Jahleel (23 page)

As I made to set Jahleel’s cellphone down, a message icon floated onto the screen. No sound. It was on silent.

Chewing on my lower lip, I wondered how unethical it would be to spy… But then again, I’ve never been an ethical girl. Have you seen me? I’m a bloody rock star.

Just saying.

I entered Jahleel’s password and unlocked the screen again, as it had automatically locked when I disconnected the doctor’s call.

96 unread text messages. 298 missed calls.

Christ, who’s
this
popular?

Going against the good, angelic voice in my head, I scrolled down over the messages without opening them so he wouldn’t know I spied. But I could see the names of the senders, and the first couple of words in each message. There was a truckload of female names, and messages that started out like,
‘You’ve been on my mi…
’, ‘
Hey, hot stud! I miss
…’, ‘
Why are you ignori…
’, ‘
When can I see you aga…
’

They were endless, and I was tempted to delete them all so he wouldn’t see them. The good, angelic voice got through to me somehow and I left them. He would know if I deleted them anyway.

I did, however, opened each of Tiara’s, read and deleted them. All were of her apologizing and begging him not to leave her.

Babii, please.

Just pick up the phone… or text me back.

I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to force anything on you. Don’t end this.

Please. I CAN do casual, I’ll take whatever I can get from you.

Just don’t end us.

Blech
. Whiny floozy. Delete. Delete. Delete.

Then I took special note of my messages in the midst of all those other messages. The others came in mere seconds before or after mine, yet
my
messages were the only ones opened.

This had me reeling for a second. He purposely ignored everyone, but answered mine? Well, he did ignore my phone calls and it took some time before he texted me back, but still, he replied. To me.

This calmed me some, and I felt all warm and tingly inside. With that, I stopped the spying and deleting and set the phone down on the kitchen counter. Humbled.

Moving back into the living room, I leaned over Jahleel and swept off the blanket. When he glared up at me with the wish of me dying a slow, painful death in his eyes, I hastily explained, holding up the blanket as a protective barrier, “Your doc says this is bad.”

Wrapping his arms around his body, he nodded in compliance. “D-Did he t-t-talk your ears off?”

That made me laugh, because the doctor did talk a lot about details and processes, giving explanations that were highly irrelevant. “I’ve got a sister who talks in a continuum, so I’m immune to chatty people.”

He gave me a shaky smile. “That’s w-why I never call him. D-Doesn’t know w-when to shut the f-fuck up.”

Still A-hole Jahleel even in fits of shivers… I
love
him.

“Be right back,” I told him, moving off. “I’ll make you breakfast.”

“N-no,” he stopped me. “Lie down with me.”

Looking down at his still irresistible body, clad in grey sweats, red socks and white tee, I hesitated.

What if I took advantage of the situation? Did he know what he was asking? Did he know how obsessed I was with him? Even now? What if I laid down there, manipulated his feeble state, and ended up riding him, debilitating him further?

Noticing my hesitation, he coaxed, “Please.”

Well, he said ‘please’, so…

I removed my hoodie and tossed it over the back of the couch, leaving on my white Cami tank and lowered down next to him, curling up.

“Hug me,” he ordered quietly.

Oh, dear Lord, help me.

Sidling up closer, I tucked one arm under and around him, and the other over him, pulling him close. He was flat-iron-hot, yet he was shivering. Amazing how the body operates, huh?

“It w-will stop s-s-soon,” he whispered. “Happened s-same t-time yesterday morning.”

“But I need to get you something warm to drink, JK.”

“Wait…” he trailed off, staring at my lips, it looked like he wanted to say something else but decided against it. “Just wait…”

Somehow, I knew he wasn’t talking about me waiting to make him coffee. I didn’t know how I knew, but I just did.

Wrapping my arms tighter around him, I pressed flush against his body, and we stayed like that for a while, watching each other, until his shivering gradually eased.

Jahleel moved even closer, and so did I. Our noses touched, though still platonic.

