Chapter 27
ATTACK OF THE KILLER SWEATPANTS
I shifted from butt cheek to butt cheek on my worn couch. Despite the half hour that’d passed, the awareness hadn’t gone anywhere. It had only gotten worse. Like not acknowledging it had made the awkwardness grow exponentially.
Not even my panic-order of Chinese comfort food had helped.
It’d arrived right after my very cold shower.
Now I surveyed it from my spot beside Sky, resisting the urge to look at him.
Mostly because every time I did, I remembered the soft, tortured sound he’d made when I’d kissed him and how those long, graceful fingers he kept running through his hair had gripped my thigh—
Clearing my throat, I twisted the hem of the baggy concert tee, curling further into the couch’s arm. My damp braid soaked into the shirt’s back, and I tugged it over my shoulder, toying with the end.
Sky was spread out on the couch’s opposite end, one arm slung over the back, his long legs crossed at the ankles. Because I was a masochist, I gave in and risked glancing his way.
Which was a mistake.
Not because he was frowning in confusion at the excessive spread of takeout littering my coffee table…but because while I’d taken the chilliest shower known to man, Sky had changed into a white T-shirt and gray sweatpants.
Gray. Sweatpants.
He’d had them in his SUV, he claimed. Why he was carrying around thirst-trap clothing, I couldn’t begin to guess. The threadbare shirt clung to his torso, and the sweatpants…well, they weren’t doing me any favors.
Clearly, the universe hated me.
I jerked my attention away from the fabric molded to his muscular thighs and focused instead on his hair. It’d dried the rest of the way into soft curls and messy tufts. He usually wore it so neatly. This tousled version made him seem…younger. Approachable.
Too approachable. Especially now that I knew how silky it was—
Sky moved then but only to look between me and the dozen takeout boxes. He appeared concerned. Understandably. I’d ordered enough for four starving people. And I wasn’t even hungry.
I couldn’t take this tense silence anymore.
“So—” I began.
At the same time, he said, “What—”
We both stopped. I sniffed a laugh. My nerves were tripping over themselves. I drew up my legs and adjusted my position until I faced him. He watched me with a slight, guarded smile.
“Go ahead,” I offered.
“Well,” he said, exhaling. He sat forward, and one of those endearing curls fell over his forehead as he steepled his hands. “I think we should talk about what happened.”
I had a feeling I knew what he was talking about: that kiss. And this wasn’t awkward at all. Telltale heat stung my cheeks.
“Which part?” I asked anyway, resisting the urge to fiddle with my braid. I had no idea what to do with my hands.
He contemplated me for a second, as if picking up my anxiety. It was probably written all over my face. Sitting back, he transferred his attention to the entirety of the Chinese restaurant menu spread out before us. “First things first. Which one do you want?”
I shrugged because I wasn’t sure I could eat at all. Not with my insides twisting and turning like they were. He began popping lids anyway.
“Orange chicken. Chow mein. Beef and broccoli. Shrimp fried rice.” He frowned at another container, lifted it, and sniffed its contents. “No idea what this one is.”
“Egg foo yung,” I whispered, tucking a frizzed strand behind my ear. I made a valiant effort to avoid noticing every casual twitch of his body. And failed. “I’ll take the fried rice. I don’t like noodles…so, you can have those. If you like noodles.”
“You don’t like noodles,” he echoed, as if making a note, passing me the rice box. “I like them just fine.”
Casual food talk. I could do this. That is, until our fingers brushed, and the blush roared back. Full steam ahead.
Kissing him had not helped this ever-present awareness. Not even a little. It’d made everything much worse.
I threw myself into opening my chopsticks, and when I took a breath, I caught a whiff of the rice. Maybe I was hungry. Despite the absolute insanity of my day, my stomach grumbled. I didn’t remember the last time I’d consumed anything that wasn’t caffeine-based.
Even with the gnawing in my midsection, though, I couldn’t bring myself to take a bite. I stared at the food in my lap while silence closed in again.
Until Sky broke it. “Rae.”
That was a serious tone. Heart skipping, I looked up. His expression matched. Here it came.
“I’m sorry,” he said, holding my gaze. “I shouldn’t have kissed you.”
My stomach dropped with the weight of those words—and the humiliation that rose with them. Of course he regretted it.
