Paradox (Unearthly Paradox) (10 page)

“And give up spending another night in bed with me?”

“Oh, the temptation,” I teased.

He laughed as he shut the door behind him.

Jett returned with boxes of Chinese food. “So what are you studying?” He put the meal on the nightstand and sat on the edge of the bed, twisting around to face me.

“Math.”

“And how’s that going for you?” He started unfolding the tops of the boxes. The mouth-watering aromas of the various dishes wafted over to me.

I put down my iPad. “It would be better if I had this year’s test instead of last year’s.”

He smirked. “You know, I could get that for you.”

Shocked, I laughed nervously. “I was only joking.”

“Then so was I.”

I raised my eyebrows, but he didn’t bite. I snatched the box out of his hand and looked around for the chopsticks.

He handed me a fork. “Here you go.”

“Can’t do chopsticks?”

“Can but can’t fit as much in my mouth as I can with a fork.” He shoved a fork full of noodles into his mouth then picked up my iPad. “I thought you said you had a math test.”

I swallowed the chicken in my mouth. “Yeah, I did. Why?”

“Then why are you Googling black-eyed people?”

I sucked in a sharp breath. I had completely forgotten that I had been trying to find answers to why my eyes occasionally turned black. I snatched my iPad away from him. “Don’t you know it’s not polite to look through someone’s Internet browser without permission?”

“I was just trying to bring up the test when I saw that.” The look on his face was far from innocent.

“Says the one who can fix my GPS that malfunctioned.”

He smirked. “I swear it was an innocent mistake.”

“Sure it was.”

He lowered his fork, still full of food. “Now, what did you find out?”

“About what?”

“Black-eyed people.” He shoved the noodles into his mouth.

“So far, I’ve found five mythical creatures posing as humans.”

He nodded as he chewed then swallowed. “And why would you be researching such a thing? You don’t look like the type of girl who’d buy into all that crap.”

I studied him, looking for any hint that he was hiding something from me.

“I know I’m hot and you’ve got a thing for me, but you’re starting to make me feel uncomfortable when you look at me like that.” He gave an evil grin.

I just about choked.
Great.
Zane must’ve told him about catching me watching him. “I was not spying on you.”

“That’s not what my brother tells me.”

“Then your brother’s full of shit.”

“So it’s not true?”

“I bet he conveniently forgot to mention how he tried to hit on me.”

His expression turned serious. “He won’t ever do that again.”

“So he told you about it?”

He twisted some noodles around his fork then stabbed a piece of meat. “I heard about it.”

I waited for him to elaborate. When he didn’t say anything else, I asked, “Why does that make you so crabby?”

He raised his eyebrows. “Crabby?”

“Just answer the question.”

“Fine. I have my reasons.”

“Reasons you’re not willing to share?”

He winked. “We do have a smart one here.”

I picked up a pillow and threw it at him, causing his food to splatter all over his shirt. “Oops.”

He turned the pillow over, and picked two noodles off of it, and put them in his mouth. “You know, you could’ve just asked me to take off my shirt.” He pulled his T-shirt up over his head and folded it so that the dirty part stayed on the inside.

My jaw dropped, and I stared unashamedly at his chest, abs, shoulders… really anything I could lay my eyes on.

He took the dirty case off the pillow, folded it up, and put it on the floor with his T-shirt. “So it’s true. You do have a thing for me.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to. I could tell you were undressing me with your eyes.”

I tried my damnedest not to, but I couldn’t help but laugh. “You’re really something else.”

He winked. “That I am.”

The next morning, I awoke to the sheets getting ripped off me. My heart pounded as I looked around the room, terrified that one of the boys had come to finish what they had started in the canal.

When I saw Jett’s smiling face, I wanted to slap it off him. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Getting you ready for school.”

“And you think practically assaulting me is the best way of doing it?”

He laughed. “I didn’t assault you.”

“Well, you certainly didn’t need to tear my sheets off. And if I’m correct, the law would consider a stranger ripping the sheets off a girl while she was asleep as some form of assault.”