His fire-hot breath touched my lips, “Aren’t you afraid of gettin’ sick breathing in my germs?”

Smiling, I shook my head the best I could with our tight space. “
Haliborange Vitamin C Tablets.”

“What?”

“Each morning, I drop one in a glass of water and drink it,” I explained, like I was telling a secret. “Vitamin C, it strengthens your immune system. As long as you take it religiously each day, you’ll never get a cold or flu another day in your life.”

When he raised a brow, I claimed, “Well, it works for me. Swear by it, I haven’t fallen ill since I was a teenager.”

His smile illuminated our tiny area. “Guess I need to try it then.”

“Yeah,” I grinned for no reason whatsoever, “I bought you some.”

We fell quiet for a while, until his shivering stopped altogether. As I shifted to move, he said with a half-smile, “You moaned my name…You were dreamin’ about me…”

Mortification seeped in again, and I dropped my gaze downward as heat crept up my neck. Why the hell did I have to wake up with my hand down my knickers when I was at
his
home? Seriously, I needed to get laid ASAP. This couldn’t be healthy.

My abashed expression wasn’t enough for him to cease the torture. “A dirty dream, too, by the looks of it.”

“JK,” I whispered, avoiding his eyes, “stop.”

Reaching a hand up between us, he drew the tip of his forefinger up the side of my neck. “When you’re embarrassed, your neck flushes a beautiful shade of red…” His finger continued trailing up over my chin and settled on my left cheek. “And, very slowly, right before my eyes, that lovely flush of colour creeps up to your face, then gathers and settles here and here…” He tapped my cheek on the other side, then settled back on the left. “Here it turns into a full-on blush, giving new meaning to the term ‘rosy cheeks’…”

Now, what did I say to that? Were we still in platonic mode or what? Had the arbitrary lines been blurred?

Oh, how I wanted the lines to not only be blurred, but rubbed right out.

“Breathe, Sassy, breathe,” he whispered with his wicked crooked smile. “It’s just fascinating to watch, that’s all.”

Untangling myself from around him, I leaped to my feet and shot him an accusatory glare, pointing a stiff finger at him. “Don’t tell me to fucking
breathe!
You always do and say things like that to me, then you tell me to
not
be affected.”

Shifting over onto his back, he looked up at me, still wearing that damned grin. “You’re right, I shouldn’t be
tellin’
you to breathe. You’ll either breathe or die.”

“I don’t want to
breathe
,” I shrieked, flinging my hands up in the air. “I want you to take my goddamn breath
away
! I want to pant and fucking scream, not
breathe
!”

Jahleel leaned up on one elbow, looking semi-normal, though still a bit pale. “You get excited too easily, Sassy. I say a couple of words, and you go all wide-eyed and asthmatic on me.”

He purposely, deliberately, wilfully, completely spoke around all I just confessed, refusing to acknowledge my desire, my need, my craving for him. Jesus Christ, he was exasperating!

Catching my lower lip between my teeth, I tried to calm down. “Because you’re
you
, JK,” I retorted in defense of my actions. “Is that so hard to understand?”
I’m in love with you, douchenizzle!

One shoulder moved up in a shrug as he simply responded with, “You’re
Saskia Day
.”

Sending my eyes heavenward, I waved a dismissive hand at him and made to exit the room. “Whatever, man. I’m going to make breakfast.”

I ignored his chuckle on my way out.

As slowly as he was recovering, the infuriating a-hole in him was coming back. Well, did it
ever
actually leave?

Whenever I wasn’t working, the place I spent most of my time was in the kitchen. I loved to eat, even though at this point in time, I had to maintain a diet to be in shape for my upcoming tour. But aside from ‘preparing for tours’ diets, I dwelled in my kitchen, cooking and eating until surfeited.

Jahleel’s kitchen, like mine, was a dream to be in. Very rarely did one find much of anything in a single man’s kitchen except beer, water and overnight takeout. But Jahleel’s kitchen was stocked, piled and loaded. He must cook a lot. In his kitchen, I was like a kid in a candy store.

