Lady Kaiden's 24-Hour Bookshop

chapter eight

two years later
I know right? Time passes by so quickly...

"Are you sure you want to do that, Adeline?"

I peered my head over my shoulder and looked down at him, "Of course I am not, but I am still doing it."

"Just be careful up there, alright," he replied back, while I crept onto my toes to place the last letter on the board. "Say the command and I will do it for you."

"But then I would have to say thank you and you know how much I loathe that."

"Well, considering the circumstances, let us just deem it as gratis." I could hear his feet moving under me like some insolent shadow waiting for me to fall.

"Relax, I almost got it." My voice was slightly strained from my outreached torso to the gaping foot in the ring of the ladder. "Just one more smidgen to the right and it shall be perfect."

"Just one more smidgen to the right and you shall be dead."

"Oh, do not act as if you are not looking up my skirt right now."

"I can do that whenever I want and I would enjoy it much more if I knew you could not fall to your death at any second."

"Stop worrying— woah!" My hand had slipped momentarily due to the moisture of the cooling air, but I caught myself. I chuckled a bit and looked down at the wide eyed Damien, "That was a close one, huh?"

He growled at me, "Oh, you almost done it there." I giggled at his reprimanding voice and I can almost see his flaring nostrils from here, "You think this is funny? Great, laugh all you want. I am happy you find this whole ordeal humorous."

"I do. I truly do."

"That is it." He clipped his tone, rolling his sleeves up. "Enough banter, you are getting off that death trap, even if I have to drag you myself." He already had one foot on the rung of the ladder, before I had finally reached the letter and slid it a few centimeters to the right.

"There! Finished!" I exclaimed, "No need to get your grey hairs into a twist."

"You are the sole cause of my greying locks, my hair used to be midnight!" He told me while I stepped down each step of the ladder and when I reached to the bottom his hands instantly grabbed my waist as if he was shocked I had survived.

"Now you hair is just midnight with some freshly fallen snow." I turned around still in his arms, sardonically grinning at him while my hands traveled through his scalp.

He released a deep breath he seemed to have been keeping in for a long time, "I am too old for this, Adeline. Stop climbing up rickety ladders ten feet off the ground. Please, for my health's sake."

"Oh, do not be mad." I pressed my fingers and tried to smooth out the worry lines on his forehead. "Just look how good the sign looks now."

He looked up and stared at the sign for a few moment and then turned back to me, "It looks exactly the same."

"No, it looks way better." I told him excitedly, "That lopsided 'e' had been bothering me since I opened for business."