Clinging to my pride, I forced myself to keep looking at him and willed those emotions to stay tucked inside. “It was just a kiss, Sky. It’s…it’s okay.”
He shook his head, mouth downturned. The dark curl flopped over his brow. “No, it’s not.”
“It’s not,” I repeated, voice thin. My throat was tight, and I didn’t know what stung worse: the rejection or the regret in his eyes.
He raked the curl back. “I…I can’t.”
Wait. I blinked, stunned. He couldn’t? Oh. Oh.
I’d just assumed—especially after what he’d said earlier, about being with humans. Had I gotten it wrong? Had I totally misread the situation? I’d practically launched myself at him in the stairwell.
I was an idiot.
“I’m-I’m so sorry,” I stammered. I couldn’t even look at him. This made things ten times more awkward. “I thought things worked the same. Well, you’d said you’d…you know…with humans—”
“No, that’s—” He loosed a sharp breath and transferred the container he held to one hand so he could pinch the bridge of his nose.
A strangled huff that might have been a laugh escaped him.
“No, Raven.” He lowered his arm. His mouth twitched like he was fighting for composure.
“Things definitely work the same. Almost exactly the same for Pladians and humans. And even if they didn’t…
” He gestured at himself. “Like I told you, the synth-skin makes me human. In every way.” He bit his lip and glanced up at me. “In case you didn’t notice.”
Oh, I’d noticed. A whimper tried to escape, and I swallowed it down, tearing my attention from him before I succumbed to the pull of the Gray Sweatpants.
I’d noticed all of it seemed human enough to work just fine.
Then the rest of what he’d said sank in. Had he just said things worked the same way for humans and Pladians?
Oh my God. My pulse lurched. I suddenly needed to know more. That shouldn’t turn me on, but it kind of did. It had to just be the thrill of the unknown.
I didn’t want to prod too much at what that—the fact I was sitting here, contemplating what it’d be like to do the horizontal tango with an actual alien in alien form—said about me.
“…ah,” I said, eloquently. My brain had abandoned me. That old, familiar flustered feeling I’d always gotten around Sky was still going strong and now was also accompanied by the fact that I knew he was a fantastic kisser. “Sure. Okay.”
“Sure?” Sky watched me cautiously. There was a hesitant note in his voice, too, when he asked, “That doesn’t…bother you?”
“That it…that it works the same?” More redness crept up my neck.
No, it didn’t bother me. No, I was very interested in exploring that little detail. Thoroughly.
He stared at me for a second before a crooked smile tugged up the side of his mouth. I frowned in confusion.
“No, Rae,” he said, grazing a hand over his face like he was erasing the amusement. Lowering it, he fixed me with a narrow-eyed look. “What I meant was, doesn’t it bother you that I’m an alien? That you kissed an alien?”
Oh. That. Funny, I’d been asking myself that question since it’d happened. Possibly before.
And I’d come to some conclusions. If he meant, did it change the fact that I still wanted to see him naked, the answer was no. Firmly. Still fully on board for naked Sky. For some messed up reason, that hadn’t changed at all. But I certainly wasn’t going to tell him that.
So I chewed the inside of my lip and settled on, “Define bother.”
He leaned back, lips parting. When I gathered my courage and met his eyes, a flash of something—interest or heat or maybe just surprise—flickered across his face before he lowered his gaze. His rough exhalation filled the tense quiet.
I twisted my braid around my finger and looked everywhere but at him. The box of Chinese takeout waited, but neither of us touched it. The clock on the microwave said we were well past my study time already.
“Sorry,” Sky said, after a moment of strained silence. “That, ah…wasn’t the response I’d expected.”
I glanced at him. He was staring at the floor. What had he expected me to say? It wasn’t like I hadn’t known what he was when I kissed him.
He breathed a faint laugh and finally lifted his head again, though he didn’t quite meet my eyes.
“That doesn’t change the fact that we can’t cross that line.
I shouldn’t have kissed you. I meant what I said about keeping our distance.
We need to work together to fix it, and we—I—can’t afford distractions. ”
He said all of it in such a reasonable, composed way. Like it was logical and obvious, and it probably was. It still wasn’t fun hearing it.
“Then why…” Unable to keep looking at him, I took in the sad shrimp count in my takeout box. There were never enough in there. “Why did you? Kiss me, I mean.”
