How to Date an Alien (10 page)

“No, it’s fine. I’m just going to the
security office to check my e-mail and then I'll probably head to
bed. It’s been a long day." I yawned and stretched my arms over my
head, hoping that she wouldn’t catch me in my lie.

“Yeah, I guess it’s been a pretty interesting
night for you with all that Ace stuff." She looked over her
shoulder at the group of interns talking, and then back at me.
“Look, I know what they’re saying about Ace is true, but I don’t
think he’d ever hurt you. I think Gavin is just being a jealous boy
or whatever.”

I shrugged. “Yeah I’m not too worried about
it.”

Really, I was a nervous wreck and wanted to
get to the bottom of it. I was hoping that by confronting Ace he
wouldn’t try and kill me right then and there, but that was a
chance I was willing to take. I knew if I didn't then, it would
just mull in my head for the rest of the night and possibly the
rest of the week until I got to the bottom of it. If I was really
falling for this alien, I needed to know if he was dangerous.

I watched as everyone walked down the hall to
the boys' room and waited a few minutes so I knew that they
wouldn’t follow me. I had looked in the computer system for where
Ace’s room was and knew it might take me awhile to get to the other
side of the building.

I walked down blinding white hallway after
blinding white hallway, squinting my eyes as I searched for his
room. Finally, the temperature dropped so low that I could see my
breath, and I knew I was close. I turned to face a metal door that
looked like something that would be on a meat locker, a stream of
ice billowing from underneath. I knew it was Ace’s room.

I knocked as quietly as I could, hoping with
as late as it was I wouldn’t wake up any other aliens. By the third
knock he opened the door, rubbing his eyes from sleep as he
adjusted to the bright lights of the hallway. My eyes widened like
saucers when I saw that he was dressed in nothing more than a pair
of black boxer shorts and his gloves, with the rest of his white
skin exposed and glowing in the fluorescent light. I tried not to
let my eyes wander, but I couldn't help letting them linger along
his abdominal line as a warm electric cloud feeling simmered in my
belly button. My eyes stopped wandering as they reached the V line
where his boxers met his skin, and the electric cloud feeling
started traveling down my stomach.

“Alex, what are you doing here? Is something
wrong?" He ran a gloved hand through his hair and scanned the
hallway.

I tried not to stare at the way the muscles
in his arms moved as his fingers grazed his scalp. When did he find
time to work out? Or were the muscles from killing people with his
bare hands? I shook away my lustful gaze from his hip bones and
looked back up to his face. "We need to talk."

He moved out of the doorway and motioned for
me to come inside.

I wished I had on my suit. The inside of his
room made me feel like I was encased in ice. Temperature aside, it
looked like a normal boy’s dorm room with the regulation twin-sized
bed and dresser. A dark glow fell over the room as if it were only
lit by black lights that glittered against his pale skin. I started
to wonder if there was something else hiding in his room besides
the regulation furniture and laptop. I stared at the blank walls.
Nothing stood out. No pictures or even some kind of a band poster.
It was as if he was trying to hide who he was. Or maybe that was
just how he wanted to remain, a mystery.

He closed the door behind him “So what do we
need to—" He turned toward me, stopping abruptly. Quickly he
crossed the room to stand less than a foot from me.“Alex, you’re
freezing. You shouldn’t have come here without your jumpsuit
on!"

He reached over and grabbed the black
comforter from his bed, wrapping it around my shaking body. He
rubbed his hands against my shoulders. My body warmed beneath his
touch, but I shook off that sense of comfort and tried to push back
my body's urge to follow that feeling the electric cloud left in my
stomach.

“Why are you being so nice to me?” I
asked.

“Well, you were cold, so I got you a
blanket.”

“I don’t mean that." I shoved his arms aside,
wrapping the blanket closer around me. I might have been mad, but I
wasn’t about to be freezing and mad. “I mean, why are you nice to
me all the time? Why do you care so much what I think and go out of
your way to save me like you’re my knight in shining armor or
something?”

He stepped back, shaking his head as he
lifted his palms out in front of him. “Alex, where is this coming
from? I thought we were friends?”

