“Hey back,” Flick dropped her bag onto the table in front of the swing and folded her arms. “I wasn’t expecting you to drop by.”
Kai shrugged. “I thought I’d take the big guy running with me.”
The Big Guy looked at Kai with adoring eyes. Hesohad a man crush. So did she. “Sure. That would be great.”
Kai stood up and cupped the side of her face, his thumb skimming the sensitive area under her eyes. “You’re not sleeping.”
“Not really,” Flick admitted.
“You and your cousin still at odds?”
“Yeah.”
Kai bent down to pick up Rufus’s leash and pulled his foot out from under his paw. “Go put on some gym clothes. Let’s see if we can tire you out enough so that you can sleep.”
Oh, what the hell? He could only say no. “I can think of a better way for you to tire me out that doesn’t involve running.”
Kai’s smile was brilliant enough to power the sun. “Oh, we’ll do that too,” He kissed her hard, stepping back when she tried to deepen the kiss. “I intend to make you very tired indeed.”
“If you make me run then I’ll probably be too tired for sex,” Flick warned him.
“I’ll take my chances,” He patted her hip as the kitten hopped off the bench. As it walked past Rufus, it lifted a tiny paw and tried to swat his nose. Rufus, the big weenie, yelped and Kai’s laugh rumbled over her. Flick felt a little of her tension melt away.
“Go get changed,” Kai suggested.“I’ll wait with the wimp.”
Rufus, in retaliation for the insult to his manhood, slammed his enormous paw back onto Kai’s foot.
“Okay.” Flick held up her hand, certain she needed an oxygen tank. “Enough. Can’t breathe.”
Kai handed her a bottle of water and led her to a boulder. Flick plopped down onto the hard rock and sucked in some air. When she thought she could talk without throwing up, she scowled at him. “You made me run.”
“Well, yeah.”
“For miles.”
Kai clicked a button on the side of his watch. “Miles implies that you’ve run more than one. You only ran one thousand two hundred and twenty-nine yards.”
Flick narrowed her eyes at him. “Most of it was uphill. That has to count for something.”
“Not really,” Kai sat down next to her and placed a hand on her thigh. His breathing hadn’t changed and he looked like he’d barely exercised at all which, to be honest, he hadn’t.
God, she was out of shape. And boy, she’d kill for a double chocolate cupcake.
Flick pulled up her foot and linked her arm around her bent knee. She’d always loved this particular spot on the trail. “This is one of my favorite places to rest on the trail.”
“And that has nothing to do with the fact that this is where you ran out of steam?”
“Shut up,” Flick bumped him with her shoulder before gesturing to the view in front of them. Below them was forest and beyond that, rolling hills. The trees were at their brightest, boldly displaying their red, yellow, and rust leaves. Fall was her favorite season, and particularly beautiful in this area of Virginia. The air was crisp but not cold as the trees flaunted their colors.
She wished Kai would stick around to fall move over for winter and then into spring. And she hated the fact that she was starting to wish that Kai would stick around. Period. She had to stop that.
“I haven’t seen Tally lately. Is she around?” Flick asked, partly because she wondered where the girl was and partly because she wanted to, mentally, change the subject.
“She went back to DC to pick up some more clothes, some things,” Kai replied. “She’ll be back in the morning."
“Has she found a job yet?” Flick asked.
Kai shook his head. “Not yet. We need some filing done at Caswallawn but that didn’t work out.”