She leaned against the door, glancing at the hall, knowing he slept in her house. Tonight had been a revelation. She still didn’t know Gerard, but she wanted to. They were stuck together for a long time. Ignoring him was no longer an option, besides, she’d done a pretty lousy job of that anyway. Kissing him, letting him kiss her back, imagining his lean naked body pressed tight to hers... heat zipped down her spine and she clamped down on a moan.
Trisha would die, and that thought made her smile. Never in her life had Betty imagined she’d find herself in this situation. Harboring an alien from some alternate dimension, a hot, sexy one at that. Martian ManHunter had been her first crush growing up, though she’d always assumed her alien would have green skin and oblong shaped eyes. As an adult the green skinned freaks had long since lost their appeal.
But Gerard looked so human-- so purely masculine-- that had she not experienced the fairies and magic herself, she’d have thought him as mortal as her.
She rubbed sweaty palms on her legs, the sound of the bags disturbed the peace of night and she cringed. Betty had driven for hours, vacillating between running to Trisha’s-- kicking whatever piece of man meat out of her house and dishing all-- or keeping Gerard’s secret to herself.
Of all the people in the world Gerard could have met, she doubted many would be as accepting of what he was. Betty had been primed from the moment she could talk, to believe in life beyond Earth. But even her brother, raised by the same parents in the same house, rejected any and all notion of aliens.
She sighed and grabbed the pendant that had ceased feeling like a weight. It pulsed against her skin like the warmth of a sun’s ray. The lights swirled in and on each other like a wave tumbling onto shore. Betty straightened her shoulders and headed to his room.
She didn’t bother to knock, knowing if he said to go away she do it. Instead, she opened it. A slice of moonlight cut across his body like a silver blade, highlighting the flat, corded muscles of his stomach. Betty swallowed and licked her lips.
“Cherie?” his deep voice brushed the night like a master painter’s stroke. Her lashes fluttered.
Betty gripped the bags tighter, knuckles flexing tight as she held on to the bags like a life line. With quiet resolve, she pushed away from the door, she’d come this far, she wasn’t going to wimp out now.
“You’re awake?” Duh, of course he was. Betty frowned, wishing for a do over, a smoother more sexy entrance. One she’d imagine Trisha doing.
He sat up, the white sheet dropped even lower, and though she’d glimpsed his bit of male flesh already, it still made her dizzy and slightly breathless. The man was gorgeous. Gorgeous, and in her house. Two words not normally synonymous in her life.
“Betty,” his smooth whiskey voice made her stomach churn, “is something amiss?”
His hair was mussed, the whiskers on his cheek more pronounced than this morning, and jeez… could her heart beat any harder? She dropped the bags on the floor.
“I bought you some clothes. Nothing fancy. Just some jeans, you looked like a size 32... so I got 34’s just in case and a pack of large ribbed shirts. There’s some...” she blushed, thankful it was so dark, “underwear. I didn’t know your size so I guessed. So um, yeah... goodnight, then.”
Her hair snapped like a band behind her head as she turned sharply on her heels.
“Betty.”
She stopped, spine rigid, breathless. “Gerard?”
“I’m not happy about what’s happened.”
Betty turned back around, concern for him easing her fears immediately. “Is it me?”
He shook his head.
“If I could take it off.” She yanked on the necklace that she’d tried on the drive to divest herself of, only to learn it wouldn’t come off.
“I can’t sleep,” he grumbled. “Slept better last night on that damn table. I just keep thinking.”
Betty took a step, and then another and another, before she knew it, she stood by the edge of his bed. With the lights turned off and nothing but moonshine to see him by, he looked vulnerable-- no less sexy, but much more approachable.
She fingered the edge of the sheet. “I can’t sleep either,” she finally admitted. “I’ve been driving for hours.”
“I heard you leave.” She drowned in the depths of his eyes as they roamed her face. “I’m not a man used to talking. To telling so much of who I am. I’m still not sure I want to.”
Betty gripped the sheet, inching it higher. “I’m not asking you to, Gerard. But I think this can at least be fun. Now that sex is out of the equation, maybe you can view me not as a body but as a person. Get to know me. I’m not all that bad.”
His lips twitched. “You’ve still the tongue of a viper about you.”
She rolled her eyes. “And you’re still a Neanderthal, but I forgive you for that.”
“Gods help me,” he moaned, and his smile was so boyish, so silly, Betty’s nerves completely fled.
She tugged on the sheet.
His eyes narrowed. “Cherie, are you trying to slip into my bed?”
Her heart jerked. “No,” she said a bit too swiftly, “why, are you asking me to?”