“Yeah, well, friends shouldn’t lie to each
other or keep big secrets from each other.”

He took a step closer. “Is this about me not
going to the bowling alley? I really didn’t think you wanted me to
go. Your intern friends hate me.”

“Or did you not go because you don’t have
clearance and you're considered dangerous?"

He winced as soon as the words left my mouth.
“When you came to my room I certainly wasn’t expecting you to say
that." He sighed. “But I guess I should have expected it sooner or
later.”

“That really didn’t answer anything." I
stepped closer, cautiously, hoping I wouldn’t push the wrong
buttons that would make him do something that really was
dangerous.

“I don’t know what you want me to say, Alex."
His eyes couldn’t meet mine as he leaned from one side to the
other.

“Just tell me the truth, Ace. What is your
real interest in me? Why did you kill that alien who attacked me?
Why did you save me from the aliens in the lunchroom? Why do you
look at me the way that you do? Are you going to try and kill me,
too?”

His eyes finally found mine. Instead of the
harsh black, I saw something softer, almost human. He leaned
closer. “Is that what you think, Alex, that I want to hurt
you?”

“Well, no, I mean…" I let out a deep sigh as
I looked down to the ground. “I don’t know. I’m just really
confused.”

He took another step closer, sliding his body
against mine, as the coldness of his skin gave me goose bumps. His
fingers tiptoed around my waist. I held back a soft gasp as the
warmth of his fingers pushed into the small of my back. He pressed
his forehead to mine.

“I killed Magpie because I wasn’t going to
let her hurt you. I would never try to harm you and I wouldn’t let
anyone else harm you either.” His icy breath was like a cool breeze
on my lips as he continued, "It took a lot of convincing for the
board to let me stay here after that, but they knew it was the only
way that she could be stopped. And you've got to admit—" He paused,
brushing his lips against mine as he smiled. "—I do have some
redeeming qualities that would convince them to let me stay."

I gulped, trying to catch my breath as my
body trembled against his. “You don’t think I can take care of
myself?”

His smile widened with every bit of his white
teeth gleaming. “I’m pretty sure any girl that would walk into a
Caltian’s room in the middle of the night, unarmed, can handle
herself." He wrapped the blanket around both of us, pressing his
body to mine. I felt an icy hot sensation race through me. “But it
doesn’t mean that I can’t try and help her out.”

“So, what’s your real interest in me, then?"
My lips almost vibrated right onto his as I spoke. I couldn’t help
but wonder how they would feel against mine.

“The most dangerous thing of all."

“And what is that?" I questioned, hoping my
knees wouldn't give out as I pressed my body tighter against
his.

“I'm falling in love with you." As the words
left his mouth, his lips pressed to mine, giving me the most
intense and explosive kiss I had ever had. With the coldness of his
lips and the warmth of his tongue beneath mine I saw fireworks and
felt them through every part of my body.

I opened my eyes only to be encased in more
darkness. Was last night a dream or did Ace kill me in my sleep? I
started clawing at the blackness before I realized that it was just
a comforter wrapped around me. Ace’s warm touch caressed my
wrist.

Ace’s warm touch?
Crap
.

I threw the blanket off me, only to realize
that I was still in Ace’s room, in his bed no less, and it was
freezing. I threw the blanket back over me and turned to see Ace
trying to cover his mouth and laughter.

“Is that how you always wake up in the
morning?”

I looked down at my body, fumbling my hands
over the same clothes I had worn the night before. All of my
clothes were still on and all my organs still felt intact, so
nothing happened as far as I could tell.

“Um, what am I doing in your bed?" I looked
over at Ace to see that he was still shirtless and hoped that he
still had on the shorts from the night before.

“Well I’m glad that I’m that forgettable,” he
teased and inched closer. “But, really, you just got tired and
started drifting off, so I just let you sleep here. Nothing else
happened, I promise." A Cheshire-like grin crossed his lips. “Well,
except…”

I sat up, covering the ridiculous amount of
cleavage that Jen’s shirt left me with. “Except what?”

