Jet

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I made a face and sat back in the chair with a sigh. “Maybe.”

Looking into those green eyes of hers was like looking into a raw piece of emerald. She watched me for a second before sitting back and copying my pose with her arms crossed over her chest.

“What do you want to do tomorrow night?”

I think the more accurate question was who did I want to do tomorrow night and the answer was clearly not Adam. I huffed out a breath that sent my dark hair sliding across my forehead.

“I wanted to go to the show with everyone, but then Adam showed up at the bar with flowers and chocolate and made a big production about making plans. Rowdy was there and saw the whole thing. Jet came in and told me I should go have a romantic night, that I deserved it—so now I don’t have any idea what I want to do, but I know I’m irritated at both of them for different reasons.”

Shaw lifted a pale eyebrow and tapped the edge of her fingers, tipped in a crazy leopard-print polish, on the cover of her book. “So tell me the reasons.”

“It’s stupid.”

“If it has you sulking outside the library when it’s barely forty degrees out, then it isn’t stupid. Something is bothering you and we should talk it out.”

I sighed again and ran aggravated hands through my hair. I normally wore it much shorter, but between school and work, I was unsuccessful in finding time for anything that might be labeled trivial or a waste of time, which included my current state of boy confusion.

“I like Adam. He’s nice and we have a pretty good time together, but it bothers me that he never wants to hang out with my friends. He’s almost too cookie-cutter, you know what I mean?” I waited until she nodded. “He has a great future all planed out, he has an awesome family all from here and I know that he really likes me. He’s cute enough and we have a million and one things in common, but . . .” There shouldn’t be a “but,” yet there it was.

“But what, Ayd?” She wasn’t going to let me sugarcoat it.

“But when he kisses me or tries to touch me, I might as well be filing my nails or watching CNN. There is no spark— Hell, there isn’t even a stiff wind. It’s boring and dull, and I hate it.”

“Well, that’s not good.”

I scoffed at her, “You think? I’m not attracted to the guy I’m supposed to be dating, but if, God forbid, the guy who lives across the hall comes out of his room without a shirt on, instantly I’m ready to spontaneously combust. Watching Jet onstage, being close enough to accidentally touch him and smell him, does more to get me off and turn me on than anything Kyle or Adam has done in the past year, and that’s why I’m irritated and frustrated with him.

“I don’t want to be attracted to Jet, Shaw. I want to be attracted to a guy like Adam, who I can potentially build a future with, and it bugs me to no end that no matter how hard I try, I can’t seem to make that happen.”

She gazed at me knowingly for a long minute. Shaw knew all about my disastrous attempt at seduction with Jet and she always told me that something seemed off about it. Sure, he thought I was all virginal white-gloves and untouched purity, but she was convinced there was more at work than Jet just trying to be chivalrous. She was always encouraging me to let a little bit more of the old me out, so he could see that I wasn’t above whatever lofty pedestal he had decided to place me on.

The last time I did that, he hurt me and made me run away, so I wasn’t too keen on letting the old Ayden out again for him to reject all over again. Frankly, I was terrified of the way he made we want to throw all caution to the wind.

“Well, we both know you can’t maintain a relationship of any kind with a guy you aren’t physically attracted to, and as for Jet, maybe you just need to get him out of your system. Maybe once he’s not the one that got away, you won’t want him so bad. That thing that happened last year between the two of you has always lingered. Maybe you just need to take a full dose of whatever he’s packing, and it will go away. Then you can focus on finding a guy more like Adam to work on building a serious relationship with.”

“I tried that already. He said it was a bad idea, remember?” I couldn’t help the bitterness that colored my tone.

Shaw laced her fingers together and leaned across the table, so that I couldn’t look away from her super-green eyes.

“So make him think it’s a great idea. You really think if you set out to seduce him, he’s going to say no? I heard what you told me happened last time, Ayd. He put up a little tiny protest and you ran away as fast as you could because it reminded you too much of something you might have done in another life. We don’t talk about Kentucky much, but I get the distinct impression that the girl from Woodward wouldn’t have let Jet go that night, the way the girl from Denver did.”

I groaned and dropped my head into my hands to cover my face. “The girl from Woodward wouldn’t have ever given him the impression that she was some good little girl, just trying to play with fire. Who I was before wasn’t pretty, Shaw. I tell you that, but I don’t think you really get the enormity of it.”

She waved a dismissive hand and got to her feet, hefting her heavy book as she went. The thing looked like it weighed more than she did.

