Chapter 10

– Months Ago –

In that first week that Kayla started living with Jason, she cooked one of her favorite meals.

With only his second bite, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d tasted something so good. “Where in the world did you learn to cook like this?”

She looked embarrassed, and he couldn’t figure out why this compliment would embarrass her.

“Kayla, is everything alright?”

Kayla closed her eyes for a second, took a deep breath, and then looked at him and smiled, but her sweet smile didn’t conceal the pain in her eyes. “Everything’s fine.”

She put her napkin on the table, and got up. “We have some more sauce, do you want some?”

As she quickly walked past Jason’s chair, toward the stove, he watched her, curiously. He was convinced that something was bothering her.

What happened next will forever be in Jason’s memory as happening in slow motion.

Mid-step, Kayla wavered, as if she were going to fall.

Jason shot up, and put his arms around her, just as she tilted too far to the side, seemingly unable to catch her balance.

He held her with his arm around her back. She leaned into him, or continued to fall. He wasn’t sure. Without thinking, he picked her up, and set her on the counter, standing in front of her to look straight into her face. He needed to see if she was OK, and figure out what had just happened.

She was opening her eyes, and then shutting them again, as if she couldn’t focus. She looked scared – a look he had only seen on her face that once.

He kept one arm wrapped around her back to hold her in a sitting position, and with his other hand, gently cupped her face, to hold her head still.

He asked quietly, and calmly, “Kayla, are you alright?”

She closed her eyes, and held them shut, and leaned her head forward to rest her forehead on his shoulder.

Jason leaned forward, and nestled himself in between her legs in order to hold her more comfortably.

She took a deep breath, and then nodded. “Just give me a second.”

He leaned his face into the side of her head, absent-mindedly kissing her hair and running his hands gently across her back. “Take all the time you need.”

She continued deep breaths in, and deep exhales.

She finally began speaking. She turned her head so that she was talking into his neck. Maybe she didn’t want to make eye contact while she said whatever she was going to say.

“I just stood up too fast. It happens sometimes.”

Jason nodded, and rubbed her back consolingly.

Quietly, she asked, “Remember when Margo and I would spend all day in your kitchen, baking and cooking?”

He kept rubbing her back as she spoke. “Uh huh.”

“I always loved cooking, but growing up, my mom barely had any pots and pans. We never had any real food. If we cooked, it was the instant mac and cheese. But when I would come stay here, you always let Margo and me cook and experiment. You let us make big messes, you let us burn things. It was all a big learning experiment. And I loved it.”

She took another deep breath. “I feel like I learned to cook right here in this kitchen.”

She wrapped her arms around Jason’s back. One hand slowly worked its way under his shirt, and she began lightly tickling the skin of the small of his back.

It was giving him goosebumps, making his whole body tingle. He redoubled his efforts to listen to her every word, even though her hands were very quickly distracting his attention.

She continued, “My mom was… well… I don’t know how much you know about her, but I moved out of there when I was 15. She… um… never really liked having me around. She told me I reminded her too much of my father.”

She stopped talking, like she was unsure how much she wanted to share.

A few moments later, she continued. “Anyways, once I stopped living with mom, I moved in with my brother, who had an apartment in South Fairmont. I cooked for him and his friends, but they never gave me any money for it, and it became more trouble than it was worth. But I have a bunch of cookbooks. I love reading about cooking. I love watching cooking shows. I always help cook at the restaurants I’ve worked at, even though I’ve always been hired as a waitress. But the restaurants just do grill work and deep frying.

“Really, though, I love to cook. I just haven’t been able to practice as much as I would have liked.”

She took another deep breath. “Until now.”

She began to raise her head, but stopped when her mouth was even with Jason’s neck. She added, “You have no idea how much that means to me.”

Ever so slightly, she brushed her lips across his neck, just below his ear.

He held his breath, not sure what her intentions were.

She added, “Here I have all the tools I need, and the money to buy fresh ingredients, and enough time to plan meals, and experiment. And to top it all off, I have an appreciative audience.”

She took another deep breath, and let her lips brush his skin again. “I couldn’t ask for anything better.”

Jason froze, not knowing what to do. He noticed that he was standing in between her legs, with her sitting on the counter, their arms were wrapped around each other, and she was now pressing her soft lips against his sensitive neck.

He started to move his head so that he could look into her eyes.

But before he could, she snaked her arms up his chest, and around his neck. She laced her fingers into his hair and held his head close. She whispered hotly into his ear. “Jason, you’ve been so nice to me. And I’ve acted so ungrateful.”

He tried to shake his head, but she held him in place. He noticed her legs were wrapping around him. He knew he needed to put a stop to this, but his body wasn’t moving.

She whispered into his ear, “I really, really want to thank you.”

She sucked on his earlobe, and then gently bit it. She added, “I want to thank you for everything.”

Kayla kissed his cheek, and then kissed the edge of his mouth.

He wasn’t pulling away, even though he knew he should stop this.

She kissed the corner of his mouth, and then moved to kiss his lips.

Before she kissed him, she whispered, “Thank you” once more.

When her lips touched his, the softness of her skin and the gentleness of her touch was too much.

