Paradox (Unearthly Paradox) (21 page)

I looked into his eyes, not understanding how he could be so calm about what had just happened and why he seemed to know more about me than I knew. “What am I?” I bit my lower lip.

He sucked in a sharp breath, and his eyes went almost black.

I stared at him. “You were there, weren’t you? You were the guy in the canal.”

He nodded. “I was visiting Jenna when I saw those guys holding you down. I started to help… only you didn’t need help.” Jett slipped off the bed and went onto his knees in front of me. “That’s when I realised you were different.”

I wanted to throw up. All my life I’d considered myself a decent human being, and yet he was about to tell me that I was the complete opposite—and maybe not human at all.

Reaching forward, he brushed my hair behind my shoulders. “What I’m about to tell you will probably freak you out—”

I barked a laugh. “I’m a demon, aren’t I?”

He let out a little chuckle. “Well—”

“Don’t laugh. I’ve seen your eyes. Hell, I’ve even seen it happen to mine. So I Googled it, and that’s all I could find on black eyes.”

“No. You’re not a demon. Look, there’s no easy way to say this, but it’s got to be better than what you’re thinking.” He covered my hands with his. “You’re a half-caste.”

“Half what?”

“You’re half alien.”

Alien.
That one word resonated over and over in my mind. I almost laughed in his face. But I pictured those five bloody bodies. Then I remembered my miraculously healing gunshot wound. That part I liked. But the evil part… “You need to start talking.”

He nodded. “Well, you can obviously tell that we don’t look like the ones from
Aliens
or other freaky movies.” He chuckled, but I frowned to let him know that I didn’t find him amusing. “Fine. What do you want to know? Where we came from? Why you’re a half-breed? Why the humans don’t know about us?”

“All of it.”

He began rattling off a story as if it were a speech he’d given a million times. “Our civilization has been on Earth for about two thousand years. We came from the planet Dracoria, which was destroyed by our people fighting each other. Our planet was mostly water, and we needed to find a similar place to live. Our ancestors decided on Earth because of the suitable climate and the inhabitants, blah, blah, blah, and we’ve been here ever since.”

“And what about me?”

He shrugged. “We don’t actually know how half-breeds come about.” He grinned. “Well, we know the act of having children is the same, but it’s extremely rare for a child to be conceived between one of us and a human. We don’t know how it happens, and we can’t recreate it on purpose. It’s a phenomenon. But when we find one… a half-breed…” He looked down at my chest. “That’s why you were shot. You’re a precious commodity.”

“What? I thought I disturbed a burglar?”

Jett grinned sheepishly. “That was just a cover.” He held up his hand. “And before you say anything about how I should’ve told you sooner, I was going to tell you, but I wanted to wait until after you finished school and celebrated your Schoolies. I didn’t want you to have to deal with finding out you’re an alien when you’re supposed to be having the time of your life.”

How could I be angry at him when he’d done everything for me? I remembered when he’d said that one day soon, I’d understand. He had obviously had every intention of telling me, but I had ruined his plans when I ripped apart Tyler and his mates. “And the police?”

“Part of the cover.”

“I knew it didn’t make sense,” I said under my breath. I narrowed my eyes at him. “So you had me believe that I was going insane?”

He grinned sheepishly again. “It was for the greater good?”

Smiling, I shook my head. “So why am I such a precious commodity?”

“Remember I said we also came here for the inhabitants? Well, humans are a big reason Earth was chosen. They produce a special energy. We need it to survive, and humans have an abundance of it. We feed off them.” He held up a hand. “Don’t get any sick ideas. We don’t eat people or anything like that.”

He rested his hands on my thighs. “The more emotion the human is experiencing while we are feeding, the more sustained we become. But the problem is… let’s just say we don’t like to see our kind with humans. The act is a necessary evil for us to survive.”

When he saw the horrified look on my face he quickly continued, “Don’t get me wrong. We don’t hate humans. If we could, we would only be with our kind. You’ve probably felt some sort of reaction when I’m around female humans. It’s a primitive response, and it’s a hard one to live with. When I have to feed off humans, it’s like a state of ecstasy, but afterwards, we feel dirty, repulsed at what we have to do to survive. Unless we find a half-breed. Then none of those sickening feelings apply.”