“None of that matters. It’s this Ayden that I’m worried about. This Ayden deserves to be happy, regardless of what the future holds, and this Ayden is the one who has to decide why she is settling for milk and cookies when what she really wants is edible body paint and furry handcuffs.”

That startled a laugh out of me and I got to my feet to follow her. “What do you know about edible body paints?” She flicked her long hair over her shoulder, and the black underneath shimmered under the pale blond.

“Tattoo artist boyfriend, remember? He likes to draw.”

We shared a knowing look and parted to go our separate ways to class. I hated that she was right. I could drag things out with Adam forever and still end up nowhere. He was too nice for that, and I was too good of a person now to make him suffer and wait around needlessly for things that I just wasn’t willing to give him. I knew that being with someone like Adam helped me keep all the bad traits from my past at bay. Dating a guy like him didn’t allow for the spontaneity or the reckless decision-making that so often ended up making me suffer harsh consequences. Adam was steady and didn’t offer up much in the way of excitement or passion, and my logical side knew that was what I should want. However, the bigger part of me that operated on instinct and emotion knew he just wasn’t ever going to cut it on the more basic, physical fronts.

I spent my entire next class worrying about it and getting nowhere. Unfortunately, Adam was the teacher’s aide for the I-chem class that was directly across the hall from mine so when I exited the classroom he was waiting for me. I had to try not to flinch when he leaned down to press a light kiss to my unyielding mouth. It shouldn’t be this hard. He was nice enough looking, with brown hair and clear blue eyes. Regrettably, he dressed like he was about to burst into a lecture about cell division or the effects of global warming at any minute. There was just nothing there; no spark, no tingle, no nothing.

He offered to take my books from me but I shook my head no.

I was getting ready to tell him that we needed to cancel Valentine’s Day and that I didn’t think it was a good idea to see each other anymore, when he grabbed my hand and placed a kiss on the back of it.

“I know you were on the fence about spending Valentine’s Day together tomorrow, so I went ahead and made us a reservation for dinner at that Brazilian restaurant you like so much. I really want us to spend the evening together, Ayd. This relationship is very special to me. You are very special to me.”

I gulped down a mixture of bile and guilt, and tried to give him a smile that I knew ended up more like a grimace.

“That’s really sweet, Adam, but like I said, I just don’t know about dinner and the night together. I don’t think I’m in the same place with this relationship that you are.”

I could see that my words hurt him and it made me feel awful, but I knew it was the truth. I couldn’t use him to keep myself from acting in a certain way. Maybe I had really changed or I was just pretending, but either way, he didn’t need to be jerked around while I figured it out. He didn’t need to be mentally rejected while I was busy getting Jet’s pants off in my mind every five minutes.

“I’m sorry, I know that’s not what you wanted to hear.”

He squeezed the hand he was holding and gave me a grin that was sad and sweet. “Well, how about this, we go to dinner and you let me try to charm you? After, you can decide what you want to do. We have to eat, and the reservation was tricky to get on such short notice. I think you’ll be missing out on something really great if you don’t give this thing between us a shot.”

I wanted to groan, but just tugged my hand free and used it to twist the straps on my book bag around. I knew the right thing to do was to walk away, but he looked so bummed out. He had given it his all for the last four months and I was having a hard time just pulling the Band-Aid off clean.

“Look, I have plans to go see a friend’s band tomorrow night. I’ll go to dinner with you but you have to understand that all it’s going to be is dinner. I don’t think my mind is going to be changed. You’re a really nice guy, Adam, but there’s just something missing here, and after four months I know when to pull the plug.”

He laughed and I heard a chord of bitterness. “I know what it means when a girl says I’m a nice guy, Ayd. You don’t have to try to spare my feelings. You’re bored with me. I’ve seen the guys you hang out with when you aren’t working or at school. No one in their right mind would ever call any of them nice guys, especially that one you live with, the guy with the band.”

We had reached the parking lot and my car, so I popped the lock and tossed my stuff inside. I shifted on my feet and tried not to look guilty.

“It doesn’t have anything to do with that. I just know that something isn’t working and I’m not going to draw it out for either one of us. Trust me, Adam, there was a time when I would have just kept dating you until I had wrung you dry, and then walked away without an apology or bothering to look back. I know we both deserve better than that now, so if you want to cancel dinner I totally understand.”

I was secretly hopeful that he would do just that. I didn’t want to sit through an awkward dinner with a guy whom I had just told, in no uncertain terms, that I didn’t find him attractive. But Adam was a gentleman and his good manners just wouldn’t allow it.

