by Jan Irving
“Can we try Indian food sometime?” he asked as he watched me stir the pot.
I smiled at him, my depression lifting. He was like a kid sometimes with his desire to explore our world, so I couldn’t stay mad at him. “Yeah. There’s a good local place with great curry.”
“I want to try the chickpea curry.”
I had that often, since it was the cheapest on the menu. “Tomorrow night, if Mr X doesn’t put in another appearance.”
He nodded gravely. “EZ is coming over in the morning to go over the contents of the flash drive with us. Perhaps we will find a clue.”
“You’re not just a fantasy, are you?” I watched our dinner cook, stirring occasionally. I couldn’t look at him, thinking even an innocent alien would be able to read between those lines.
“You wanted me to be like the sexy alien with the purple eyes?” he asked me, referring to my latest romance illustration. “All powerful. Not someone who could be hurt.”
I rubbed the back of my neck. “Yeah, I guess I got caught up in the fantasy when I met you.”
“I did try to find an attractive human male with purple eyes, Mitchell,” he admitted earnestly.
Aw. How could I not melt? My alien lover had searched for a body with eyes he thought I’d like. “I love your eyes…”
“I would die the true death to protect you, but even that might not be enough.”
I put down the spoon. “Wait, what’s the ‘true’ death?” I didn’t like the sound of that.
“My people are immortal unless our energy is intentionally dissipated by another. That is the true death.”
I swallowed, picturing his soul shredded like mist in sunlight. “Mr X can do that to you?”
“Yes.”
“I won’t let him.”
“Mitchell,” he sighed.
“I won’t.”
“Remarkably unscientific for you to say that.”
The pasta was ready so I poured out the hot water and began to mix the sauce. Jaden watched avidly. He was still pale and I didn’t like that. We’d have to experiment to see what his limits were in Jaden’s body.
“Sit down. Eat.”
He sat, and when I served him dinner, he ate without further conversation, completely focused on refuelling. I poured him two glasses of milk and found some two-day-old doughnuts in the pantry. He ate them and then half a bag of carrots.
“Okay now?”
“The pasta was good.” He looked at my half-finished plate. I slid it to him and put my chin in my hand as he devoured my leftovers. Watching him eat like that sent a curl of heat through my backbone. He’d been like that making love, totally focused.
He looked up at me through his lashes. “Very good,” he murmured around a mouth full of food.
Now I sighed. “I’ll see if there’s more.”
He gave one of his slightly off-kilter smiles.
“I want to work in your laboratory tomorrow,” he announced after he’d finished all the pasta.
I bristled but then took a deep breath. “I don’t like sharing my space. I have to do it at school but here at home…”
“I won’t touch your works in progress,” he said. “But I need time alone to create a detection device to help locate our adversary.”
“Yeah?” Now that I could get behind. Besides, it would be fascinating to see him build it. “I want to help.”
He nodded. “It will be an energy construct. You should appreciate it since you have an intuitive mind with science.”
“Science saved me. If I didn’t have it, I don’t know what I would have done.”
“I watched you when you were a child. You were neglected by your aunt and uncle. You spent a lot of time alone then too.”
I swallowed. “It was okay. It just helped me hone my discipline.”
“You should have been loved for the special person you are.” When I raised a brow at the unaccustomed sentimentality from him, he added, “No, you are correct—I do not fully understand the concept of love, but I have seen children who are valued. The people who raised you were not worthy.”
“EZ would say that my past was the manure that made the rose grow.”
Jaden’s expression didn’t quite lighten. “She would. She is exceptional.”
“You look better. Not so pale.”
“I must rest and restore for a time. Your sleeping shelf will prove adequate.”
“Dandy.”
“Ah… Will you share it with me, Mitchell? I like the custom of your people.”
“What custom is that?”
“Sleeping together.”
I took his hand as he tugged me insistently from the kitchen. I’d been tired and depressed and bruised. Suddenly I was plastered against the wall, his heart slamming against mine, his lips covering mine in a clumsy, ardent kiss.
