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Soft hues of pink, orange, and yellow painted the early morning sky. Cat sat on the edge of the rooftop, watching the sunrise. She reached up to rub her eyes, already wishing she had gotten more sleep. Since she had been unable to sleep and already had plans to be somewhere early this morning, she had opted to come watch the sunrise.
She jumped up and startled when someone plopped down next to her. She hadn’t even heard the door open or footsteps approach. She almost fell off the roof in surprise, but a hand grabbed her upper arm to steady her before she did. Instead of falling off the roof she found herself falling into the lap of the intruder.
“Careful, Sweetheart.”
“Goodness, Mason! Don’t sneak up on me like that!” She scolded, pushing herself out of his grasp, and ignoring the heat rising in her cheeks.
He just shook his head and chuckled. “What are you doing out here anyway?”
“I just wanted to watch the sunrise before I go out this morning.”
“You never go anywhere this early in the morning.”
“I wanted to go out and pick some apples. A friend of mine has an orchard, and she said I could come out and pick some fresh apples before she starts harvesting them.”
He wrinkled his nose at her plans, and turned back out to look at the sky.
“What are you doing out here this early in the morning?” Cat asked, turning his own question back on him. She pulled her legs up into her chest, and shifted so that she was facing him.
Mason just shrugged. “I like it out here.”
She sat there for a moment, waiting for him to elaborate. When it became clear that he wasn’t going to, she stood up. “I have to get ready to leave.”
She walked back to her room thoroughly confused, as occurred more and more as of late. She really didn’t understand Mason. Most days he was making exceedly inappropriate comments, but he spent almost as much time grumpily sulking. She rarely minded his sulking. If she was being honest with herself, a part of her found it a bit endearing. What she did mind was the way she always reacted to his flirting. You’d think she would be used to it by now, but she still managed to turn redder than a tomato everytime it happened.
She sighed and tried to push the confusing vampire out of her mind as she pulled on her skinny jeans, and light white t-shirt. She pulled on a red, white, and blue flannel that she borrowed from Areylia. She quickly brushed out her long ginger hair before braiding it. Grabbing her keys and phone, she stepped out of her room, walking towards Areylia’s car.
When she got there, she paused. Mason was leaning against the trashed car, elongating his torso cigarette in hand, no doubt trying to make himself look as good as possible. Cat let out a breath of air, trying to steady her heart rate at the sight.
“What are you doing out here?”
“What does it look like? I’m coming with you.”
She gave him a pointed look at the cigarette, and he sighed before dropping it on the ground and putting it out. “You are voluntarily taking an hour-long drive for food that you won’t eat?”
“Well, with this bounty, I’m not letting you go that far alone, so you’re stuck with me.”
Cat’s jaw dropped. She had expected the unit to protest to her going off alone after receiving news of the bounty. That’s why she had planned to leave so early in the morning, no one would be expecting her to be awake. Despite that, her heart was hung up on a single word: I. Not we, not the team, not Areylia bribed me to keep an eye on you, not even it’s not worth the speech the brother is going to give me if he finds out, I let you go out alone. He was coming because he wanted her to be safe.
“Let’s get this over with,” he grumbled, getting into this car.
Cat shook off her shock, and climbed into the driver’s seat. Instinctually, she turned on the radio, only to immediately grimace as the sharp sound of drums and electric guitar blast way louder than necessary blasts through the speakers. She quickly turned off the music, trying to ignore Mason’s sharp glare.
“Sorry. Sometimes I forget this is Areylia’s car, and she has terrible taste in music.”
“That was supposed to be music?”
“She certainly thinks so. I don’t see the appeal.”
After a period of silence, Mason looked over at her, “What are you getting apples for?”
Cat jerked up in surprise that he had voluntarily broken the quiet, but she quickly recovered. “I was planning on making some pies for a fundraiser at the school.”
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Mason shaking his head at her in disbelief. “You spend all your time at work helping people, and so you decided to get up early on your day off to do more good deeds for someone else?”
“Why wouldn’t I?” She shrugged, not really sure why he was surprised. It was just making some pies for the local middle school, who wouldn’t help out. “We always pitch in to help at the school. Areylia even mentors a group of high school girls in her freetime. Besides, with everything that has happened the past few months, someone needs to spread some hope and cheer back into this community.”