“No. I already made the reservation and I would still like to take you. I don’t want to be alone on Valentine’s Day, especially not when I thought things were moving in a much more favorable direction with you.”

Man, he was even being nice about being dumped. I sighed and climbed up into the high vehicle. “All right. I really am sorry, Adam.”

He gave his head a rueful shake and slid his hands into the pockets of his slacks. “To be honest, Ayd, sometimes when we were together I felt like one minute you were there with me, and present, and then the next second it was like a stranger was staring back at me. You’re very difficult to get a handle on, but I really thought it was worth the effort to try.”

That made my eye twitch and I needed to get away from him. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“I’ll pick you up at eight.” It was on the tip of my tongue to just tell him I would meet him at the restaurant, so I could go to the show right after without him having to drop me off, but I figured I had done enough damage for one day. His comment about me being two different people was still spinning in my head, so I just left.

I was surprised when I got to the house to see that Cora’s little Mini Cooper was parked in the driveway. She normally closed down the tattoo shop where she worked and did the bank deposit for the night. She was usually just getting home when I was leaving for my shift at the bar. I was also irritated and relieved to see that the Challenger was gone. Jet had been scarce lately, which in turn made me curious as to what he was up to and grateful I didn’t have to deal with his unpredictable moods as of late.

When I walked into the living room I was brought up short by the tiny figure curled up on the couch. Cora wasn’t the type to wrap up in a fluffy blanket and watch sad movies on Lifetime, so the fact that both those things were happening right now made me drop my bag on the floor and rush to her side. I was startled to see that both the brown and the blue-green eyes were glassy with tears, and that her normally cheerful smile was hidden under a quivering lip and flushed cheeks. Cora was a couple years older than me, but right then she looked all of five years old.

“What’s wrong?” I didn’t know what to do, so I patted her on her knee under the blanket.

She blew her nose into a Kleenex and swiped at her damp face with the back of her hand. She looked like a sad pixie.

“I just had a really bad day.”

I frowned and settled even more fully onto the couch. “I’ve known you awhile now and you’ve never even called in sick, not even when we all got food poisoning from that bad Thai food. What happened?”

She sighed and flopped over on her back. She tossed an arm over her swollen eyes and gritted out through clenched teeth, “My ex-fiancé is getting remarried at the end of the year. The asshole sent me a wedding announcement in the mail.”

I blinked in surprise because I didn’t even know she had ever been engaged and because I never would have figured her for the type to carry a torch for someone. “I’m sorry. That has to be rough.”

She let out a string of swear words that would have made Rule and the boys proud and shoved up into a sitting position so that she was hugging her knees. “It shouldn’t matter. He was a bastard and cheated on me the entire time we were together. He owned the shop I worked at in Brooklyn. I came back late one day because I forgot something, and walked in on him putting it to one of his clients in the back room. That wasn’t even the worst part. I thought we were family, that the shop was home, but everyone knew and no one ever said a thing. I looked like a fool.”

She ran her hands through her short hair and growled like an angry puppy. “He was the first guy I ever really loved, ya know? I was so sure that I was over it, but then I saw that stupid announcement and I felt like I was reliving it all over again. If Phil hadn’t pulled me out of the city when he did, I don’t know what I would have done. It just sucks that he’s moved on to some other unsuspecting girl, and I go day after day alone.”

I went to the kitchen to grab her a bottle of water and hand her a paper towel to wipe off her face.

“It’s not like you don’t have every opportunity to date and have a boyfriend. I’ve been out with you. You get hit on all the time.”

She rubbed her multitoned eyes and sighed. “I get hit on by the same kind of guy over and over again; tatted up, restless, and only looking for a good time. I work with guys like them, and some of my best friends are guys like that, Ayd. I know how they operate. I’ve had my heart stomped on, so even though I could probably hang out with one of them for a minute, in the long run I would still end up heartbroken and alone.”

“So date someone different.”

She looked at me from under spiky eyelashes and a hint of her old attitude started to surface.

“Says the girl who is dating a guy who looks like he should be smoking a pipe and reading Chaucer.”

Now it was my turn to sigh and flop on the couch. I crossed my arms over my stomach and looked at her out of the corner of my eye.

“I broke it off with him today.”

She lifted a pale eyebrow, the one with the pink stud in it at me. “Really? I thought you were planning a perfectly boring future of going to the cinema and breeding supergeniuses with tedious bouts of vanilla sex.”

