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Now, I am not an exercise or even an outdoorsy person, so hiking isn’t my thing. Still, after being cooped up inside that house for weeks, I’m fast developing a brand new appreciation for the outdoors.
“Hell yes!” I grin, and he grabs a backpack out of the back of his car, then the two of us follow a narrow gravel path as it winds down the side of a hill.
The two of us walk for the next hour, switching between silently drinking in the scenery and chatting easily. Our conversation is light and free-flowing, keeping me distracted from the weariness slowly filling my legs with lead and the fact I’m drenched in sweat and Kai’s barely breathing heavily. In fact, despite my obvious lack of fitness, I’m starting to think I should add hiking to my list of favorite things to do—well, hiking with Kai, at least.
“What?!” I exclaim. “How can you even relax if you aren’t wearing cozy pajamas?!”
He laughs, this loud, free bark that is completely at odds with anything I’ve heard come from his lips before. I’ve loved watching him unfurl the longer we’ve been out here. It’s like he’s an entirely different man than the one I’ve been living with for the last two weeks. More carefree. That’s not to say he’s not prepared to dive into action at the first sign of a threat. I don’t think Kai could ever be relaxed enough for that, but he’s definitely the most at ease I’ve ever seen him.
“Why do I have to be wearing pajamas at all to relax?”
“Because,” I argue. “You just do.” I groan. “Please tell me you aren’t one of those people who doesn’t change out of their work clothes as soon as they get through the front door.”
“I practically live in jeans and t-shirts. It’s not like I wear a suit to work. Why would I need to change?”
All I can do is gawk at him. “You can’t relax in jeans. They’re restricting and tight, and uncomfortable. Nobody wants to lounge on the sofa all night in a pair ofjeans.”
That earns me another carefree bark of laughter. “Usually I’ll exercise in the evenings anyway.”
Well, now I’m truly horrified. “Exercise later? Isn’t exercise like a mandatory part of your job? Why would you also exercise in your free time?” I scrunch my nose up, horrified at the idea. I mean, exercise like this, I couldmaybebe talked into. It hardly feels like exercise except when we reach a particularly steep part of the path, and suddenly I sound like an eighty-year-old asthmatic trying to climb her stairs.
He shakes his head at my antics. “I enjoy exercising.”
“You were undoubtedly dropped on your head one too many times as a baby. Nobodyenjoysexercising.”
He turns to face me, his eyebrow raised as he asks, “Don’t try to tell me you aren’t having fun right now, because I don’t think I’ve seen you smile so brightly.” My grin wavers, a blush creeping into my cheeks as I duck my head. Before I can think of a suitable response, he nudges my shoulder with his muscular arm. “I know you haven’t had much to be happy about recently, but you should make an effort to smile more often. It suits you.”
Bashfully, I tuck a stray strand of hair behind my ear, muttering, “Yeah, maybe when this is all over.”
“I didn’t see you smile muchbeforeyour life got tossed in a blender, either.”
Brows furrowed, I snap my gaze up to his as I stop in my tracks. “I smiled.”
He comes to a stop beside me, clearly disagreeing as he shakes his head. “No, you didn’t.” Lifting his hand, he traces the edges of my lips with his thumb. My lips tingle where he touches, and I swear I stop breathing, unable to do anything but watch as he stares at where his thumb brushes my skin. “Not like this. I rarely saw a smile that reached your eyes. One that was completely genuine and open. Never a smile like the one you’ve been wearing today.”
It’s on the tip of my tongue to argue with him, but he beats me to it with a knowing smirk. “It was my job to pay attention to you. Trust me, I watched you often enough to know. You don’t fool me with your fake smiles meant to appease everyone else, Emilia. When this is over, you should smile only for yourself. No one else.”
His words leave me utterly speechless as I stare up at him, and after a moment, he drops his hand and continues forward. When I don’t immediately follow, he peers back at me over his shoulder. “Come on, it’s just up ahead. We’re nearly there.”
Shaking my head in an attempt to clear it, I turn to stare at where he’s walking ahead of me. “Nearly where? What’s just up ahead?” I call, breaking into a jog to catch up to him. “I thought we were just out for a hike?”
“Every hike should have a destination in mind,” he responds cryptically, not providing me with any more of an answer than that.
We continue on in silence for another twenty minutes or so. So much for our destination being just up ahead, though I don’t complain because I am genuinely having a lot of fun. I can’t remember the last time I enjoyed myself this much. I’m completely immersed in the here and now instead of thinking about the million and one things I need to do later—or in this case, the reason why I’m even out here with Kai at all.
Maybe, when this is all over, I’ll take up hiking as a hobby.Although, even as I think it, I know I won’t. It’s not the hiking I’m enjoying. It’s the company. I don’t remember ever being so at ease with another person. I feel like I could tell Kai anything, and he wouldn’t judge me or take offense. Maybe it’s the circumstances in which we met or the fact that we’ve been stuck together under the same roof, but we’ve developed a solid kinship. It doesn’t hurt that he looks like a golden Adonis, especially with how the rays of sunshine make his skin glow, like he was made to spend his days outdoors. He took his shirt off a while ago and tucked it in his back pocket in that hot way guys do, where it’s hanging out, and ever since then, I’ve had a hard time not tripping over my feet. Every golden inch of him is perfection personified, and I’m finding myself parched—and not solely because of the warm weather.
We left the actual path long ago, blind faith my only justification for why I followed Kai into the wilderness. Since then, we’ve been traipsing through grass and jumping over streams. I’m just about to cave and ask him how much farther we have to go when I hear it—the sound of rushing water. My ears perk up, and Kai laughs at the expression on my face, a knowing grin gracing his very kissable lips.
Wow, where did that thought come from?
It’s obvious the heat and exhaustion are getting to me.
“What’s that?” I question, looking around for the source.
Grabbing my hand, Kai urges me forward. “Just around this corner.”
I have to jog to keep up with his large strides as we skirt around a wall of rocks, and then the area opens up. Giant rock walls reach up to the sky around us, but following the sound of the rushing water, I gasp when I see a waterfall running down one of the cliffs and seemingly disappearing into the ground. Getting closer, I realize the rock we are standing on overhangs a cavern below, where the waterfall ends in a plunge pool and spring. “Wow,” I gasp.
