It wasn’t a sickness I was searching out a cure for.
After “saying our hellos” last night, we both passed out about two heartbeats after. When I’d gotten up to start breakfast, Jesse hadn’t even shifted. I almost checked his pulse he was sleeping so soundly. Sleeping in for Jesse was snoozing a few minutes past dawn. For him to still be asleep when it was rounding onto seven, the guy had to be about as beat as a person could be before keeling over from exhaustion.
As the bacon sizzled, I tried to work up some anger, or at least irritation, at Jesse making that five hundred mile drive after being awake for twelve hours. As usual, it didn’t work. Truthfully, part of me was thrilled he’d defied exhaustion to get to me sooner. Another part of me, a part that seemed a bit larger, worried that one day, our luck would run out and something terrible would happen.
That whole “running out of luck” thing I worried about didn’t only apply to Jesse driving across two state lines late at night. It plagued my nightmares and the darkest recesses of my mind when it came to Jesse’s and my relationship. I tried to ignore it—that feeling that the bottom would surely fall out from beneath us any day—but it crept into my mind and spread like a cancer. I knew my natural mentality tended toward pessimism and that those premonitions stemmed from that, so I tried damn hard to suffocate the naysayer in my mind. It was a constant battle.
I’d never brought up my luck-running-out thoughts to Jesse, and I never wanted to. They were my demons to fight. It wasn’t that I didn’t want his help; it was just that I’d have to bring him into hell to be a part of the battle. Hell—my personal one or any other one—was no place for someone like Jesse Walker.
So I battled them on my own, swore to myself I wouldn’t let the self-destructive person I’d locked up months ago out of her cage, and would do everything in my power to make sure I never ran out of luck when it came to Jesse. Whatever came, whatever obstacles we faced, one thing was certain: he was there now. He chose to give his love to me, and that had left me forever changed, no matter what happened.
“You make me breakfast when you come to Willow Springs, and you make me breakfast when I come here. You do realize you’re spoiling me, right?”
My beam was back in all of its prior glory.
“I do.” I turned off the burner before turning around. Jesse had managed to find his jeans, although the top button wasn’t fastened, but he was still sans shirt. Probably because I’d tossed it behind the headboard when I peeled it off of him last night. “I kinda like spoiling you.”
His eyes ran over me in a slow, purposeful way. Not in a lustful, I’m-going-to-take-you-right-now kind of way, but in a worshipful kind of way. I doubted I’d ever get used to him admiring me that way. “That can make a man weak.”
“I know. That’s all part of my evil plan.” Whether it was the look in his eyes, or the way he looked in nothing else but a carelessly situated pair of tight jeans, I simply couldn’t not approach him.
“What evil plan?” His arms tangled around me, and he drew me close to plant a kiss on my forehead.
“To make you so weak and spineless you’ll cave to my every wish, whim, and want.” I nestled my head into his chest as I wound my arms around him. His warmth spread to me, and I knew if there was one position I’d want to spend all of eternity in, that would be it.
“Hate to break it to you, but that evil plan has been working since last June, Rowen.”
“Oh? Did I miss the memo?”
“I’m weak, spineless, and . . . putty”—I felt his smile curve into the top of my head—“to your every wish, whim, and want now. I have been. I always will be.”
“That so?”
“For you only,” he whispered into my hair. “For you, I’m a weak, weak man. I’m so weak for you that you could break me with one word. You could end me with one look. You could ruin me with one touch.”
I thought we were born knowing how to breathe. It was an instinctive thing. But right then, I had to remind myself how to do it. “You’re weak?” He was the strongest person I’d ever known. If he was weak, then I don’t know what I was.
“Incredibly.” He kissed my temple. “For you.”
After a few moments of re-learning how to breathe—so much for “instinctive”—I wove out of his embrace to plate up our breakfast. “Well, damn. There goes my meticulously detailed evil plan.”
Jesse chuckled. “What are you going to do with all of your free time now?”
Glancing over my shoulder, I gave him a once-over of my own. Mine wasn’t nearly as innocent as his had been. “Other evil things.” I lifted an eyebrow to fill in the blanks.
Jesse didn’t blush. He didn’t even blink. He did grin though. “Where do I sign up to take part in these other evil doings?”
I was about to forget all about breakfast and rush back to the bedroom—or hell, the table was faster—when the front door flew open. In dashed my quirky roommate with impeccably awful timing.
“ROWEN! Get your snarky ass out of bed! The day’s a wastin’!” Alex’s back was to us as she tugged off her knee-high, shiny black boots. Alex’s wardrobe was hardcore. I don’t think she owned a single thing that was cotton. She sported leather, silk, tulle, satin . . . did I mention leather? The girl was Hispanic, but she dressed like a Japanese anime character. Living with her was about as colorful and adventurous as her wardrobe.