“No,” I whispered. “Let me show you.” I wasn’t any hot shot in the kissing department, since there had only been Riley before Jaden, but in my fantasies I’d lived out kissing a thousand men, tasting them, nipping their lips, running my tongue along skin. With Jaden, as soon as our lips met there had been a crackle in the air, as if from a kind of manic electricity. Blue sparks went off around us like firecrackers. He moaned, gripping my hips.
“Wait…”
“Mitchell.”
“Trust me.”
He laid his head against my shoulder in surrender, his chest rising and falling fast. “Yes.”
“Look at me, baby,” I said. When he raised his head I saw his irises had been devoured by the black of his pupils. Colour flagged his cheeks. Apparently my pasta had recharged him with a vengeance. “Let me kiss you.”
He shuddered as I used the tip of my tongue to tease him, outlining his full pouty bottom lip. He definitely had been gifted with the face of a poet, more Lord Byron now than Mr Darcy.
He gasped as I penetrated him with my tongue, taking him so he groaned again, shivering wildly from just this tiny touch.
Power pulsed in the air around us, the sparks glittering in jewel tones of ruby, sapphire and amethyst, and that power was also inside me, for the first time in my life, hot and soaring, like I was a bird flying over a forest fire.
As I tutored him in kissing me, I couldn’t help but reach out and cup him where he was as ready as I was, as stiff and aching.
He pressed himself eagerly into my hand, his eyes heavy lidded as I stroked him.
“Good boy,” I said.
He growled. Apparently my big, bad alien didn’t like being called a boy. It made me grin.
“Mitchell.” His tone was a warning.
I hooked a leg around him and he leaned against me, his body quivering. Just like that, I won. He would let me take control.
He was mine.
The heat melted into something soft and fuzzy. Oh shit. I didn’t want to put a name to it.
My moment of weakness was too much of a delay for Jaden. He raised my arms above my head. Then he took over the kissing lessons, bumping noses with me once, but then… Oh, yeah, he licked me like I was his favourite ice cream.
I wrapped myself around him, so desperate from just our kissing game. His hand tangled in my hair, dislodging my glasses so they fell to the floor beside us. “You don’t need those.”
“Yeah, I do.”
“No. Close your eyes, Mitchell.”
“What are you up to?” I asked him suspiciously.
“Shhhh.”
He’d trusted me and now he was asking that I trust him. “Okay.” I closed my eyes and felt the warmth of his body close to mine, felt the pulsing of my excitement and the tingling of my lips from kissing him. Jaden gently brushed my eyelids and I felt lightning zap through my skull.
I snapped my eyes open, vision swirling. And then his face sharpened, came into focus.
“Holy shit…” I breathed. I could see him perfectly, even better than with my scratched glasses.
“I can take away all your hurts,” he said. “I can take away that neglect
in your childhood; erase it from your memory.”
“Whoa,” I panted. I couldn’t think about the implications of his offer right now. I grabbed his head and kissed him and we fought to get closer, clunking against the stairs, his hand rubbing me through my pants.
The sparks danced around us like we were creating our own personal bonfire. But I didn’t care about his unique abilities right now. I didn’t care about anything but his body against mine, his harsh breathing and the sweat that gleamed on his forehead.
We couldn’t break apart long enough to strip. I could barely grab air for my lungs.
“I need you.” I’d never said it to another person. His hair was tangled in my hand, his neck under my lips, his body working against mine…
“Mitchell!” His back arched as he thrust against me.
“Jesus!”
I came, pressed against him so I felt the answering quiver of his release.
We held on to each other. If we’d let go, I think we both would have fallen. The sparks around us gentled to soft fireflies, revolving lazily around our bodies as we slumped, gasping, onto the stairs.
“Jaden,” I said, clearing my throat because my voice sounded so hoarse.
“Y-yes?” He gave me a look of concern. “You are all right, Mitchell?”