For breakfast, I prepared a hearty meal of baked beans, thin-sliced ham, poached eggs, mushrooms, sausage and toasts.

Just as I poured a cup of coffee for Jahleel, he appeared in the second entryway of the kitchen, propped on the wall with one hand. Refusing to acknowledge him, I moved the mugs to the tray and dunked a Lady Grey teabag in my cup. I was still in hate mode.

“Gonna use the bathroom,” he unnecessarily announced.

I focused my attention on the task at hand and apathetically responded, “Thanks for the update.”

“Aren’t you gonna help me?”

That got my notice, and I glanced up at him standing there, eyes twinkling with mischief and a repressed smile. In my judgment, he seemed perfectly capable of going to the bathroom himself. The man clearly took pleasure in screwing with me.

“Sure,” I caustically stated, “You want me to hold your
penis
while you
wee-wee
, too? Shake it after, yeah?”

“You’re the worst caretaker ever,” he pouted, lips twitching as he struggled not to smile.

“Piss off, JK,”

“Someone’s in a bitchy mood,” he grumbled as he shuffled off.

When he was gone, I allowed myself to smile, knowing he couldn’t see. I was still obsessed, of course.

By the time Jahleel returned, his face somehow fresh and revived as if he had healing water running from his taps, breakfast was set up on the coffee table in the living area so he could eat from the couch.

“Wow…what a spread,” he commented, nodding at the food as he sat beside me on the couch. Picking up a piece of toast, he bit in, and while chewing, said, “You’re amazing, Sassy. Thanks again.”

Stuffing food in both corners of my mouth, I ignored him.

“Still in bitch mode?”

No reply.

On a shrug, he gave up and dug into his breakfast, eating every last drop of food on his place. When the plate was clean, he looked at the cup of coffee on his tray and frowned.

As I lifted my cup to my mouth, he asked, “Can I borrow that for a minute?”

Befuddled, I paused and frowned at him. He took the opportunity to steal the cup from my fingers and sipped my tea.

“Lady Grey,” he muttered, nodding in approval.

With my cup, he leaned back on the sofa, pulled up his feet on the couch like a five year old, picked up the remote and switched on the television.

“Um,” I dragged out, looking at my confiscated cup and back to him, “what’s wrong with your coffee?”

Eyes on the television, fingers working the remote, he absently replied, “I don’t drink coffee.”

“Then why do you have a coffee maker and a 27ounce bottle of Folgers in your darn kitchen?”

“Krissy.”

I’d thought it odd finding boxes of Twining’s tea in an American kitchen. They were supposed to be coffee lovers, but I didn’t pay it much mind at the time. I just assumed he was a coffee drinker instead of asking. “So, are you going to give me back my tea?”

Without looking at me, he shooed me off with the remote, “Get your own.”

Batting down the urge to punch him, or kiss him, or rape him, I cleared the trays and washed the dishes.

I poured two glasses of ice-cold water and dropped two of the Vitamin C tablets in each to dissolve. Mine was quaffed in one go. I brought Jahleel’s to him, setting it down on the coffee table. “When you’re done with that, drink this. All of it.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

The doorbell rang just then and I started for the door, knowing it was Thomas.

Jahleel’s voice stopped me. “You’re leaving already?”

When I swivelled back around, he was watching me from under his lashes—a look I was positive he used whenever he wanted to win one over. He wanted me to stay.

“No. That’s Thomas dropping off clean clothes for me,” I told him. “I’m staying until tomorrow…if you’re okay with that?”

“Yeah, yeah, of course.” He sounded relieved. “But, don’t you have shit to do?”

“Yes, but I had my assistant shift around a couple of things on my schedule so I would have today free.”

“Ah.” He sipped his tea and peered at me over the rim, eyes devilish. “Well, you’re welcome to stay, but you have to stop being mean to me…”