“For one, you wouldn’t wake up when I tried to wake you nicely. And two, when are you going to stop calling me a stranger?”

Ignoring his question, I asked, “What’s the time?”

He sighed. “Eight twenty-five.”

“What?” I shouted.

I only had fifteen minutes until class started. I jumped out of bed then realised that should have hurt way more than it did. I was still wobbly on my feet, though.

“Easy.” Jett took my elbow to support me. “Sit back down, and I’ll get your uniform.” He eased me back onto the bed then went over to my wardrobe. A minute later, he emerged with my little maid outfit held to his chest.

“Oh, my God!”

“I think you might not be as uptight as I thought.”

“It was from a
Rocky Horror
play we did in school last year.”

He winked. “Sure it was.”

I huffed. “Aren’t you supposed to be helping me get ready for school?”

“Right.” He went back into the wardrobe and returned with my school uniform.

“Thanks,” I said as he handed it to me. I needed some clean underwear, but I wasn’t about to ask him for that.

“I’ll be right outside.” He went into the hallway, closing the door behind him.

I managed to get out of bed with greater ease than the day before then went over to my wardrobe and pulled out a pair of panties and a bra. I carefully got dressed, surprised by how little it hurt.

A knock sounded at the door. “You ready?”

I quickly shoved my dirty underwear under the bed. “Ready.”

He opened the door and walked over to my bed. “We have ten minutes to get you to school.”

He supported me as I got to my feet. When I stood, our faces were inches apart. I realised there was a great possibility that I had morning breath, and he was copping the full brunt of it.

“I need to brush my teeth.”

“I wasn’t going to say anything, but…”

Horrified, I took a step back and covered my mouth.

He chuckled. “I was just kidding. Your breath doesn’t smell.”

“The bathroom, now,” I said with my hand still slapped over my mouth.

He shook his head and helped me to the bathroom. As I started brushing my teeth, Jett leaned against the wall next to the sink and watched me—and I mean
really
stared at me.

I pulled the toothbrush out of my mouth and turned to him. “Do you really need to watch me brush my teeth?”

He shrugged. “You can tell a lot about a person by how they brush their teeth.”

I smirked at him. “Is this some weird kinky fetish you have going on?”

“Maybe.”

“Seriously?”

“Hell no.” He laughed. “I just like to see you squirm. It’s cute.”

My cheeks flushed, the red emphasised by the bright lights above the mirror. “I think that’s what you get off on—making girls get embarrassed.”

He smiled, but I noticed he didn’t deny it. I finished brushing my teeth then spat the toothpaste out, all the while watching Jett out of the corner of my eye. He was enjoying my discomfort way too much.

Once I was finished, Jett helped me down the stairs. He picked up my school bag from beside the couch and guided me into the garage.

When he opened the passenger door of my car, I asked, “You want to drive
my
car?”

“Or we could take my bike.”

“My car it is.” For the first time, I sat down in the passenger seat of my car.

When Jett got behind the wheel, I said, “Just press…”

He pushed the button to start the car before I could finish. He also found the remote for the garage before I had a chance to tell him where it was. He moved the seat back, adjusted the rear-view mirror, then reversed down the driveway and onto the road.

I looked at the clock on the dashboard—eight thirty-six. “We’re not going to make it in time.”

He flipped on the turn signal. “We’ll make it.”

“School starts in four minutes and it takes at least five minutes on a good day.”

“We’ll make it,” he repeated.

Jett must’ve made over a hundred road violations just to get me to school on time. Never had I been so self-conscious on my walk from the parking bay to my class. Jett had his arm wrapped around my waist and insisted I do the same to avoid face- or ass-planting. I had only agreed because I hadn’t walked that far since I was injured and very well could’ve faltered and ended up on my ass. Well, that was what I kept telling myself. The fact that I could finally touch the body I’d admired all weekend really had nothing to do with it—
yeah, right!

Everyone stared at us as if Jett was a celebrity and I was someone from another planet who had no right to be standing beside him. Wanting to crawl under a rock and hide, I walked with Jett all the way to my classroom.

