Sliding over to her side again, he frowned at her question. “Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I be?” His smile was peaceful as he stroked her ribs.
Jessie sighed and shook her head. “I know things between us are…better,” they both crooked a grin at her choice of words, “but…I didn’t just find out that the man who’d raised me wasn’t my real father. I didn’t just find out that my entire childhood was a lie.” She cupped his cheek and studied his eyes. “Are you okay, Kai?”
With a sad sigh, he lowered his gaze to the sheets. “I don’t know. I just…can’t think about that yet.” When he looked back up at her, a love beyond comprehension was in his tropical eyes. “One life-changing event at a time.”
Jessie grinned as she ran her arms around his body. “Life-changing?”
Pulling her tight in their side-by-side position, he nodded. “You’ve change everything for me, Jessie. I really don’t know what I’d do without you.”
Jessie let out a happy sigh; a yawn of exhaustion accidentally slipped out right behind it. Kai smiled then yawned himself. Jessie ran her thumb across the weariness she could see under his eyes. “You’re tired,” she whispered.
He nodded. “It’s been a long day. A long week. A long autumn.”
Jessie nodded, then softly kissed him. Yes, it definitely had been. Closing her eyes, she murmured that she needed to call work and let them know she wouldn’t be coming back. Kai handed her the phone from the nightstand, then adjusted the bedspread so it covered their naked bodies. Jessie yawned as she dialed, relaxing into his warm skin under the warm quilt. The combination was a natural sedative, and she could barely keep her eyes open. Upon hearing the receptionist pick up, Jessie began lying her ass off. Letting all of the tiredness seeping into her body seep into her voice, she told the woman that she’d thrown up after lunch and was staying home. The receptionist didn’t want to get sick, so she heartily agreed with Jessie’s decision, and told her she’d take care of her clients.
After she hung up the phone, Kai laughed. “Such a liar,” he muttered.
Now that she was free for the afternoon, the exhaustion she’d been fighting completely took over. Tucking her arms in-between them, she sighed in contentment as Kai’s warm body enveloped hers. “I couldn’t really tell her the truth now, could I?”
He let out a tired laugh, then kissed her head and exhaled in a long, happy way. As a peaceful silence filled her bedroom, Jessie felt her head drift in and out of sleep. Hearing Kai’s breath start to slow down, she wondered if he was already there. Then his low voice broke the quiet. “Can I stay?”
Jessie wasn’t sure if he meant here in her bedroom or here in Denver. Regardless, her answer was the same. Sleepily kissing the edge of his tattoo, she muttered, “I think the better question is, can you ever leave?”
Kai squeezed her and sighed. “I can handle that. I love you.”
She mumbled something that loosely resembled, “I love you too,” then sleep swept her away.
Jessie could have slept all day. She was so warm and content in Kai’s arms. In fact, it was quite possible that she had been sleeping all day. She didn’t care; her dreams were all of Kai, of what their life could be now that they could be together.
She was deep in a dream of watching him emerge from the ocean—the waves pounding behind him, the water dripping from his body, a seductive smile on his face as he ran his fingers through his dark hair, the low slung board shorts clinging to the shape of him, outlining what was only hers now—when a loud voice in the real world seeped into her subconscious. “Hey, Jess, you can’t bitch about us leaving stuff everywhere and then… Oh, hey, sorry, I didn’t know you had comp…and…oh my God.”
The alarmed voice intruding on her fabulous dream of a dripping wet Kai rudely jerked her to awareness. For a minute, Jessie wasn’t sure where she was, what was going on, or why the voice sounded so disgusted. Then ice-cold realization flashed through her body and her eyes shot open as wide as they could go. In all the euphoria of finally letting go with Kai, Jessie had sort of forgotten that she had roommates who knew him, and knew he was her family. Or they thought he was, at least. April and Harmony didn’t know what Jessie and Kai knew.