A Graduation Gift

As the night grew freezing cold, Cassandra and Rufus shared a kiss that burned passionately.
Cassandra blanked out by the overwhelming passion she felt. She could feel nothing but the burning desire of the ardent man.
With her eyes wide open, she gave him no resistance and just let him do whatever he wished.
His mouth covered the fullness of hers and they were biting and exploring each other's lips. Cassandra didn't want that to stop.
Rufus, however, let her go for he could no longer catch his breath. He looked at her so intensely that he was still biting his lips
savoring the taste of the lady. The woman was left bewildered. The kiss felt so long and so pleasing up to the point that she
couldn't remember what she was doing.
"We're here,"
the man whispered in her ears. Their bodies were pressed against each other. They were so intimate that when the man spoke
with a low and charismatic voice, the woman felt totally elated. Looking at her eyes, he couldn't hide the mirth and pleasure he
felt deep inside.
It was then that Cassandra realized what had just happened. Feeling the intense heat and the intimate position they were in, she
gave him a gentle push and cursed in a cute voice, "Bastard!"
Her voice was mixed with anger and shame. Even though she was cursing him, deep inside she knew she enjoyed the feeling.
Despite the fact that it was too embarrassing for her to admit, she loved the way Rufus kissed her. She hated the idea that she
liked the kiss and wanted more of it.
'Why did I even let the kiss happen?' she asked herself.
Escaping from the strange thoughts, she quickly got off the car and rushed into the hotel, totally ignoring him who was just
following her closely. Her lips were quivering as an aftermath of the torrid kiss.
'Cassandra, what have you done?' The question kept on bugling her mind.
Rufus who was just walking behind Cassandra, casually with his hand inside his pockets. He couldn't help smiling at the sight of
her murmuring to herself.
For him, the night became more charming and interesting because of this woman.
Inside the deluxe room of the hotel, sprinkles of hot water from the shower trickled down onto the floor.

Cassandra immersed herself in the hot water, letting the water flow from her head, to her face, down to her breasts, her waist,
and her legs. The water was way hotter than the normal bathing temperature but she didn't seem to mind. She felt numb and
careless.
She was merely standing there staring blankly at the floor. Her mind was preoccupied with the earlier kiss and the emotions she
felt associated with that kiss.
Rufus' face kept on lingering through her mind. It was glued and tattooed on her mind and she didn't know how to shut it out.
'Cassandra, did you enjoy that kiss?' she asked herself.
The woman gently touched her lips with her fingers, remembering how Rufus' soft lips complimented hers. Cold shivers run
down her spine at the thought of it. Bracing herself, she pinched her cheeks a little to shut out the absurd thoughts on her mind.
She reminded herself that she couldn't continue with such a state of mind. She felt silly and out of her mind, which was very
unusual for her.
The unforeseen kiss from Rufus had been torturing her. Now she couldn't even think properly, but worse was to follow - she was
kind of expecting something more intimate than a kiss.
'What are you expecting?' she asked herself once again.
Quickly she blamed herself for consistently thinking of him. When did she become so attached to him? It was just a kiss? What
was the magic of that kiss that would trouble her until now?
With all these thoughts on her mind, she hadn't noticed that she was still standing under the hot shower. The bathroom turned
disturbingly hot as steams hanged in the air. Cassandra's cheeks were now crimson red caused by the heat from the water
coupled by the warmth she was feeling inside thinking of Rufus.
Unconsciously, she lost track of time. The heat was now creeping into her senses. But she stood still without moving an inch
away from the shower. She couldn't think clearly, her brain was in total chaos and her visions were clouded by the thickening
steams.
Strangely, she couldn't breathe normally. The temperature of her body continued to rise. She was starting to feel dizzy.
'Am I going to die?' she wondered. That was her last thought before she collapsed. She could no longer support herself that she
fell on the floor with a loud thud.

Snap! Her heart leaped in shock by the compact.
She felt a searing pain in her back. Luckily, the pain awakened her senses. However, even as she temporarily regained her
senses, her body lacked the strength. She felt weak and exhausted. She wanted to grab onto something so that she could stand
up, but failed. She was so weak to even raise her arm.
'Why am I so dizzy?' she asked herself. Shaking her head, Cassandra tried to stay awake. But that didn't help. Desperately, she
bit her lip to lessen the numbness of her face. She went too hard and droplets of blood smeared on her lips.
She was struggling to save herself, but suffocating in the heat, especially with the heightened smell of blood diffused by the
steam.
Feeling totally weak, she had given up all efforts to get up. She let herself lie on the bathroom floor with the shower still spraying
hot water over her. On the contrary, she felt better lying on the floor. The floor felt cooler, giving her a temporary remedy from the
burning sensation.
'I guess, I'll just lie here for a while, ' she told herself. 'The door was locked. No one would be able to save me now. The best I
could do was just to do nothing for the meantime and rest on the floor until I could gather some strength to get up.'
Thinking of that as a bright idea, she then closed her eyes with no intentions of falling into sleep on the wet floor. The hot water
was still spraying on her.
...
Soon, somebody was knocking on the door outside her room.
It was Rufus. In order to catch the flight, they didn't have time to eat. So Rufus, after taking a brief rest, came to invite Cassandra
to have dinner with him.
He had been knocking on her door for quite a while, but there was no reply from her, not even a single sound from the room.
With each passing second, his face was turning dark. Abruptly, he felt a surge of panic.
Cassandra, to his knowledge, was not a woman who would throw random tantrums. Refusing to open the door, or even refusing
to tell him that she didn't want to open the door was definitely not something she would do. 'Could it be that she is avoiding me
because of the kiss?' he began to doubt.

Finding a possible reason for her abnormal behavior, Rufus settled down a little and asked a waiter to send some food to
Cassandra's room.
Shortly after he returned to his room, the waiter he had talked to came back.
"Mr. Luo, I have knocked at the door of Miss Qin's room for several minutes and there was no response."
Upon hearing the bad news, the panic that he managed to contain engulfed him. His face turning bleak, he hurried back to her
room.
As he knocked at the door incessantly, he ordered the waiter to get the spare access card from the reception.
"Cassandra, are you inside?" he shouted out loud. "Open the door!"
Now his impatience and worry heightened, and his knocks on the door grew stronger and louder. However, the response from
inside the room was still dead silence.
It didn't take long for the waiter to retrieve the access card. Narrowing his eyes, he soon opened the door and entered the room
in a swift motion.
Cassandra wasn't in her bedroom.
Standing in her empty room, he was swallowed by his anxiety and worry.
The vague sound of flowing water reminded him of something. Hastily, he rushed to the bathroom and knocked at the door.
"Cassandra, are you inside?" he shouted.
There was again, no response.
The man felt something was wrong. Forgetting about the possibility that she could still be showering, his anxiety compelled him
to open the door without her consent.
Blows of hot steam surged out, making him frown. Amidst the water vapor, the woman was nowhere to be found.
His face turned grimmer, and heat was spreading across the room. His calm composure was gone and was replaced by a
nervous panic.

"Hmm, it's so hot. So hot..."
His visions were clouded by the steam so he hadn't noticed that someone was lying on the floor. It was her voice, weak and
vulnerable; he knew it was her. Hearing her voice made him assume that she was safe and wiped all his worries away.