“Yeah, well, I would actually have to want to have sex with him in order to breed anything and it just isn’t happening—vanilla or otherwise. I just couldn’t string him along anymore.”

She popped me on the shoulder with her tiny fist and gave me a huge grin. “Good. Now you can stop pretending that you don’t want to get all kinds of naked and horizontal with Jet.”

I snapped my head around and stared at her with my mouth hanging open. “You’re the second person today who has told me I should just go ahead and sleep with him.”

She shrugged and tossed the blanket to the floor. “Shaw and I talk about it all the time. Jet is sexy, like it-hurts-to-look-at-him sexy, so we totally get it. What we don’t get is why you so obviously struggle to keep him at arm’s length. I see you stare at him day in and day out, and when he’s onstage, Ayd, you should see the way you look at him.”

I fidgeted nervously, again unaware that I was being so transparent about what he did to me and the struggle I had with myself to keep my hands off.

“Everyone watches him like that when he’s onstage. He’s amazing and talented.”

She got to her feet and stretched her arms above her head. She patted me on top of my head with the tattooed arm on her way out of the room, calling over her shoulder, “Yeah, that’s true, but you’re the only one he ever looks into the crowd for. You’re the only one he makes sure is watching if he knows you’re there.”

That made my breath catch in my throat and my pulse slip and slide. I wasn’t oblivious to the fact that Jet and I shared a pretty potent amount of attraction, but I was also smart enough to know that after turning me down last winter, he hadn’t had an empty bed or a serious relationship since.

A relationship needed more than fire and flames to make it work. Plus, he didn’t know the real me, and the me he did know, he had deemed too clean to mess up. Having someone else tell me that he might be looking at me, realizing all the forbidden things I wanted to do to him and seeing through the perfect image I tried to project, really made me nervous. I struggled around him now, and if he had an inkling as to what I really wanted, I didn’t know that I would be able to keep my hands to myself and out of his pants any longer .

Grumbling to myself I picked my stuff up off the floor and wandered back to my room. I scowled at his closed door and settled in to do some homework and brood. I didn’t want to go to dinner with Adam, and now with Cora’s startling revelation, I didn’t really want to go to the show afterward, either. Maybe when I packed up and left Kentucky, I should have looked into becoming a nun. Right now, that seemed like it would be a whole lot easier to handle.

With my dark hair and odd-colored eyes I looked good in red and since it was Valentine’s Day, I thought that my dress with its flared skirt and off-the-shoulder boatneck in lipstick red was a perfect choice. My hair was too short to do much with so I curled it around the front of my face, and pinned the long bangs back with a bobby pin that had a big rhinestone heart on it. I had been to enough of Jet’s shows to know that heels weren’t exactly the best choice in footwear, but I didn’t have anything else that would fit with the dress, so I settled on a pair of black patent leather Mary Janes.

When I looked in the mirror I had to acknowledge that I looked way too good to simply be having dinner with my ex-sorta-boyfriend, and that I was dressing for someone else entirely. And that wasn’t smart, but I didn’t care or change my outfit.

Adam arrived right on time in his very sensible Subaru, and drove us downtown. The conversation in the car was stiff and strained, even though he told me I looked lovely and was being perfectly polite. We devolved into talking about school and chemistry. By the time we got seated at the restaurant, it was all I could do not to check my phone every five minutes to see the time. I was antsy and still a little concerned about his comment that he felt like I was two different people. That was something I battled with on a regular basis and had thought I’d figured out how to keep the old me totally locked down tight.

I would be the first to admit that I was probably the worst Valentine’s date in the history of the holiday. When he ordered a bottle of wine to have with dinner, I wanted to groan because that just seemed too datelike, but I owed it to him to at least try to be pleasant. I let him pour me a glass and forced a smile.

“Thanks, Adam.”

“I’m glad you came. I really wish you would reconsider and think about trying to work this out between us. I really do like you, Ayden. You’re smart, funny, and beautiful. Plus, we have so much in common.”

What was wrong with me? This guy was nice, cute, and clearly thought I was awesome. He was like the dream guy most girls wanted, but for some reason, the more he extolled all my virtues, the more turned off I got. I pushed the glass of wine away and picked up a glass of water.

“Adam, I don’t think you really know me. For instance, I hate wine. I usually drink tequila, a lot of it, and then hate myself in the morning. We have our chemistry majors and school in common, but beyond that, not much. I really don’t like the ballet or the opera, and I’m more of a line dancing, rodeo kind of girl. I thought that it would do me some good to try to date a guy like you, because you’re just so thoughtful and nice, but all it did was show me that trying to force something to happen just won’t work.”