“Peachy.” I couldn’t stop from combing fingers through that tumbled dark hair. “I don’t want to forget. I appreciate the eye renovation but…” I chewed my lip. “I’m the man I am, the scientist I am, because of my past.”
He turned his head into my caress, obviously enjoying being petted. “You taught me to kiss,” he said simply. “I like you.”
I grinned. “You know, so do I.” I hadn’t for a while, letting the incident with Riley make me feel shitty. Hell with that.
Chapter Nine
EZ, Jaden and I all sat on pillows on the floor in my laboratory the next morning. “All we need is a sitar to complete this picture,” EZ joked. “I feel like George Harrison.” “If I have to move, I don’t want to bother with much stuff,” I reminded her. What
furniture there was in my laboratory were long tables holding equipment I’d borrowed, bought or modified on my own. When I’d woken that morning, Jaden had been gone from the single bed we’d shared. I’d found him standing in the middle of my lab, his eyes closed, his arms outstretched, his brow furrowed. Creating the special energy construct he’d mentioned the night before?
I’d brought him a bowl of cereal and then worked on one of my projects until EZ arrived.
“Here’s some lattes so we don’t go completely sixties,” she said, passing me and then Jaden a steaming paper cup.
Jaden sniffed it where the steam rose from the little opening. “Coffee. This was one of the things I was most curious to try.” He took a gulp and then closed his eyes.
EZ gave me an amused look. “I guess he likes it.”
“Not as much as orgasms,” he mumbled around his drink. “Mitchell gives me many.”
“Oh, do tell,” EZ drawled.
I flushed, which only seemed to amuse her more. “Um. Okay, on to our suspect list.”
EZ sobered and then pulled out a spreadsheet from her messenger bag. “I made a shortlist last night. I’m assuming whoever’s body Mr X, uh, took over, would be someone who had relatively close contact with Mitch on Halloween so he or she could pass on the virus.”
Jaden nodded, pausing to inhale more coffee aroma as if it were perfume.
“And you don’t think Mr X was that scum Riley?” she asked him.
“No. When a body has been used by one of my kind, there is a…residue of energy,” Jaden said. “I have not seen traces in Riley. But he is scum. He is garbage to be walked on.” EZ laughed and I flushed again. “Jaden, Jeez!”
He narrowed his eyes at me. “I do not like how that human treated you. He trifled with your feelings in some kind of…game.”
I sighed because I could see another sign of Jaden’s innocence. He just couldn’t get why Riley would pull that kind of trick. Well, I couldn’t explain it to him since I didn’t know either. That kind of thinking…it just eluded me.
“It didn’t make him happy,” I said. “And now he’ll never have me.”
“His loss,” Jaden growled.
I laughed. “Thanks. Now back to our suspect list.”
“Two people I think we should check out first,” EZ said. “Riley’s girlfriend…”
“—But Jaden said he could pick up residue if someone had been taken over…” I began.
“Wait.” EZ held up her hand. “He may not have used her directly on Halloween night, but she’s tight with Riley and his crowd. At the very least we should question her. She’d know if anyone close to Riley has been behaving oddly.”
“Okay.” Good point. I had forgotten how smart EZ was about people, probably from running the yoga studio and vegetarian cafeteria with her mother for so many years. I tended to prefer to hide from people, so I hadn’t developed her edge.
“Our second and far more viable suspect is that creepy redheaded engineering student Mitch and I spotted after the explosion on campus. I did some research. His name is Mason Anderson and he attended the Halloween party.”
“So we hunt them down on campus and…” I blinked. Looked at Jaden. “You said you could build some kind of device to detect our opponent?”
Jaden nodded, then closed his eyes and sucked in a deep breath. Of course, the strain on his face only made him look hotter, muscles bulging, dark hair tangled over his brow. He probably looked great working out in a gym, while I usually looked like I was fighting constipation. “I will ensure that you and EZ will recognise our enemy.”
