[h2]Esme[/h2]
 Esme almost matched Duke’s smile as they looked into each other's eyes, and he brushed the backs of his fingers against her cheek. The action calmed her a little more. She took in his words, feeling that he spoke the truth, but it still bothered her that she had scared him so badly. When he brushed his nose against her, she closed her eyes briefly, then kissed him back when he kissed her top lip, her smile growing a little more. “I’m good.” she whispered, reassuring him. “And I’ll be sure to get you a warning list made soon.” she added. “With all the signs to look for. I don’t want to worry or scare you anymore than I already have.” Esme lovingly brushed her thumb along his cheek as she took another deep breath and slowly let it out. As much as she wanted to stay in bed with Duke, just staring into his eyes and cuddling, she knew they needed to get up and get breakfast. She also desperately needed a shower. “As much as I want to stay here with you, we should get up and get breakfast. I could also really use a shower.” she told him warmly.

Removing her hand from his chest, she brought it up and brushed his hair away from his face before kissing him lovingly and sighing softly through her nose. After a moment, Esme broke the kiss, rested one hand on her chest and the other on her stomach, and then tilted her head toward the house and focused on it. Her eyebrows knitted together, and she closed her eyes with a heavy sigh and light groan. There was already tension brewing within the house. It was too early in the day for her to deal with tension, especially after how she woke up. Tilting her head back, Esme opened her eyes and looked up at the RV’s ceiling. “Tension is already brewing in the house. It’s too early to deal with tenison.” she complained with a sigh. She knew that as soon as she walked into the house, the tension would get stronger and hit her hard in the face. Esme didn’t want to mess with it but knew they needed to go in and see what was causing it. “I guess that means we should go in and see what’s up.” Esme slowly sat up in bed, wincing a bit at the soreness she still felt.

She then carefully stretched, feeling a bit stiff, and ran a hand through her hair, being sure to avoid the area with the stitches and dried blood. Even after sitting up and stretching, Esme was having trouble pulling herself out of bed to get dressed and go into the house. She felt like a kid purposely dragging their feet to avoid having to do something they didn’t want to do. Taking a breath, she finally pulled the blanket from her legs, swung her legs over the side of the bed, and stood. Esme walked over to her open duffle, pulled out a pair of black sweatpants, slipped her legs into them, and pulled them up to rest on her hips. She then looked back over at Duke. “Are you just going to lay there tempting me back to bed, or are you going to get up?” she lightly teased.