“Glad to know you weren’t wanting to be sick after you had sex with me,” I said dryly.

He cupped my cheek with his hand. “Don’t ever think you would make me sick. You could never make me feel that way.” He brushed his thumb over my lips. “You are the very essence of perfection. Don’t ever doubt the way I feel about you.”

I wanted to look away, but I had to see his reaction. “Are you just with me because I don’t make you feel sick when you feed off me?”

He smiled. “Seriously?”

“I think it’s a valid question.”

Not taking his eyes off mine, he put his hands on my waist and pulled me toward him. “Look. You being a half-breed is a massive perk, but that is
not
the only reason I want to be with you.”

I scoffed. “Geez, that sounded real assuring.”

“I can get what I need elsewhere. I can get what I need from you any time, and I don’t have to date you to get it. I’m with you because I like you, not because you’re a convenience.”

“But you’ve never dated anyone before.”

“It’s pretty hard to date one of our kind when you constantly have to watch them feed from humans. Most of us can’t handle it.”

“How do you do that? Feed, I mean?”

He leaned in, pausing within millimetres of my lips. “We breathe it in.”

My eyes went wide. “So that’s why Jenna’s been sniffing me.”

He laughed.

“I’ve noticed you doing it as well, but it was just plain old creepy coming from her.” A thought popped into my head. “Do you get jealous when someone else sniffs me?”

He chuckled. “We’re not dogs.” He smirked then began sniffing my neck, face, and chest with exaggerated noises. He pushed me back and climbed on top of me, not breaking from his sniffing. I burst into a fit of giggles and shoved him off me.

He rolled onto his side and propped his head up with his hand. His stare felt as if it were boring into my soul. “You seem to be taking this better than I’d expected.”

The smile dropped from my face. “After what I did down on the beach, I knew something was wrong with me, and being half alien sure beats being a demon.”

He brushed his thumb along my jawline. “Nothing is wrong with you.” He smiled. “Well, at least not to me. But to the millions of humans, yeah. They’d be hurling pitchforks at you if they knew the truth.”

“So is my father an alien, then?”

“No. He’s human.”

“Are you sure? ’Cause that would explain
a lot.
”

“I saw him leaving your house when he left for China. He’s definitely not an alien.”

“Then it was my mother.”

Jett nodded.

I wondered if my life would’ve been like Jett’s if my mother hadn’t died. Sure, she probably wouldn’t have been a drug lord… I trailed off as I thought about what I’d seen in Jett’s office. I sat up and ran my hands over my thighs. “I know this is rich coming from me, but I need to ask anyway.”

His brow furrowed. “Okay.”

“Why did you kill that guy?”

Jett rubbed the back of his neck. “It was a business thing.”

I laughed nervously. “You execute people for a living?”

He sighed. “You know my family’s reputation is a little shady by human standards, right?”

I nodded.

“Well, when someone steps out of line…” He shrugged. “We need to keep control. We’re not the only aliens around here or in the world. And sometimes we’ll get someone who betrays us, and we need to keep order so the GC doesn’t turn into a battleground.”

I scrunched up my face. “I’m sorry, what?”

“GC—Gold Coast,” he explained. “This is our territory, and we want to keep it that way. Anyone who tries to screw us will be dealt with by whatever means necessary.”

I stared at him. “So you’re telling me that I better watch my back, because if I step out of line, I’ll end up like that guy?”

He shook his head. “He was the one responsible for letting it get out to our enemies what you are.”

“Oh.” So I could add another person to the list of people who were dead because of me.

“As I said before, we’re extremely territorial.”

“You didn’t even know me then.”

“I found you.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “So that automatically makes me yours?”

“In our world, yes.”

Running my hands through my hair, I stood. “We live in the same bloody world, you know.”

“But we don’t live by the same rules.” He got to his feet. “Just because I knew I wanted you from the moment I saw you, that doesn’t mean I like you any less than if I were human and had done this the ‘normal way.’” He did air quotes.

“Do I even get a choice in this? Because the way you’re saying it, it doesn’t feel like I do.”

