Darren laughed when he saw Kelly’s tired face the next morning as she managed to get herself down the stairs groggily. She looked like she had had a hell of a night. And truthfully, she probably had. She had made herself at home in the bar, getting herself quite drunk and well acquainted with the karaoke machine. It was strange to hear her singing, even stranger because he hadn’t expected her to have such a good voice, even when she was too drunk to read the lyrics properly.
“Good morning,” he called up to her.
Kelly glared at him, but that only served to deepen the broad smile that was creeping across his face. She was something else.
“Good morning,” she grumbled finally. She wasn’t being quite as defensive as she had been the other days that she had been staying with him. He chose to take that as a good sign. Perhaps, they had managed to bond a little bit the night before after all. He had honestly been wondering if she would remember any of it.
“I have a hangover cure ready for you. It’s something my kind have been using for a long time. It helps with general stomach upset. I don’t know if it will work for a human, but it’s a must-have for anybody who drinks at Jared’s place. Do you want to try it? I know that last time you had something that originated with my people, you didn’t like it.”
She squinted down at him as she descended the staircase, and sighed. “That’s not true. I did like it. It was just a very strange sensation that came over me. I felt like I had eaten it before, but I know I never have. It was just strange. Everything about this with you has been strange so far. I never would’ve thought I would’ve found my way here. And yet, here I am. I don’t know how to feel about that.”
Darren was quiet as he listened to her speak. “It has been strange for me as well. But I hope that maybe we can try and find a balance between the two of us. That is very important.”
“Oh,” Kelly said, trudging through the open-concept living room and into the kitchen. Darren had already placed the glass full of hangover cure on the table for her. “Is this mine?”
Darren smirked. “Yes,” he said. “You are the only one here who had enough to drink that it would warrant such a hangover cure. Besides, I can hold my liquor. Human bodies are far more fragile. I think it has to do with your high water content.”
Kelly glared at him and shook her head. For some reason, this only served to amuse Darren and he smiled at her as she lifted the glass to her lips. She drank that cure down deeply, wincing only once as she put it back down on the table completely empty.
“Thank you. I already feel better.”
Darren could tell. The grumpy look was off her face now, and the pained crease on her forehead had eased. It was nice to see her feeling better than she had been. And yet, somehow, the whole situation only served to cause Darren quite a bit of mirth.
“You are welcome. Just let me know when you would like something to eat. I can make you something.”
Kelly held her hand up and shook her head, then brought her hand to the bridge of her nose and pinched it. “Oh no,” she said, shaking her head slowly. “That will probably not be happening for quite a while.”
Darren laughed. “Then come and sit with me. Maybe we can try and have a conversation or something. I know that seems weird, but we were doing okay with our letters, weren’t we?”
“I like you a lot more in your letters,” Kelly mumbled, trudging toward the armchair across from Darren slowly. He laughed, and she looked up at him, a small flash of red creeping across her face. He was stricken in the moment by just how beautiful she really was. It wasn’t the kind of beauty that most humans seemed to idealize. There was something deeper about it. Something special that seemed to be crying out for him to appreciate it. And he would. He already had been.
“So, you really don’t drink where you’re from?” he asked, studying Kelly’s tired face.
“Like I said, the people there aren’t really the company you would want to be drinking with.”
Darren nodded. That was fair enough. He didn’t want to make her feel like she had done something wrong by being conscientious about who she spent her time with. In fact, it only made him respect her all the more. “So, did you have fun drinking at Jared’s last night?”
She gave him another glare, and it brought a laugh to his lips. This time, though, instead of staying grumpy looking, Kelly smiled too. “Yeah, actually, I did have a lot of fun. I think your friend is really nice. I’m glad I got to meet him.”
“Yeah, if it weren’t for him, I guess we never would’ve met. So, he has a right to know what’s going on between us. At least a little bit. He made sure I knew I had an option.”
“What do you mean? Everybody has options,” Kelly said, although she sounded dubious, almost as if she didn’t believe her own words.
“Well, I guess I should just say that I have a little bit of a reputation around here. People don’t trust me very much to keep my cool.”
“What, you?” Kelly said sarcastically. “Keep your cool?”
She laughed quietly, and Darren joined her. “I know I have a little bit of a temper problem,” he said. “And I’m sorry for that. I never want to scare you or make things needlessly difficult. I’m really trying to change. I don’t want to be somebody who can’t get along with other people anymore. That’s why I brought you here. I was hoping that maybe, if we were together, I could turn over a new leaf. It just felt right.”
His last words seemed to encourage Kelly to look at him, a strange light in her eyes. “It felt great to me too. So, I guess I might be here for a reason. And if not, the very least we can do is finish this week out and see how it goes. Right?”
“Absolutely,” Darren said, giving her a small nod. “And if you think I’m too much of an asshole to stick around, I can’t say I blame you. And nobody else ever would either. Sometimes, a man just can’t adapt.”
Kelly laughed and shook her head. “Well, if I’m going to be honest with you, I kind of hope you can.”
Kelly gave him a secret, sweet smile and then stood up from her chair and stretched. “I’m going to shower and get ready for the day. It’ll help me feel better. Thank you for everything.”
Darren watched her disappear, a strange warmth surging through his body. She wasn’t trying to run away from him. Sure, she wasn’t hiding the fact that she thought he was a jerk, but maybe that was what he needed. That kind of honesty was rare, and it was something he had always been able to respond well to. He wanted to be able to be with somebody who wasn’t afraid of him. He was sick of all the women on Oak Mountain believing he was too wily and self-absorbed to make a good mate.
Sure, maybe that had been true of him in his younger years. He had been very stubborn and didn’t care very much about rules and convention. But, now that he was older, all he really wanted was to settle down with the right woman. And as soon as he had seen Kelly’s face in the paper, he knew he had found the right woman for him. Now, it was just a matter of trusting fate and letting things play out in their natural course. Even if it seemed impossible.