All's Fair in Love and Las Vegas

Chapter Fifty-Eight

        The next morning, I was to give Kylie and Clay a ride from their hotel to the airport. This time around, they'd completely rejected Laura's offer to stay at the mansion and spend one night at a hotel for Gracelynn's wedding.

        Clay was thankfully a morning person, because when I knocked on the door of their room, he was the one that answered, bright-eyed and dressed and all sorts of crazy things.

        "Morning, Jackie, come in," he said, opening the door. I looked at the bed, where Kylie was still dead asleep.

        "So...are we going to wake her up?" I asked.

        "Well, she was awake about an hour ago," he admitted. "Showered, dressed, ate breakfast. Then she passed out again."

        "Sounds about right," I sighed. Kylie was scary at sleepovers; she'll stay up until four in the morning laughing and talking with you, then be out until lunchtime. "You guys know your flight is in two hours, right?"

        "Yeah, better get her up," Clay said, walking over to where Kylie was facing the window. I decided to make myself useful and pack up some of her things while he worked on getting her conscious.

        Shockingly, Clay appeared to be the neat one in the relationship. His duffel bag was zipped and stuffed, sitting on the chair in the corner. Kylie was messier, which of course I already knew. Her black dress from the wedding was crumpled on the floor, and the bathroom counter was full of her makeup and hair products. 

        Grabbing her toiletries bag, I started packing up her makeup, knowing she never flew wearing it. This is why you have best friends, girls. Boyfriends will love you and know everything about you, but girlfriends are the ones who know you so well they're practically your stalker.

        Zipping up the bag, I checked that the bathroom was empty, since Kylie once left her diamond earrings on a hotel bathroom counter and left them in London. It was bad. A bright patch of color in the wastebasket caught my eye, so I felt obligated to check.

        I should not have checked. I covered my mouth, queasy at the sight of a pair of ripped, lacy underwear and a wrapper that was the size of a tea bag and not meant for tea or candy. I shouldn't have been grossed out, especially since obviously Clay and Kylie are together, but still...ewww.

        "Okay, are we ready to go to the airport?" I said loudly, getting out of that bathroom as fast as I could.

        "Jackie, as much as I love you, it's like, six am," Kylie groaned, now sitting up but only half-awake.

        "Love, it's eleven," Clay said, clearly holding back a laugh.

        She groaned harder. "That's still too early."

        "Come on, Kylie, you're going back to Montreal with Clay," I said encouragingly.

       "Yeah," she yawned.

        He came over from the kitchenette and handed her a mug, saying softly, "How about some coffee?"

        "Okay. Thank you," she mumbled, taking a sip. Or draining it in one gulp. That works too.

        It took another half hour of sluggish movement and packing, but between Clay and me we finally got Kylie in the car. I kept checking on her in the rearview mirror, noticing how droopy she was.

        "She's not normally this tired," I said, going into overprotective mom-friend mode.

        Clay shifted in his seat. "I mean, we did fly across the continent yesterday and attended a wedding. That's a lot."