“How?” EZ looked intrigued.
For an answer, Jaden raised his palm and energy shot from it, surrounding her in an orange swirling ball.
She gasped, her body jerking as she writhed inside the energy sphere. Her body lit up, not merely her physical body, but the air around it in several bright, rainbow shades. For a moment she resembled a lion fish, spikes of colour bristling around her, and I realised I was actually seeing her aura. Then the light show snuffed out and she wavered on her feet.
“Jesus!” I roared, going to her and crushing her limp body close. “What did you do?” I glared accusingly at Jaden.
He was pale and sweating, but his eyes gleamed with a kind of eerie heat. “I lent her a part of myself. She will now be able to feel Mr X if he is in close proximity. She will also have other…abilities, although I’m not sure how they will manifest.”
“Abilities?” EZ wheezed, a hand pressed over her heart chakra. “Will I be able to do hot yoga?”
Jaden looked confused. “I don’t know.”
“Sorry, bad joke. I feel different…” She bit her lip. “Not bad different, Mitch, so don’t get all protective.”
“You could have warned her!” I was still glaring at Jaden, who looked clueless.
Jaden blinked. “Why?”
“Mitch, we can’t argue about this now,” EZ interrupted. “We have to find the bad guy. Besides, look at him…” EZ gave Jaden a worried look. “You don’t look so good, honey.”
“I am…fine,” Jaden whispered.
“Hey.” I touched his forehead. “You’re like ice!”
His lips curved in his awkward smile. “I am almost at the limits of what I can share with you and EZ. Much more and I will be trapped in this frail human form.” He lifted a wrist to illustrate.
“You mean you’d have to stay Jaden forever?” I could feel one of those tension headaches brewing. The kind I got when I was trying to grasp a particularly difficult problem.
Jaden held my gaze. “Yes. I’d need this body to continue. I only have enough reserves to fight with my enemy now, after… It doesn’t matter.”
“It does matter,” I muttered.
“Wait!” EZ waved a hand. “I’m having an epiphany!”
“You look like you’re giving birth.”
“What’s with your fa
scination with me having a kid?” She poked me. “Probably a latent desire to have kids. Fair enough. I wouldn’t mind being inseminated with your super-smart sperm one day. We could share the child.”
“What? Uh.” EZ did that, jumped from A to Z; it was the root of her nickname. I wasn’t going to touch the bizarre baby-plan idea. “What’s your epiphany?”
“If Jaden can be reduced by expending energy, why can’t we do that to Mr X?” She whirled to look at Jaden, who was still pale, hair matted to his damp brow. “Our opponent’s probably still winded from that big energy ball he whizzed at the classroom. If we find him and can make him spend more energy…”
“We can weaken him,” Jaden finished. “Take away his ability to do harm. Yes, it might work.”
“He wouldn’t just…stay stuck in a human body, would he?” I asked Jaden. “You said he was a fanatic about how superior your people are in their natural state, so if he loses a round with us, if we manage to best him—”
“He will choose non-existence over being trapped in inferior flesh,” Jaden agreed. He closed his eyes. “I need…a moment.”
“Jaden, you’re not feeding me any more of your energy,” I told him, letting him lean on me. “Shit, you’re limp as a sleepy puppy.”
He was breathing deeply. “I am never limp around you, Mitchell.”
EZ giggled.
“Ah, right. Good to know.” I couldn’t resist pushing the hair off his sweaty forehead. He was both chilly and perspiring, like he had a weird tropical fever. “I can’t take anything from you. Not when it leaves you wasted like this.”
His eyes opened and he looked into me. “It doesn’t matter. All that matters is you.”
My throat got that stupid burn. I swallowed around it. “Don’t start with that protector business or you’ll piss me off. EZ and I are going to do our share, help even the odds, but you are not sacrificing yourself for me.”
He only shook his head. Stubborn, gorgeous alien.
“Are you going to be up to hunting with us on campus?”