Because we had somehow arrived before the bell, the door was locked. Twenty-five of my classmates were standing around staring at us. It didn’t help that my bag was slung over Jett’s shoulder—another thing he had insisted on. Jett pulled me over to a spot against the wall and turned me in his arms so we were facing each other like a couple.

“What are you doing?” I whispered.

“I think there will be less questions if they think we’ve got a thing going on.” He shrugged and added, “Or you could just explain to everyone that you were shot on Friday night and I’m helping you get to your classes. Of course, then the teachers will find out, and they’ll probably call your dad and—”

“Okay, okay. I get it.”

He brushed a lock of my hair behind my ear, making me suck in a sharp breath.

He bent his head and whispered, “Unless you want to tell everyone the truth, then I suggest you stop acting like this is the first time I’ve touched you.”

I was saved from responding by the teacher’s arrival.

Mr. Harvey unlocked the door. “I hope everyone prepared over the weekend for the exam.” He walked into the classroom.

Nobody followed. They just continued to watch us. Ignoring the gawking, Jett walked me inside and helped me to my seat.

Mr. Harvey took off his glasses and looked at Jett. “Mr. Lomazzo, may I remind you that you no longer go to this school. Therefore you should not be in this class.”

Lomazzo?
Where had I heard… “Oh shit.” I remembered Jett saying that Nurse Lomazzo had been the one to change me out of my bloodstained clothes.

Jett whispered, “Now be a good girl for Nurse Lomazzo.” He kissed the side of my head then moved toward the door.

I vaguely heard him say something to Mr. Harvey, but I didn’t care. I was too busy thinking about the fact that Jett had been the one to take off my pants.
Oh my God!
I thought I was going to die from embarrassment.

When the rest of the class came in and settled down, Mr. Harvey blabbed on about something then handed out the test papers. I tried to concentrate on the problems, but the test may as well have been in a different language. All I could think about was how much Jett had seen of my body while I was unconscious. I didn’t know how I was ever going to look him in the eye again—other than to slap him.

Mr. Harvey walked to the board and wrote: 15 Minutes Left.

I rubbed my eyes then tried to read the first question. I had to read it three times before it made sense. After that, I raced through the questions as fast as I could.

I was about halfway through when Mr. Harvey stood and said, “Time’s up. I want everyone to put your pens down, turn your paper over, and leave the room.”

“Shit,” I muttered. There went getting into university on my own merits. I flipped the page over then eased out of my seat. I looked up to see Jett sauntering into the room.

“Mr Lomazzo, I thought I told you…” The colour drained from Mr. Harvey’s face when Jett shot him a look. The teacher suddenly found some papers on his desk that needed straightening.

“Hey, you.” Jett grabbed my hand as though he was actually glad to see me. He wrapped an arm around my waist then leaned down and whispered, “How’s my favourite patient?”

I raised my hand, fully intending to slap him. “You—”

He caught it in the air. “Uh uh uh. You don’t want to ruin the appearance we have going on, do you?”

Unfortunately, there was no way out of the room without his help—or my dad finding out about my wound—so I sucked it up and pretended to be happy to see him. But as soon as I was sure no one was looking, I threw him a bunch of daggers with my eyes to let him know just how not okay I was with what he’d done.

“So,” he said, ushering me toward the door, “you’ve got a study period next, right?”

“For the rest of the day.” I only had one test that day then two to three a day for the remainder of the week.

“Then, let’s get out of here.”

As we exited the classroom, I ran into Lilly. She didn’t seem at all surprised to see me with Jett, and the grin on her face made me think that the rumours had somehow already spread throughout the school.

“Jett,” Lilly said, nodding at him.

He smiled. “Hi… umm…”

“Lilly,” she supplied, completely unfazed by the fact that he didn’t know her name even though she knew his.

“Right.” He turned to me, his eyebrows knitted together. He bent down and whispered, “Is this how you heard so much about me?”

I said, “
This
has a name, and don’t blame her for your reputation.”

Lilly was standing there, looking like the third wheel, not knowing what to do with herself while we shared something private, which was not what was going on.