Love At Last

CAYDEN AND LILY

I planted the most passionate kiss I had in forever on Lily’s lips; it felt so good. After the heavenly seconds ended, we stared deeply into each other’s eyes still maintaining our position – her face still wrapped in my palms.

In that very moment, memories of how the petite beautiful face I held in my palms walked into my life, crept in. In the space of an instant, I imagined how I was able to kiss someone who fought and argued with me most of the times we spent together.

“MMhh,” Lily cleared her throat and sat upright while I also did same. “Umm… so I’ll…I’ll be going…be going… I’ll be going,” she stuttered while pointing her house, “I’ll be going in now,” she completed her statement and cleared her throat again.

“Ah…yes.” The atmosphere felt really awkward. “Can I come in with you?”I didn’t know when the question escaped my lips.

“Next time please,” she declined my request. “Thanks for dropping me off.”

“No issues.” The kiss must have shaken her a bit; she hardly ever thanked me for dropping her off at home. She alighted the car and went straight home without looking back.C0pyright © 2024 Nôv)(elDrama.Org.

I didn’t intend to persuade her so I just let her alight and zoomed off after I saw her walk into her house. Driving home, I couldn’t stop caressing my lips. The kiss scene replayed in my head over and over again. ‘I just kissed Lily’, I kept reciting in my head continuously. I enjoyed every bit of the moment I interlocked my lips with hers; that feeling was divine. I’d kissed dozens of lips and no one felt as good as hers; I wondered why that was so.

On getting home, thoughts of Lily still consumed my spirit, soul and mind. I kept smiling and giggling by myself as I reminisced the feeling vividly. I struggled to shake her thought off but failed every time I tried. I decided to let nature take its course and not fight it again – I let the thoughts overwhelm me.

I’d gotten home fifteen minutes ago and just sat on the couch doing nothing but fantasize. My fantasies were interrupted and I was jerked back to reality by a call that came to my phone – it was my boss.

“Hello sir,” I said on picking the call.

“Good day, Mr. Cayden,” he greeted.

“Good day sir,” I returned the warm gesture.

“So how’s it going with the investigation, any useful information?” I was too preoccupied with Lily the entire day that I almost forgot what I was back in Nedford for. “Or are you taking your time?” he asked while I rummaged my thoughts on what to say and bailed me out at the very last moment. I just chuckled.

“I’m getting you a partner, Mr. Cayden.”

“A partner?” I asked.

“Yes. You’ll need assistance and so we decided to send you one. How does that sound?” he asked.

“That’s not a bad idea, sir.” Who was I to say no to orders from above?

“Perfect! Expect a call from us soon.”

“Okay sir, thank you,” I concluded the call.

*LILY’S POV*

The awkwardness I felt after the kiss overwhelmed me. For the entire day, I couldn’t think straight; the kiss scene kept replaying in my head over and over. I did so many things to get it off my head – played with Jacek, helped nana prepare food, did more chores than I used to – all to no avail. I was doomed!

While Cayden brought his head closer to mine, beckoning for a kiss, I was too frozen to even refute or push him away. On realizing that his lips were already interlocked with mine, I still said nothing and let him have his way for seconds! The kiss ended when Cayden – of his own volition – backed off.

The entire day, Cayden plagued my mind. When I settled in to sleep, I held out my phone and thought of calling him. Actually, my mind was made up – I was going to call him. The thoughts I had were on what to say and what excuse to give to him to prevent him from thinking I called because he was all I had in mind all day; even though that was nothing but the truth.

After careful consideration, I decided to call on the pretext of ‘just checking up on you’.

“Hello?” his voice flooded the memories I managed to suppress for a while, back to mind. “Lily?” he called out sweetly.

“Cayden,” I finally broke my silence.

“You missed me?” he teased.

“I just called to check on you, dumbass. Don’t get the wrong idea,” I said. I must have sounded pathetic to him – it was obvious I called because I missed him. But I couldn’t just spell out ‘I miss you’ to his hearing; I had my pride to keep.

“How are you?” he asked with concern.

“I’m good and you?” I replied.

“Doing just fine, thinking of you.” For a moment, I felt butterflies in my stomach.

“Thinking of me indeed.” I rebuffed. I didn’t intend to play along in any way.

“So tell me…can’t sleep?” he asked.

“That’s not the case, mister. I sincerely called to check on you.” He chuckled.

“Indeed.”

“I’m serious though,” I insisted.

“Fine, fine, I agree,” he yielded. “So tell me when the next phase of your competition is going to hold.”

“Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?” I sensed surprise in his tone.

“Yes, tomorrow.”

“Are you prepared?”

“We were all supposed to be prepared before the competition kicked off.”

“So you’re ready for it then?” he asked.

“Yes sir,” I replied sarcastically and we both laughed.

“So this time, what’s involved?” he inquired.

“Well, just like today, we’d be asked to prepare dishes and get scored. Easy, right?” ‘Easy indeed’. I just didn’t want to sound pathetic and portray myself as someone who was still sulking over ‘forty points’.

“Now that’s the spirit. You’ll do better this time, right?”

“Sure!” I said with so much confidence.