“Of course you have a choice.” He reached for my hand.

I wasn’t ready to give in so easily. I took a step back, holding my hand out of reach.

“I’m not going to
make
you be with me. But I will say that you’ll have a pretty hard time in getting rid of me. I know what I want.” Jett stepped closer, only a sliver of air separating us. His eyes dropped to my lips. “I want you.”

I let out a little gasp. Of course I wanted him, and with him standing so close, breathing me in, I couldn’t think of anything but the way his lips felt against mine. How my skin seared under his touch. How I wanted to feel that way again. Everything inside me ached to feel him again. To give him what he needed. And the satisfaction in knowing that I was the only one who could give him
everything
he needed was indescribable.

I never thought I would willingly get involved with someone who killed people as a “necessary part of business,” but things had changed. What had happened down on the beach had changed me in ways I might never know. My eyes had been opened to another side of me, one that no human would be okay with and only one of Jett’s kind could ever understand. I was part of his life whether I liked it or not. And the thing that scared me the most: I liked it.

A knock at the door killed the moment. “Yeah,” Jett said, his lips brushing over my forehead as he breathed me in.

The door opened, and Jenna stood on the threshold. “Do you want me to take Lilly down to the hospital? Or should I just call Doctor Brennan?”

“Shit.” In all the chaos, I had completely forgotten about Lilly. She had just had her world ripped apart. I felt like a pretty crappy friend. I slipped around Jett. “Where is she?”

“She’s in the other room.” Jenna grabbed my arm as I walked past her. “But I don’t think her seeing you right now is a good idea.”

I slumped against the doorframe. “Lilly’s afraid of me, isn’t she?”

Jenna glanced at Jett. “Yeah, she is. But don’t worry. I’ve given her something to mess with her memory.” She patted my arm. “Don’t worry. I wouldn’t give her anything that would harm her, especially after what she’s been through.”

I backed up until I hit the foot of the bed. “Take care of her for me?”

“Of course.” Jenna pushed off the doorframe. “I’ll call you when we’re finished,” she told Jett, then she left and closed the door.

Jett sat beside me and put his hand on my back.

“Where’s she taking her?” I asked.

“To the hospital. She needs to be checked out, and it’s best that she has all of this on her medical record.”

I never heard Jett tell Jenna to take her to the hospital, but other concerns came to mind at that moment. “What about Tyler and his friends? The police are going to come for me. What I did must have been caught on CCTV footage.” Actually, I was surprised they weren’t already banging down the door.

He put his arm around my shoulders, leaned his head on mine, and inhaled deeply. “You don’t need to worry about any of that. The cleaners are dealing with that problem.”

The cleaners?
“Do I even want to know who they are?”

“All you need to know is that they’ll clean up all the mess, and no one is going to come looking for you.”

That explained how his family seemed to get away with murder. It didn’t seem right, but I also didn’t want to go to jail. I raised my hands and held them out in front of me. I studied both sides then my fingernails, wondering if some claw-like razors were hiding under there.

“What are you doing?”

I shook my head. “How’s it possible for my fingers to go through a person’s skin?”

He pushed my hands down into my lap and covered them with his. “You’ve got to stop thinking of yourself as human. You’re a lot stronger than a regular human, and you’re capable of so much more.”

Strong didn’t even begin to explain what I’d felt during that dream-like state when I massacred them. It was one thing to hear Jett explain it to me, but it was another to wrap my head around it. What I needed was time—and maybe a clearer head.

Jett’s phone buzzed in his pocket between us. He pulled it out and looked at the screen. “I’ve got to make a phone call. I’ll just be out in the lounge room.” He squeezed my knee as he stood. “You’ll be okay?”

I ran my hand over the bedspread. “I’ll be fine.”

Something held me back from having a full-blown panic attack, and I had a pretty good idea that was because of the pill Jett had given me. Crawling up to the pillows, I lay down and pressed the button to turn off the main light, leaving only the dim glow from the bathroom. Just as I’d done when I was a child and wanted to keep the monsters away, I pulled the covers over my head and squeezed my eyes shut. But even with my lids closed, blackness took over, and the images of what I’d done on the beach replayed in a continuous loop.