He tried not to feel insulted by her response, instead realizing that he might have just dodged a bullet. “So, maybe love without sexual attraction then?” he asked.
A sly smile crossed her face. “Not that I’m not curious, however.”
He smirked in response, silently conceding that he also found her attractive. “And blood?” he asked.
She grinned at him and nodded. “Oh yes. I definitely want your blood.” I’ve tasted you before, and now that I have, it’s amazing.
Her response made him swallow hard, and he tensed. That was stupid.
“Wait,” she reassured him, “I’m just saying, the desire for your blood is always there. But then, I guess that’s a given. I’m a vampire, after all, first and foremost. But I would never just take it from you or anything. It’s different with you in that way.”
He nodded and relaxed a bit. Yep, that was a stupid question, he chided himself again. It had to be his fatigue hampering his ability to think more clearly. After a pause, something else occurred to him, something so important that he groaned to himself. Idiot!
“Crap! I was supposed to call Kat when you got here,” he recalled and reached for his phone.
But she caught his wrist before he could speed dial Katrina. “Not a word about this, kiddo. We have to talk about this first,” she instructed him carefully.
He nodded, and she released her grip on him. After pressing the button, he waited for Katrina to pick up. It took only one ring.
“Hey, Kat,” he offered. “Paige made it home. We’re sitting in her living room as I speak.”
There was a pause at the other end before Katrina spoke. “Good, I’m glad she made it home,” she said. “Is everything okay?”
“Okay?” he asked with as much innocence as he could muster. “Yeah, sure. We’re just getting caught up, that’s all.
“Hm,” Katrina replied guardedly. “Okay, well, maybe give me a call in the morning, all right?”
“Sure, Kat. Will do,” he assured her. “I’ll talk to you in the morning.”
“Sleep well, my love,” she replied.
Paige quietly chewed the tip of one thumbnail as Caleb talked.
“Thanks. You too. And Kat,” he added, “I love you.”
Something in the way he said it made Paige suddenly look up into his eyes. So much said in so few words.
There was another pause, and Katrina replied, “I love you too.”
He returned his phone to its holder. “Sorry about the interruption,” he apologized.
She smirked and shook her head. “No, you needed to do that. She would’ve worried too much if you hadn’t. Then again, she would’ve been angrier with me too.”
He frowned slightly at her odd statement, but was too tired to connect the pieces in his mind. Instead, he merely rubbed at his eyes and stifled a yawn.
She reached out, squeezed his hand, and offered, “Hey, you look kind of tired, kiddo.”
He shrugged, stifled another yawn, and admitted, “Well, yeah. I’m kind of beat, to tell you the truth.”
“You’re always supposed to tell me the truth,” she noted with a smirk. She regarded him for a moment and suggested, “Why don’t you go take a shower and turn in? I have a lot to consider and could use the quiet time to think. We can talk more in the morning.”
“Sure,” he conceded and considered it really was a good idea. In the morning he should be thinking more clearly and might avoid additional embarrassing questions. He leaned over to her and kissed her on the cheek lightly. “I missed you, Paige,” he offered sincerely. “We’re best friends, after all. And I’m not trying to make life more difficult for you.”
She nodded and reached up to run her fingers lightly across his cheek. “I missed you, too, tiger,” she replied with a grin.
He rose, and she darted from the couch in a blur. Before he could walk past the coffee table, his luggage disappeared from the floor, and a gust of wind whipped past him heading upstairs.
“You’re in the bedroom at the top of the stairs and to the left,” she called out. “And you have your own bathroom.”
“Thanks,” he replied, slowly making his way upstairs.
He took a shower, changed into a pair of sweatpants and t-shirt and was awake barely five minutes longer once his head hit the pillow.
An hour later, Paige quietly peered into the bedroom to gaze at him from the doorway. She fondly watched him soundly sleeping and quietly returned downstairs.