Because he had kissed me first. I’d definitely initiated that second one, but the first time? Sky had kissed me.
When the silence went on a heartbeat too long, I looked up.
He gave a helpless, full-body shrug. There was something in his eyes when they finally slid my way. Something a little…bashful? That couldn’t be.
“Because I’ve been thinking about it for a long time,” he said so quietly, I leaned forward, sure I’d misheard. “And I wanted…well, I guess I wanted to know what it was like.”
It was my turn to be shocked. My mouth dropped open. I had to have misunderstood what he was saying.
He took in my flabbergasted expression, and his small smile flashed dimple. The rain pounding on the roof was louder than ever.
“Are you telling me…?” I started, but that’s as far as I got. He didn’t look away. I shook my head slowly. “No. That doesn’t make sense. You called me Rachel. Like a week ago.”
He sniffed, running his fingers along his jawline. “I know. It’s dumb. I’ve always called you silly names that start with R. Lame way to flirt, but…” This time, his grin was definitely a little shy. “It got your attention, and you usually ignored me.”
Ignored him? Ignored him? Is that what he’d thought I was doing when I was short-circuiting in his presence?
“So you’re trying to say you called me the wrong names on purpose?” I managed an incredulous huff. “You’re joking.”
He wasn’t laughing.
My eyes bulged. “You’re serious.”
“Well.” He averted his gaze, cheeks coloring. “I’m trained for infiltration, not flirtation.”
That surprised a laugh out of me, a real one—but I wasn’t so sure I believed him. He seemed to have zero issues in the flirtation department.
He gave me a quick, answering smile then grew serious, adjusting his grip on his takeout box. “I don’t know. I guess I wanted you to correct me. Tease back. You were always so guarded around me.”
I scoffed. Guarded? I turned into a complete moron around him! He’d clearly misread everything. How was that possible?
His long sigh drew my attention back to him.
“But…” He set his chow mein on the coffee table and eased into the couch, twisting toward me.
“My life is complicated. Very complicated. As you are now aware.” He scrubbed his palms over his thighs.
I tried not to look. Gray sweatpants were a menace to society.
“Somebody like me, with the mission and the secrets, not to mention the dangers…well, I can’t afford attachments.
Especially considering how dangerous this could be if I’m right about the halix. ”
I swallowed hard. There was that note again in his voice, the same thing I’d just glimpsed in his eyes. Maybe loneliness.
I understood more than I wanted to. Right now, despite the fact that only a foot or two separated us on my dingy couch, the distance felt vast. Like I was floating alone in a void. In fact, I’d felt that same isolation this past week since I’d stumbled into this extraterrestrial mess.
And I wasn’t from a different planet. I could only imagine how he felt.
Even so, that shared emotion also felt too intimate. Almost more so than the kiss in the stairwell. I didn’t know what to do with it or the soft way he was gazing at me. Like he was full of regret for something that hadn’t even happened.
“Right,” I murmured, wrapping my braid around my finger again. “Of course.”
“I noticed you the very first day you came into Oasis, you know.”
His words took a second to register, but when they did, I snapped my attention to his face. He was lying. Surely.
“You don’t believe me.” He read my skepticism, and his grin was slow. Leisurely. “Is that so hard to believe?”
“Kinda, yeah. That was months ago.” And you’re you.
“Six months ago. Almost seven.”
“Seven,” I corrected, eyes wide. Holy crap. He was throwing me for another loop, here. How had he remembered that?
He lifted a brow in challenge. “You were waiting at the bar with your bag, a bio-anthropology book sticking out of it. Your hair was in that braid you do…” He indicated my drying French braid, and I smoothed a hand over it self-consciously.
“You were dressed up. White button-up. Very professional, especially for Oasis.” Still smirking slightly, he leaned his head back, resting it on the couch cushion, his gaze settling on the ceiling.
“You smiled at me, but I could tell you were nervous. I’ve gotten pretty good at reading people, and you were doing that thing where you chew your lip.
” He sent me a sidelong glance. “Like you are now.”
Caught, I pried my lip from between my teeth and pressed my mouth into a line. Despite my better judgment, I found myself wavering.
Because out of a day full of crazy reveals, this one—if he was telling the truth—might’ve topped them all.