“The past few months haven’t exactly been easy for you either, Sweetheart?”
At his oddly genuine comment, she found herself wondering if he knew she still wasn’t sleeping well at night, and that the real reason she had watched the sunrise this morning was that she was having nightmares again.
“That’s why it is so important that I still help people now,” she said, her grip tightening on the steering wheel. “If people only did good things when they were having good days, the world would be a pretty awful place.”
“You know it's okay to think about yourself sometimes too, Sweetheart.”
Her cheeks grew warm at his, for once, seemingly innocent comment. “We’re almost there,” She said, changing the subject. “There’s a fantastic view of the orchard when we pull up.”
He let the topic go, and returned to staring out the window. As Cat drove up the final hill, she got a glimpse of the view she had been praising mere moments before. From the top of the hill, she looked down at the vast sea of apple trees spread across the grounds. Trees lined either side of the road creating a tunnel of sorts.
When we pulled up to the front of the driveway, she walked over to the trunk to pick up her basket. She frowned when the door of the trunk appeared to be jammed, and she had trouble getting it open. Mason pulled her back a bit.
“You’re going to hurt yourself, Sweetheart. Let me do it.” His gruff tone contrasted with his kind words.
“Catalina, is that you?”
Cat turned to see a elderly woman approaching them, pulling off her gardening gloves, and brushing a lock of white hair behind her ear. Cat broke out into a smile.
“Agnes! How wonderful to see you.” Cat stepped out from behind the car and walked forward to embrace her friend.
“I see you still haven’t got your own car like I keep telling you.” Agnes chuckled, gesturing to Areylia’s beat up silver car. “Although, it seems like you’ve taken my advice about dating again. If you ask me he’s definitely an upgrade in the looks department from that reporter.”
Cat followed the old woman’s gaze to where Mason had managed to get the trunk to open and was pulling out the basket she wanted. Her face turned bright red, and she tried to come up with a way to explain why Mason was with her that didn’t involve romance. The situation was made even more awkward by the fact that she knew Mason had heard the woman’s comment. Even if she hadn’t known about his hypersenses, that smirk was a dead giveaway.
“We’re… not… uhh together. Mason’s just… here to help me carry stuff.” She silently cursed the awkward words as she tried to come up with something better. Mason was being decidedly unhelpful by sliding up much too closely behind her, and wrapping an arm around her waist. She was too caught off guard to protest, and her heart was pounding so hard she could feel every beat. Her face turned a shade of red she didn’t know was possible, and her brain refused to help her talk her out of this situation.
“Her brother doesn’t know yet, so she’s trying to keep it quiet.”
“Mason!” Cat gasped in surprise, having fully expected him to join in her denial of their relationship. Instead he was not only encouraging her to believe her assumption, but was actually adding details to it.
Mistaking her surprise for confirmation, Agnes stepped forward and patted Cat on the hand, giving the crimson faced girl a wink. “Your secret’s safe with me Dearie. I’m just pleased you’ve found yourself a good man.”
How could she possibly make that assumption? Agnes has only seen Mason for five minutes maximum, and Cat hadn’t told her anything about him. That question was the least of her concerns, however, as Agnes started walking away.
“You guys go get your apple’s. I’ve got some work to do in the vegetable garden.”
Cat attempted to protest again, but Mason used the arm around her waist to pull her into him. Spending every ounce of effort she had on maintaining composure she looked up at him. She couldn’t control the spike in her pulse or the blush flashing across her cheeks, but her voice was surprisingly steady.
“What was that all about? How many times have you told me you’re not interested in having an actual relationship, and now you’re tricking old ladies into thinking we’re not just a couple, but a secret one!”
He leaned in close enough that Cat could feel his breath on her skin, and was pretty sure she had stopped breathing. “Maybe I just like seeing you get flustered? Or maybe I just wanted an excuse to touch you?”
“Well then can you not do that in front of my friends? This is the second time I’m having to do damage control about my relationship status because of you.” She stepped out of his grasp and was grateful that he easily let her go, knowing that if he really wanted, she wouldn’t be able to go anywhere.
