Page 135 of Where There's Smoke

I swallowed hard. “We will.” I pulled back and, keeping my hands on her thin shoulders, looked her in the eye. “You’ll take care of yourself too, right?”

She smiled, and for once I believed her. “Don’t worry. I will.” She glanced at Jesse, and the smile broadened. “I’ll still have him keeping after me.”

Jesse laughed. “Well, someone has to keep you out of trouble.”

I snorted. “Fox guarding the henhouse, methinks.”

“Hey!”

Simone laughed. “He does have a point, Jess.”

He rolled his eyes and gave an exasperated sigh. “You two…”

She giggled, then hugged him again. “I’d better go. We’ll sort everything out, the divorce and all of that, another day.”

Jesse smiled. “No great rush, right?”

“No great rush.” Simone returned the smile, and for the first time since I’d met her, she looked like she really meant it. She wasn’t so tense or pretending to feel something she didn’t. She didn’t look truly happy, not yet, but she looked like she was well on her way tobeinghappy.

After Simone and Dean left, Jesse released a long breath. “Great. And now I leave California in the hands of John Casey.”

I shrugged. “There have been worse governors.”

“I could have been a better one.”

“Yeah,” I said. “You would have been. But such is the political climate we live in. Maybe you’ll get a chance to run again.”

“Maybe.” He tilted his head to one side, then the other, probably to stretch a crick out of his neck. “For the time being, I guess I should start looking for another place to live. We’ll probably have to sell the house, and even if we don’t, I think it’ll be easier on her if we don’t keep living together.”

“Well, you could…” I hesitated.

He raised his eyebrows. “Hmm?”

“It’s just me at my place,” I said quietly, reaching up to scratch the back of my neck. “If you…I mean, if that’s not too…fast…”

Jesse stared at me. “Are you serious?”

I fidgeted, not sure why it made me so nervous to throw the offer out there. “It isn’t exactly a place in Malibu, but it’d just be, you know, the two of us.” I met his eyes. “The offer’s there. If you want to stay temporarily or…longer…”

He cocked his head. “Are you really asking me to move in with you?”

I coughed into my fist. “Well, it’s a suggestion. A thought.” I shifted my eyes away from him, then made myself look at him again. “But yes. I am.”

“Are you sure? I don’t want to impose on you any more than I already have.”

I trailed my fingertips down the side of his face. “I want you to, Jesse.”

He smiled and leaned in closer. “I couldn’t think of any better place to go.”

And right there, in a public place with people around and voices chattering nearby and cameras not far away, Jesse kissed me.

People would talk. They would know. Our phones would be ringing off the hook, and there was a good chance both of our careers in politics were over, or at least significantly altered.

But I didn’t care.

Because the man I loved was in my arms, and we didn’t have to hide anymore.

Epilogue

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