21. Kavi
KAVI
From: Kavi specialk_jain@gmail.com>
To: Nathan nathans@gmail.com>
Date: July 2 7:29 AM
Subject: Simple it’s not, I’m afraid, you’ll find . . .
I have more news you’re probably not going to like, so I’m going to keep this short because the image of your disappointed face is just not going to help things. I’m sort of disappointed in myself, too, so don’t worry, I’ve already given myself the verbal smackdown on your behalf.
Here it goes . . .
I slept with my boss. Yes, the same guy I told you I kissed last time.
It kind of came out of nowhere. Or maybe it was always around us——the electricity, the tension, and need. Maybe it’s been there since day one, but we finally acted on it.
I’ll spare you the gritty details, but things haven’t been the same since. Yeah, I know what you’re thinking: Surprise, surprise. You slept with your boss and now he wants nothing to do with you because he”s a misogynist who probably does that to every woman who works for him. But I fully believe you’d be wrong to think that of him, despite his current actions of avoiding me.
How do I know? Well, you’ve always told me I had a good sense for people.
I get the feeling he’s been hurt by some of the shit he went through with his brother and his ex—a story for another time—and it’s made him guarded. Or maybe he knows there’s no future for us.
Either way, things are a little weird between us, and while that saddens me, I have no one to blame but myself. I knew exactly what he was asking and said yes, anyway.
Wish me luck in being able to survive another seven weeks of this.
xoxo
Special K
Looking at the clear skies, no one would know we’d just had weeks of relentless rain. It’s refreshing to finally see birds against the canvas of blue and sunlight blanketing everything in sight after so long.
It’s also a perfect afternoon to be sitting outside, holding the sweetest little bundle, swaddled like a human burrito in a pink blanket.
“She’s perfect, Belinda,” I say, admiring Evelyn’s little nose and soft eyebrows. It’s as if they were brushed on. “She looks just like you.”
Belinda sits back in her patio chair with her cup of tea in hand, dressed in leggings and an oversized button-down. “Except for that hair. That’s all from her dad.”
“She’s beautiful,” Madison pipes in, peeking over my shoulder at the baby in my arms, before wandering back to sit next to Brie on the outdoor loveseat. “And so quiet.”
Belinda snorts. “Yeah, that’s because she’s finally sleeping. The booger woke up five times last night, and let me tell you, she was not quiet then. She has a set of lungs that can rattle walls.”
Madison, Brie, and I giggle. We’d coordinated meeting the baby so Belinda wouldn’t be overwhelmed with multiple visits from us now that she had Evelyn’s schedule to consider.
The three of us get into an easy conversation with Belinda, telling us about how much her life has changed over the past two weeks, groaning with a laugh when she says she can’t remember the last time she properly showered.
“But I wouldn’t have it any other way. Life has been turned on its head in the most satisfying way possible.” Her eyes soften, watching her baby sleep, before flickering over to me. “Enough about me, though. How are things going at the office? Tell me you’re still working there.”
I giggle. “Still employed since the last time you checked on me a couple of days ago. Things are . . . good.”
I don’t mean to hesitate, but telling them that things are tense and charged every time Hudson and I are in a room together wouldn’t be the most prudent answer with Madison sitting right next to me.
Not to mention, my stomach has been in knots all morning with the anticipation of seeing her. It’s the first time we’ve hung out since I moved into Hudson’s condo, and not telling her feels like a breach of our friendship.
The last time I mentioned it to Hudson, he’d said our living situation wasn’t something Madison needed to know about. And now, with the fact that he made it clear we were a one-time thing, I can’t imagine he’d be okay with me telling her. And I don’t think it would be right to tell her without giving him a heads up.
Ever since the time in his office when he completely ravaged my body and left me deliciously bruised for days after, it’s been hard to find a new normal with him. I wish I could say I was the type of woman who could walk away unaffected after he’d told me in no uncertain terms that it was a one-time only deal, but I’m not.
I’m confused, sad, and I don’t know . . . hurt, in a way. I have no right to be, but I am. I’m hurt that he just wanted something for one night, as if that’s all it would take to get me out of his system. I’m hurt that we can’t seem to hold a conversation for more than a few minutes when we’re alone. And I’m hurt that he insisted on giving me that one and only time.
I know I’m not being fair, nor am I being rational because I agreed to it when he asked me if that would be okay, but damn it, I am.
It was nice that he was out of town for the week after because, honestly, I didn’t know how to be around him anymore.
I can play the part of his admin during work, return email responses with utter professionalism and nod at the right times during staff meetings.
But what I can’t do is go back to the way it was before.
What I can’t do is pretend I don’t remember the way his eyes brushed featherlight over my face, contradicting the way he sheathed himself inside me. What I can’t do is convince my heart and mind that I don’t want more.