This wasn't like me. I hadn't done anything
more with a guy than make out and some touchy feelyness, but I'd
never actually gone to bed with a guy. I wondered if Ace thought I
was easy, or worse, what the other interns and my dad would do if
they knew I spent the night in Ace's bed.

“You talk in your sleep, a lot,” he managed
to get out before bursting into laughter.

I flicked his shoulder. “Shut up, I do
not!”

“Oh Ace, I love your cold skin and your
statuesque face. Will you take me away?" He mocked in the voice he
used that sounded almost identical to mine.

I could feel the heat rise in my cheeks. I
hid my face in the bed.

“I’m sorry. I won’t tease you anymore." He
pressed his frosted lips to my cheek leaving a trail of ice. It was
hard to ignore the tingle that lingered from my cheek down to my
chest and made me want to stay in his bed even longer.

I turned my head toward Ace, leaning in for
his lips when I got a view of the clock on his desk. “Crap! It’s
nine!" I threw off the blanket and shot off the bed, knocking
myself back into reality and realizing that Jen and Riley were
probably wondering where I was, or worse they
knew
where I
was and were talking about it. What if this ended up just like the
first day and someone tried to kill me for this?

“Yeah." He stood up, stretching his arms
above his head. “You want to go down and get breakfast?”

I found a mirror and stared at myself. My
hair was thrown around my head like a rat’s nest and my makeup had
somehow all ended up underneath my eyes. I looked like the poster
child for the walk of shame. There was no way that anyone would
believe that I had just fallen asleep in Ace's bed.

“You know I’ve never been with a human girl
before, but do you always check yourself out in the mirror in the
morning and make faces like that?" Ace slid behind me, wrapping his
arms around my waist and kissing the top of my head.

I released myself from his arms and turned
around to face him. “How can you be so calm about this? I fell
asleep here and people could be looking for me! What if there is a
search party or a rescue team or something?"

Ace furrowed his brow and stepped back,
raising his hands in the air. “I promise you it’s fine, Alex. No
one saw you come in and all you have to tell your roommates is that
you fell asleep in the office or something." He put his hands down.
“I promise it will be fine.”

"How is it that you can act so aloof, like
you want nothing to do with me one day, and the next you're all
touchy feely?"

He shrugged. "Maybe I just realized that it
was finally time to give into my feelings toward you."

I shook my head. I wasn't sure if that was
the answer I wanted. I actually wasn't even sure what the answer
was that I was looking for. I didn’t even look at him as I headed
for the door. “I’ve got to go. I’ll see you at work. Bye.”

I raced out of the room, not looking back or
even up from the floor, and headed down the long stretch of
hallways that lead back to my own room.

“Look who finally decided to come home!"
Riley yelled as I walked through the door.

I ignored her and headed straight for the
bathroom. I waited until the water sprayed a steady stream and fell
over my body before I let the tears spring from my eyes. What had I
done? I was falling in love with an alien and I was pretty sure
that had to be against one of the rules. Though to be fair, I
didn't really read the packet I was given on the first day so I
wasn't even sure what the rules were. But if all my friends freaked
out about me even talking to Ace, or thinking about him, what would
they say if they knew I had spent the night with him? Or worse, if
they knew that I might be falling in love with him?

“Alex?" Jen yelled. It was my fault for not
locking the door. I wasn’t in any mood for a lecture; in fact I
wasn’t in the mood to talk to anyone.

“Is everything okay?” I saw her silhouette
walk toward the shower.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just really tired,” I yelled
back, wiping away my water-soaked tears as if she could actually
see them through the curtain.

“Do you want to talk about it?" Jen said
softly as she leaned in closer to the curtain.

I swallowed hard. I didn’t want to lie to
Jen, but I also wondered what her reaction would be if she knew the
truth. “It’s fine. I just fell asleep in the office, no big
deal.”

I was hoping that would be enough and she
would go back into the room, but she just stood there against the
curtain.

“Did you see Ace while you were there?" Her
question wasn't pointed, and I didn't think anyone had seen me
leave his room, but for some reason Jen's words made me defensive.
I turned off the water and ripped my towel off the rack. I threw
open the shower curtain and wrapped the towel hastily around
me.