She turned and started walking towards the orchard. As she walked she couldn’t turn her thoughts from Mason. Everytime she thought she was finally starting to understand him, he did something else that had her completely off balance. At least this wasn’t like the last time they got mistaken for a couple. Cat had a doozy of time trying to apologize to Hailey about the scene while also trying not to cry. Somehow she found this worse though. A relationship was what she really wanted and he knew that. It really wasn’t fair of him to make light of that on whatever impulse had made him react that way. It was way too early in the morning to deal with this.
Cat managed to fill about half her basket full of apples without a sign of Mason. He must have gone back to the car to sulk, she figured, grabbing at an apple that was stubbornly just outside of her reach. She frowned and stood on her tiptoes to make another attempt at grabbing that apple. A moment later the branch tipped down just enough for her to grab the apple on it. On the other side, Mason was holding the branch, refusing to meet her eyes.
“Thank you,” she said simply, and placed the apple in her basket. “I think I’ve got all I need for this trip, if you want to start heading back now.”
He grabbed her wrist, and she turned back to face him, catching his intense gaze. “Are we good?”
“Yeees?” She said drawing out the word slightly confused. Was he actually worried about what she thought of him? He never seemed to care before, except when it came to whether or not she thought he was attractive.
He searched her face for a moment before releasing her, apparently satisfied. A part of her was disappointed by the lack of contact, but she told herself it didn’t matter. She turned to grab her basket of apples only to find that Mason was already carrying it for her.
“Thank you,” She mumbled, walking back to the car with him.
After returning to the car, she started driving back towards the warehouse. She had planned to drive back in silence, but Mason surprised her once again by breaking the quiet.
“Are you alright, Sweetheart?”
“What makes you think I'm not?”
“You’re just being quieter than usual.”
“You usually prefer the quiet.”
“You’re being quiet because you think I’d be happier that way?” He was confused again, she could tell by his tone.
“I just thought it would be the decent thing to do since you came all the way out here with me.”
“You really are something else, Sweetheart?”
“What?” She asked, risking glancing at him instead of the road, but he was looking out the window again.
After they made it back to the warehouse, and got the apples into the kitchen, Cat turned to Mason who was already walking out.
“Mason,” She called. When he turned, she stepped forward, and placed her hands on his arms. “I really am glad you came with me.”
He just looked at her confused “Why?”
“I… I just appreciate your company I guess.” She shyly lifted her eyes to meet his gaze, peering at him from under her lashes.
He wrapped his arms around her waist again, forcing her to slide her hand further up his arms. As always the proximity made her breath catch. She bit her lip as she looked back at him wondering how she was going to get herself out of this situation, or if she even wanted out of it. Before she had any other thoughts, he leaned down and pressed his lips to hers. Her grip on his arms tightened.
Why did she do this to herself? She knew there was no chance of a real relationship with him, so she should really stop letting herself kiss him. But just as the two other occasions they had kissed, the part of her that wanted him overroad the part of her that knew this would only end in heartbreak.
Mason lifted her up and set her on the countertop, and somehow her hands had moved from gripping his arms to being locked behind his neck. She pressed her forehead to his breathing heavily when he leaned forward to kiss her again.
“Oh, you guys are so lucky that I’m the one who found you,” A voice called from the doorway.
Mason pulled away and turned his head to face the intruder so fast that Cat fell forward, and collided with his chest. After stabilizing herself, she glanced at the door to find her sister leaning against the doorframe smiling at them.
“What do you want?” Mason growled, clearly annoyed by the interruption.
“Unfortunately for you, my mother doesn’t have your report from your last mission, and she’s been trying to find you for the past two hours, so you’ll have to put Cat down and go take care of that.”
Mason continued to glare at the dark haired detective before lowering Cat back to the floor. He leaned forward, brushing a loose strand of Cat’s red hair out the way. “We’ll just have to continue this later, Sweetheart.” Then he pulled away with a smirk, and sauntered out the door, pausing to glare at Areylia again, who gave him her most charming smile.
Once Mason had left, Areylia walked into the kitchen. “So… How was your trip?”