So the morning I saw him after he came back, half-naked and deliciously sculpted—tattoos and all—I almost fell on my ass and gave myself a concussion. I tried to avoid his gaze, as if I wasn’t the least bit affected by his presence, when all I could feel was him around me. His scent, the weight of his gaze, his god-like physique; he was everywhere.
I thought I had it all under control until that night, when he found me in my room in the throes of a particularly terrible nightmare.
The way he held me, calmed me, and carried me to his bed . . . The way his arms never unwrapped from my body through the night . . .
In a way, it made me feel even more disoriented than the dream itself. On one hand, I longed for his touch, happy to have any scraps of his attention. On the other, it threatened to put a crack in the heart I was trying so hard to protect.
Perhaps it’s easy for him to separate what happened in his office with the protective and gentle way he held me in his bed, but it isn’t for me.
Perhaps returning to an all-business tone comes naturally to him, but it doesn’t to me.
Perhaps forgetting is as easy as switching off a light switch for him, but it isn’t for me.
I’ll never forget.
After having slept better than I had in weeks, I’d woken up in his bed that morning to find him gone, and we haven’t spoken about it since.
Belinda’s voice brings me out of my thoughts. “Well, I’m glad, and I hope you don’t let Hudson push you around. He can be a demanding dick, but he means well.” She eyes Madison over her cup. “No offense, Madison.”
Madison chuckles. “None taken. I told Kavi before I referred her that my dad’s no walk in the park to work for. But it looks like she’s handling him just fine.”
Little does she know exactly how I’ve handled him . . .
Hoping to hide the pink rising to my cheeks and bury my guilt, I try to take the conversation in a different direction. Though it’s still about Hudson, since it seems all I want to do ever since I met the man is gather information about him like some desperate hoarder. “Has he always been this intense and single-focused on work? Like everything else is just an afterthought?”
Madison sighs. “The only times he loosens up is when he’s at the ranch, riding his favorite horse—”
“He has horses?” I interrupt. When Hudson said he had a ranch, I wasn’t envisioning a functional one with horses and pigs, but I guess it sort of explains his somewhat rough hands. Maybe even the few freckles on his nose.
Brie laughs, her chocolatey brown hair getting picked up by a breeze. “Oh, yeah. And no one else can handle her. Hudson’s had her forever.”
“She’s like another daughter to him, I swear,” Madison chimes in with a soft laugh. “One with more attitude than me. Dad does relax, but it’s not often. It’s why I’ve been on him to start dating again, to get himself out there.”
An acrid taste fills my mouth, and I look down at the baby in my arms to avoid their gazes, hoping they don’t see the way my smile withers.
Of course his daughter would want Hudson to find someone. My mom has only recently been widowed, but I worry about her in the same way. But the image of Hudson with someone—probably leggy, well-dressed, and with an IQ of one-sixty—has that bitterness curdling my stomach.
“Well, given how needy Kenna was,” Belinda starts, getting a groan from Madison. “You’ll have to find him someone more independent and less clingy.”
Madison snorts. “And hopefully someone who won’t sleep with my uncle because my dad isn’t around enough. It’s why Dad hasn’t wanted a long-term relationship.” She frowns. “He doesn’t think he has enough time to offer anyone.”
Is that why Hudson insisted on something for one night? Because he doesn’t have time for long-term attachments?
Brie shrugs, pulling Madison into her side. “Either that or he hasn’t found the right person worth offering his time to. I’d like to believe the latter.”
I hold back the bitter noise itching to crawl out of my throat. Clearly, I’m not the ‘right person’ she’s referring to.
And because I can’t help it, hunting for every tiny morsel I can get, I ask, “Did he and Kenna live together?”
“No.” Madison puffs out a laugh. “Let’s just say, I’m lucky Dad could handle living with me for as long as he did, and I’m his daughter!” She shakes her head. “No, they didn’t, and that’s something that worries me for his future. Other than me, he’s never lived with a woman before; I’m not even sure he remembers how to.”
Jesus. My face feels like it’s on fire.
“Plus, he’s so private,” Belinda adds. “In all the time I’ve worked for him, I haven’t once seen his place—not even to drop off his dry cleaning.”
“Well, don’t let that offend you,” Brie piles on. “In the five years Madison and I have been together, I only got an invitation for dinner at his house for the first time last year.”
Belinda raises both her brows. “Yeah, it would take a very unique woman to break down Hudson’s walls enough for him to allow her into his home and his heart. And I just don’t know if someone like that exists.”
As the conversation changes to updates about Brie and Madison’s wedding, my thoughts stay on the previous topic.
Hudson has certainly given me keys to his home. His heart, however? I wonder if he remembers where the keys to that are.
“Hello?”I squint at my phone to see the name on the screen again, my voice sleep-laden and groggy. “Jojo? Are you okay?”
