself up as best as he could, he watched Juliet’s face intently. She wasn’t the least bit sorry, at least she didn’t look it, he thought. She was one hard-hearted stripper, this one. Not an ounce of sympathy in that beautiful face of hers. It was probably all about the cash, whatever she could get out of her customer - or should he say ‘victim’ - before moving on to the next job.

“Maybe you should lie down instead,” Juliet’s voice broke into his thoughts.

“No, I want to see my eye,” he demanded, like a pouting four year old child. Angry at her for what he believed was still her cold indifference to his pain, he firmly pushed himself away from the wall and leaned on her completely for support, putting as much of his weight on her that he felt she could handle.

Juliet faltered, as his arms came around her and his heavy weight rested on her own slim arms and body. “Whoa,” she let out as she nearly fell over herself. But she caught herself in time and putting all of her concentration on her strength, held him up as best she could. He was a big guy and although he looked lean, he was muscular and that made him heavy… very heavy. She could feel every rippling muscle on his abdomen underneath his t-shirt pressing against her ribcage as he clenched them to try to ease his back pain.

She looked up then and her gaze was caught by his. Juliet hadn’t realized that he had been staring at her as she’d maneuvered him up off the floor. His blue eyes were piercing her with an intensity she’d never felt from a man before. It was as if they were searching for something in her soul, deep inside her, in those secret places she had never allowed anyone to see.

“Let’s get this over with,” she coldly announced, quickly hiding her raw emotions behind a frozen face.

Romeo smirked to himself. Just as he’d suspected. She was cold as Arctic ice inside and all business.

The couch they had to reach was a good ten feet away and the large mirror was positioned over it. Putting one foot out, Romeo braced himself for the pain that he knew was about to come when he’d put his weight on it, but no matter what, he was determined to do three things in the next three seconds. He was going to walk over there, have a good look at his eye and then call her out on her lie. Those were the only goals that his mind could process right now.

Gingerly putting pressure onto his right foot, he felt a shard of pain shoot up his spine but it wasn’t as bad as it had been and the long swigs of vodka he’d downed had deadened some of the sensation. Clutching to Juliet for dear life, he shuffled his other foot out slowly, and together, they began to make their way across the living room.

“Are you okay?” he quipped, trying to sound concerned for her welfare. Intentionally, he let one of his arms slide downwards a bit and

‘accidentally’ rest against the length of her breasts. He smirked to himself. Hell, why not cop a feel, especially after everything she’d put him through tonight?

“Yeah, fine,” Juliet puffed, as she tried valiantly to bear the brunt of his entire weight, not to mention the intense heat his body was giving off. She could feel every straining muscle of his as his entire form was pressed against hers. His arms were both around her shoulders and one of them had dropped against her chest, resting against her breasts - but maybe he didn’t realize he was doing that, being in pain and all. Okay, she’d let that one slide. They’d almost reached the couch anyway.

As they both shuffled to the sofa’s edge, they came into full view of the mirror. Romeo looked up and on seeing his ravaged reflection, his smirk dropped, “Oh my God! Look at my eye!” he shouted. He could see that the swelling had begun, the eye was shutting and the purple color was turning into a nasty shade of deep eggplant. “My God; I didn’t think it was this bad.” He looked down at her then. “Look at what you did to me!”

“Romeo, calm down,” she intoned rationally, trying to infuse some sanity into the situation.

“Holy shit,” he expelled before swinging both of his arms off of Juliet’s shoulders and up to his injured eye, trying to feel the damage there.

But with that sudden action, he’d removed the only support holding him up - which was Juliet. Losing his balance, he fell with his full weight against her. Juliet’s muscles were still straining with the exertion of having helped him across the room and she didn’t have anymore strength left to hold him up. Her knees suddenly buckled and screaming out, she fell backwards onto the couch with Romeo falling right on top of her. The air whooshed out of her lungs as his weight hit her with full force and she grunted.

Trying to catch her breath, a shocked Juliet stared at his face mere inches away from hers and she could feel every rippling, hard muscle of his sandwiched against her soft contours as she lay beneath him. Her pulse quickened of its own volition. “You lughead, why did you let go of me?” she shouted, suddenly feeling overwhelmed by his powerful presence.

Clearly in pain, Romeo let out a scream of his own as one of his hands flew to his back. “My back - I think I twisted it when I fell. I can’t move.”

“Get off me - now,” Juliet gritted.

“I can’t! I can’t move,” he yelled.

“I don’t care.” She began to squirm, trying to get out from under him. For some reason, every instinct in her was telling her to get away from him and get away now.

“Stop!” he gasped. “You’re making it worse.” His face twisted with pain and she immediately halted her movements.

As they lay there, both breathing heavily, their eyes suddenly locked onto each others with an intensity that surprised them both. Neither could tear away and the seconds stretched into what felt like an eternity. Softly, their labored breathing began to synchronize and they could both feel their heartbeats begin to pound in a coherent rhythm together.

Romeo’s eyes lowered to her rosy full lips and began to study them intently. Even though his back was throbbing, another part of his brain was beginning to register how soft they looked, and pink and juicy and inviting.

Juliet lay still as those eyes of his locked into her again and held her captive. In an instant, the tension in the room was replaced by a quiet anticipation. She watched his brilliant blue orbs travel from her eyes, down to her lips and back up again. What was he thinking, she wondered?

Sure, he wasn’t exactly the best looking guy she’d ever seen, especially with all that wild hair and beard. And he certainly dressed and acted like an idiot party boy and the black eye, which was now further swelling shut, didn’t add to his appeal, but there was something about those eyes of his and the way he was looking at her and the way his hard, angular body felt against every inch of hers - there was just something and she was caught in its spell.

Suddenly, the front door bell rang, snapping her back to reality. With all the breath she could muster, Juliet began to yell out. “Help! We’re in here! Help!”