At first, he just savored the feeling of her lips against his, but then she gently tickled his lips with her tongue, encouraging more.

Barely opening his mouth, he ventured to explore her with just the tip of his tongue.

As soon as their tongues touched, it was like someone had waved a race flag. He was revved up, and there was no doubt in his mind that he wanted every single piece of this gorgeous, sensual woman.

His grip around her back tightened, one hand moving down to her waist, pulling her ass closer to the edge of the counter, pushing their hips together.

Her legs tightened around his back, lodging his hardening cock firmly between them. Her fingers wove through his hair, gently pulling his hair, while pushing their heads together.

She whimpered into his mouth.

It was the sexiest thing Jason had ever heard.

One of her hands trailed down his chest, and his stomach, slowly making her way under the waistband of his pants. She whispered again, “I really want to thank you properly.”

Before her hand went any further, his brain caught up with what they were doing. He sighed, “Oh fuck” and grabbed her wrist to stop her progress.

She didn’t let up. She kept kissing his neck, but he leaned his head over to stop her, and with a pained look on his face he said, “Kayla I just have to ask you something.”

She kissed his cheek. “I’m on birth control.”

He smiled. “That’s good to know. But my question…”

She was still kissing him.

He moved his hand to her face, to steady her. He held her face a few inches away and asked, “I have to know…”

He looked into her eyes, with their faces still very close. “Tell me something, and be completely honest with me.”

She nodded.

“Is there any part of you that feels like this is why I offered for you to live here?”

She was silent, thinking about it.

He added, “Does any part of you feel like maybe I wanted this to happen, and that’s why I invited you to stay?”

She smiled seductively. “Jason, I saw the way you looked at me at the club. There’s no doubt that it plays some sort of role in your willingness to help me.”

Damn.

“I was afraid so.” He pulled his face a few inches further away. “Kayla, we can’t do this.”

She leaned forward to kiss his neck again. “Yes we can.”

He tried again. “Kayla, I can’t do this, then.”

When she stopped kissing him, he hugged her, and continued talking without kissing her. “Everything I’ve done is meant to help you, and if we do this, I wouldn’t be helping you.”

She rocked her hips ever so slightly. Sexily, she argued, “But, you would be helping me. Please, Jason.”

He responded, “Oh fuck. I would like that. But …” He placed his hands on her hips to keep them from rocking forward. He knew if she kept doing that his body would take over and the argument would be lost. “I want this to be a place you can live throughout college. And if we do this, it will jeopardize our living arrangement.”

She seemed unconvinced.

He tried again. “Have you ever slept with someone you lived with?”

She smiled sheepishly. “Yes”

“And how did that work out?”

She laughed, “Not so well, I suppose. We broke up and I moved out.”

“And are you still friends?”

Laughing again, “Not a chance.”

He gave her a look, knowing that she just made the argument for him.

She asked, “Well, what about you? Have you slept with a roommate before?”

He nodded. “When I was your age. I lived in a house with six other people. Four girls, three guys. By the end of the year, almost of all of us had slept with each other at some point, and it was the most dramatic episode of my life. I wouldn’t wish that on my worse enemies.”

She bit her lip. “Hmm. Kinky. Did you sleep with the guys too?”

Jason shook his head. “That’s the part you want to know more about?”

She nodded with a smile..

“No, I didn’t sleep with the guys. Just the girls. And a few of their friends. I don’t remember the reasoning behind any of it, but we all regretted it afterwards. We were young, immature, and let our hormones get the best of us. We all ended up getting our feelings hurt at least once. We all hurt someone else’s feelings. It was a bad situation all around.”

She chewed on the side of her mouth, and asked, “So you think I’m too immature to handle this?”

“No. I think you’re very mature. More mature than me, probably. I respect you too much to do this. And I don’t want to put you in an awkward position.”

He noticed that he was still standing in between her legs, with his hands holding onto her waist. He asked, “Do you want to finish dinner and keep talking about this?”

She nodded, and he helped her slide off the counter. He held onto her for a moment longer and asked, “You feel steady?”

Smiling softly, she nodded.

He kept one arm on the small of her back, following her back to the table.

She started to sit down, and then he asked, “Want to take our plates into the living room? It’s more comfy in there.”

She nodded and grabbed her plate. “Great idea.”

After they got situated on the couch and started to eat again, she said, “Jason, I just want to say sorry. That I… uh… sorry I… you know. I don’t want you to think I would do that with just anyone. I know now that you don’t want to, and I won’t let it happen again, OK?”

Before he could think, he said, “Kayla, it’s not at all that I don’t want to – believe me. It’s that I shouldn’t.”

She raised an eyebrow, questioningly, but then shrugged. “OK. It’s fine.”

He hoped to god she didn’t feel rejected. He didn’t know what else to say to help ensure it, but she seemed relaxed, and they didn’t talk about it any more.

After dinner, they watched some TV together, and Jason unfolded a big throw blanket and threw half of it over to Kayla on the other side of the couch.

Eventually, she tucked her cold feet under his butt, and she looked at him carefully. “Is this OK?”

Jason looked over at the beautiful young woman who somehow had agreed to live with him. He smiled at her. “It’s very OK.”