I’m already climbing to my feet, trying to find my bearings, when she answers. Her voice is blanketed behind the echoes of rain and thunder. “Hey Kavi,” I’m positive I hear her sniffle, “I didn’t mean to wake you. I’m sorry, I just . . . I just didn’t know who to—”
“Jojo, I’m right here. You never have to apologize for calling me. Where are you?”
She’s quiet for a moment, and all I can hear is the rain again. “In my dad’s shed. He’s not home. Only she is, along with her friends, and I . . . I came here to think. To get away.”
Rubbing my eye with my fist, I blink at the time on my old Dr. Seuss clock—three-twenty-two AM—before turning on the lights in my room. I shuffle over to my closet to grab my raincoat, cursing myself for not talking to her after the last class like I’d intended.
One of the other students and I started chatting about something he was going through, and before I knew it, time was up. I’d convinced myself that Jojo had seemed happier since the last time we spoke, when she told me she was having trouble with her stepsister. I figured they’d worked out their differences.
“What are you thinking about?”
“I don’t know.” She sobs into the phone. “I just don’t think it’ll ever get better.”
The bleakness in her voice sends chills up my arms. “Okay, okay. Can I come see you? Can you send me your address?”
“I don’t want you to come here for me. It’s raining and—”
“Jojo, listen to me. This is what I’m here for, okay? I gave you guys my number so you could call me, day or night. You did the right thing by calling me. Now, can you please send me your location?”
She’s quiet for another beat, sniffling. “She’ll see your car . . . Can you park farther away? I’ll text you my address. I’m in the backyard, inside the shed.”
I hang up with Jojo, knowing she wouldn’t have called me unless she had no other option. Rushing down the hall bathed with the glow from my nightlights, on hushed steps, I pull on my Doc Martens in the foyer. Grabbing my keys, I pull out my phone and open the Uber app to order myself a cab. I’m interrupted mid-typing when the sound of feet shuffling on the tile has me looking up.
Hudson’s hair sticks up in every direction like he’s run his hands through it incessantly, and he’s scowling at me like he’s just caught me sneaking out. Well, he has, but his glare makes it look like I’m betraying him somehow.
It irritates me, knowing he has no right to act betrayed when I don’t owe him anything but what’s required for this job.
“Where are you going this late?” His voice is thick and raspy.
I swallow, looking down at my app and continuing to type in Jojo’s address, knowing I don’t have time to debate.
Hudson and I have been cordial ever since the night we cuddled in his bed after my nightmare, but the fact that he hasn’t been around much and we still haven’t talked about any of it, I still feel . . . confused. “One of my students is in trouble. She called me, and I need to get to her.”
He only hesitates a moment to process what I’m saying before turning toward his room, speaking to me over his shoulder. “I’ll take you.”
“But . . .” I follow him on hurried steps. “Hudson, don’t worry about it. I’m just going to get an Uber and—”
“Kavi.” He turns around when I follow him to his closet, giving me one of his hefty, unimpressed looks. “It’s not negotiable.” He pulls on a T-shirt that conforms to his body, and I try not to watch the way his sinewy biceps flex while he does it. “I’m taking you wherever you need to go. It’s not up for debate.”
I roll my eyes but, five minutes later, I’m in Hudson’s behemoth truck—one of his many vehicles, though I notice he uses this one the most—headed to find Jojo.
I chew my fingernails, looking out the rain-soaked passenger window, before turning the band on my thumb over and over. I repeat the movement a few more times when Hudson’s warm hand lands over mine, his touch grounding and reassuring. He entangles our fingers, bringing my hand to rest on his thigh, and I let him.
It seems, at least for the time being, we’ve both silently decided to put our own issues aside for a more pressing matter.
His thumb caresses my skin. “She’s going to be okay, Kav. You’ll see, okay? She’s going to be fine.”
I nod, hoping he’s right. “I just wish I’d reached out to her after class last week.”
“But she reached out to you on her own. Doesn’t that say something?” He flicks a glance at me. “She trusts you. She knows you’ll be here if she needs you.”
I nod again, though guilt still pricks my chest.
We park one house down from Jojo’s, and Hudson follows me as I make my way over to her backyard. I turn toward him. “You don’t have to come with me. I’ll just talk to her for a bit.”
Under his umbrella, he gives me that blank stare that says he’s not going to be changing his mind before nudging ahead of me to open the back gate, motioning for me to enter.
I make my way toward the dark shed, noticing none of the lights are on in the house. In fact, it seems like the entire neighborhood has lost power.
No fucking lights. Just what I needed right now.
My feet have me right in front of the shed, and I take a shuddered breath. My stomach drops and my heart races as I place my hand over the handle when the gentlest of hands squeezes my shoulder.
“I’m right here, Kav. I’ll be right out here.”
Tears prick the corners of my eyes, and I wonder if I’m feeling choked up because of my fear or because the man who took me out of his system in just one night is the one here with me now, seemingly understanding my fear without me having vocalized it.