He cleared his throat and set his wine down as well. “You could have told me all of that months ago, Ayd. You never even gave me a chance to get to know you. You already decided, before we even began, which version of you that I was going to date, without considering that I might like both of them enough to stick around. Maybe I like to line dance as well.”

He was absolutely right and that just made me feel even worse.

I spent the rest of the dinner sulking, and to his credit Adam still offered to pay for the entire bill. I couldn’t let him do that, so I paid for my half and for the tip, to make up for being such a jerk. He drove me to the Fillmore and I had every intention of jumping out of the car and dashing inside, but for some reason when he caught sight of the crowd waiting out front decked out in a whole lot of denim and spikes, he decided that he had to park and walk me in.

I wanted to tell him that it was unnecessary. I had been to plenty of these shows over the past year, and while my fancy dress might garner a few weird looks, most of these guys could care less about me. They were here for the music. But I had already rained on his parade enough for one day, so I let Adam guide me up to the front doors. I didn’t miss the scowl on his face when I told the girl taking tickets I was on the list.

She double-checked my name and wrapped a bracelet around my wrist that said I was over twenty-one. She looked questioningly at Adam, who just shrugged and paid for a ticket. He stood out like a sore thumb amid all the other miscreants milling around, and I didn’t have the heart to tell him it was going to be even worse when we got inside. We had to wait in a little bit of a line to get to the front doors, and I tried to tell him I was fine, but he kept insisting on at least getting me to my waiting friends. Since Enmity was the headlining band, I knew that Jet would have arranged for them to have one of the VIP tiers up in the balcony by the bar. It took a little work, and a lot of waiting for Adam to stop gaping at barely clothed girls and guys who looked like they ate glass and metal for breakfast, to get to the rest of the group.

Shaw was pressed up against Rule and looked cute in a black dress with pink polka-dot hearts scattered all across it. Rule’s nod to the holiday was to have dyed the front of his dark hair a shocking hot pink. Only a guy like Rule could rock pink hair and not have to give a second thought to getting his ass kicked.

Nash was in a deep conversation with Cora, who looked much better today. Rowdy was saying something to Jet, trying to get his attention. It was to no avail, because as soon as Jet’s gaze locked on Adam and me making our way over, those dark eyes went pitch-black and the gold on the outside started burning like embers. I had to swallow a lump in my throat, because for the life of me I couldn’t figure out why he was so mad. Before I could say anything, he pushed away from the table and stalked away without saying anything to me or anyone else.

I stiffened automatically when Shaw slipped away from Rule to wrap me in a hug. “Hey, girl, you look great.”

I cleared my throat and waved a hand around the table. “Adam, this is everyone, everyone, this is Adam.”

I didn’t wait to see if anyone talked to him. I focused my gaze on Rowdy and moved toward him with purpose. He was staring past me at Adam, and sucking on a Coors Light tall boy. I put myself right in his line of sight and crossed my arms over my chest.

“What’s Jet’s problem?” I was one second from tapping my toe like a disgruntled kid and I think he could tell, because he just smiled at me and tipped the beer up.

“You should probably ask him.”

Annoyed, I poked him in the center of his solid chest. “I’m asking you. He’s been acting pissed off all week. What’s going on with him?”

He moved the beer and narrowed his eyes at me. Rowdy was your typical blond-haired, blue-eyed, perfectly sculpted God’s gift to women, but there was always something lurking just below the surface of that ocean-colored gaze that let people know there was more to him than just an easy smile and a good time. There were depths beyond all that tattooed skin and perfectly coiffed hair. I didn’t know him as well as some of the others, but in him I felt a kindred spirit I didn’t bother to try to define.

“It’s Valentine’s Day, Ayd, and you showed up looking like a goddamn pinup model, on the arm of a guy that dresses like someone’s dad. Like I said, maybe you should go ask him what’s wrong. I think it’s long past time that the two of you have an honest conversation, before one of you—or both of you—end up doing some kind of irreparable damage to the other.”

I sucked in a hard breath between my teeth and put a hand on my racing heart. The opening band was starting their set, so I knew Jet would have gone backstage to make sure the band was getting ready to go. I looked over my shoulder and noticed that Adam was alternately looking at Rule like he was an alien from another planet, and at Shaw like she was crazy for cuddling up to him like he was a giant teddy bear. He just didn’t get it, and even if I had tried to make a relationship with him work, he never would have gotten it.