Billie Bossa Nova

28.

Billie had to assure Kai the next morning that she was fine. Yes, she loved the room, she didn't need anything fixed. No, she wasn't crying because of what happened with Adan. No, she needn't anything at the moment. No, no, no there is nothing wrong, she swears it. No, don't worry about it. It's okay, I'm fine, I don't need anything.

Billie was raised in a household where moaning or crying over your problems was ridiculed. Tears don't present a solution, her mother would say. No hugs, no "it's okays", because she had to be taught reality. She had to be introduced to the rough life before the field did.

Which was why she was so off guard by his concern. She would definitely considered it adorable had she not pledged to herself to distance herself completely from Kai. She didn't want to cause any further damage, and everything that happened so far was evidence that she was quite easily allowing herself to get distracted. In her action drought, her second mission that she assigned herself to was to keep away from Kai Rivera.

It didn't even sound simple. It was an utter hassle, especially now with living with him alone at the penthouse. The following day, he'd passed her while she was making coffee in the kitchen and told her about a dinner party that they would be attending the next week Wednesday, for which she should prepare for. She nodded her head in response. His eyebrows had drawn together. He seemed to want to say something, but held his words and left. The morning afterwards, when she entered his office during her lunchbreak for the routine coffee drop and didn't sit with him like she usually did, he called for her. When she turned around, he'd scrunched his brows in confliction and simply thanked her.

Her conversations with him were always about work, about the upcoming dinner party and approaching deals. Billie could tell that Kai sensed her shift in energy. She was more curt, more professional, lacking any enthusiasm or emotion. He repaid her with equal treatment, amplified tenfold. Almost as if he was upset at her behavior, and his retaliation was to be more curt with her than she was with him.

If she were to ask, "Who would you like designing your suit?"

He simply replied, "Doesn't matter."

"How will you do your hair, " she'd say.

"Anyhow," would be the reply she receives.

"Will you be wearing any jewelry?"

He shrugs. She had to hide her agitation as she gathered up the list of things to get done. By the time Wednesday came, she was fed up with Kai's antics. Sure, she was being less engaged, but he barely even communicated compulsory things.

Eight AM, Tuesday morning, they landed in South Africa and drove ten miles to Luna International's luxury resort called Haven City, where they booked a hotel room to stay at for the night. Five PM, Wednesday night, the hotel was swarming with hair and makeup artists. They set up in the small living room, putting tables and chairs and equipment everywhere, yells and shouts of instructions and rebukes echoing across the room. The pressure was even more so because Kai Rivera was in the room, carelessly staring at his phone but still putting everyone on the spot.

"Marissa, where the hell are Kai Rivera's rings?!" Trevor rolled his eyes when the woman finally found the missing rings on one of the many tables in the room. He was busy curling Billie's hair, her dressing gown on and an ice coffee in her hand.

"Relax, Trev," Billie laughed. "You know he really doesn't give a fuck, right?"

"Arg, girlfriend," Trevor sighed deeply, a blonde strand wrapped around the curling iron. "I do not know how you work with him twenty-four, seven. I feel like he's breathing down my neck."

Kai was right across the room, getting his hair done. She had to fight away staring at him because the way his wet curls fell onto his face like he'd just stepped out of a wet dream was dangerously enticing. Billie knew that it would go away soon, that he would slick all that sexiness back into a neat push-back hairdo. It was such a pity, that he had those wild, enthralling curls but never let anybody see them.