Taking another breath to calm my racing pulse and remembering that I can’t tell my students to face their fears when I can’t face my own, I step into the dark shed.
Thankfully, my phone’s flashlight is enough to illuminate the space around me and quell my churning stomach a touch.
I breathe through the feeling of being locked in a small compartment. It’s so much like . . .
No. No, I’m not going there.
Forcing my intrusive thoughts away, I focus on finding Jojo. I spot her in a corner, her head leaning back against the wall.
“Hey,” I say, taking a seat next to her on the damp ground. “What’s going on?” And then, noticing that her shirt and pants are covered with something wet and thick, I wave my flashlight over her with a gasp. It looks like acrylic paint. “Who did this?”
Her bottom lip trembles. “Max and her friends.”
I grab her hand. “What happened?”
She wipes off her cheek before taking a deep breath. “They came into my room and broke the picture frame of me and my mom before ripping the picture inside it. Then, they mixed up a bunch of my paints and flung it all over my room. When I came in to see what was going on, they laughed and one of them threw paint on me.”
“Oh, God—” My heart aches for this sweet kid. “Does this kind of thing happen often?”
Jojo shrugs. “It depends on Max’s mood. Last week, she destroyed the school project I’d spent hours working on.” She chuckles mirthlessly, the sound so forlorn, it lodges something rough inside my throat. “How far back do you want me to go, because this hasn’t stopped since Max and I moved in together with her mom and my dad.”
She continues to tell me that this seems to happen most when both the parents are away at work. And because her dad was so distraught after losing his late wife—Jojo’s mom—and has finally found some happiness again with her stepmom, Jojo hasn’t confided in him about the things going on in her life. Namely, her stepsister’s bullying.
I squeeze her hand, remembering exactly what it was like to feel helpless. “Would it help if I were there when you talked to him? Just the three of us?”
“What if Max finds out and it gets worse? What if this puts stress on Dad and Jackie’s marriage?”
“Do you like Jackie?” I ask, referring to her stepmom. “Does she treat you well?”
She nods, wiping a stray tear. “She may have given birth to a demon, but she herself is sweet. She just doesn’t see what an asshole Max is. She doesn’t see that I can barely get up in the morning, that I avoid being in the same room as her daughter. My dad doesn’t, either.” She takes another heaving breath. “I’m just scared to say anything and ruin things for my dad. He’s lost so much.”
“You have to, Jojo,” I say solemnly, referring to her stepmother. God, my heart breaks for her. Even through her own pain, she puts her dad’s happiness first. “Listen, your dad loves you, and I have no doubt he’d want to help you if you told him what was going on. And as for being scared, do you want to know something?”
She turns to me in response.
“I’m really scared of the dark. It’s so impressive to me when someone can sit inside a small dark room and not let it bother them. I came in here, and that was the first thing I noticed; you were sad, sure, but you were brave. You walked out of your house and came to this shed, despite the power being out, and you called me.”
I smile at her, hoping she can see how brave I think she is. “I think it takes courage to work past your fears and call someone, and I am so glad you did. Just as I know it will take a little more courage from you to bring your dad, and maybe even your stepmom, into the fold; to let them know what you’re going through. We can work on next steps, but only you can make that decision.”
After a few minutes of silent contemplating, with me sitting near her for support, Jojo nods, agreeing to take a chance and talk to her dad and stepmom as long as I’m there.
I pull her into a hug. “I’m so proud of you.”
She manages a soft chuckle before she winces, looking down at my raincoat. “Oh no, I got paint all over your coat.”
I follow her gaze. “Ah, well, you know what? I think it’s going to look even better than it did before.”
A half hour later, with Jojo safely back inside her house, I’m back in Hudson’s truck, feeling like a mountain has been lifted off my shoulders.
I still can’t believe he stood outside the shed under his umbrella the entire time I was inside, like my personal bodyguard and savior.
The fact that he didn’t even hesitate to bring me here in the middle of the night, without a clue as to how long he’d have to wait for me . . .
How do I equate that to the man who’s barely spoken to me over the past couple of weeks? How do I fuse that with the man who told me all he wanted was one night with me? How do I even believe he’s the same irritable and demanding boss I started working for—the one who frowns way more than he smiles?
“You okay?” Hudson watches me turn the ring on my finger, one of those familiar frowns painting his features.
I give him a small smile. “Bet you didn’t think you’d be taking all this on as part of our business arrangement.”
His eyes stay on the road just as I slip my hand inside his. He squeezes it in that reassuring way of his, one corner of his mouth hitching up. “No. I definitely got more than I bargained for.”
“Are you ready to rip up that contract and send me on my way?”
He shakes his head, almost imperceptibly, before he lifts my hand to his lips. “There’s a reason it’s paperless, Kav.”