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If Jace didn't want me for sex—or if that wasn't the bulk of it, at least—then this was potentially something more real than I'd experienced before. Even with Zac, who'd wasted no time taking me to bed as soon as he'd had a chance.
When the first sting of perceived rejection wore off, something else took its place. Something that felt a lot like security and peace of mind. Maybe even something close to happiness. Jace didn’t just see me as an object.
"So," I said, unsure how to press down the sizzle of nerves firing through me as a result of Jace's kiss.
He smiled, his white teeth revealed by those full perfect lips curling up, and his dark eyes gleamed beneath the dimmed lights overhead. "So," he repeated.
Every cell in my body was flinging itself against the next, my entire body like an electrified fence. But Jace looked calm and relaxed, and completely focused on me. I took a breath. "Tell me something I don't know about you."
The smile dimmed a bit, and Jace dropped my gaze. At first I thought he wouldn't answer, and I worried I’d read everything wrong, but then he leaned forward and said, "What would you like to know?"
I glanced around his room, looking for a clue to his inner life, to the parts of the strong tough bodyguard I hadn't seen yet. "Those books. I know you’re taking classes. What are you studying?"
"I'm close to finishing my degree." He looked shy as he said this, and I wasn’t sure I should press, but I wanted to know what he spent his spare time reading, what filled his mind.
"What will your degree be in?" I asked. "When do you have time for class?"
The broad smile returned. "Physics," he said. "And I study at night. My classes are online."
"You don't sleep?"
"Not a lot, actually. I never really have. It used to drive my mom nuts, but I really only need four or five hours a night. Leaves me a lot of time for other things." He winked at me lazily, and there was something about the way he was sitting in that chair, his long limbs kicked easily in front of him, his arms draped over the armrests, that gave me a sense of peace for some reason. And knowing he was awake, studying, while I slept just a couple doors down—that made me feel safe too, in a way that even having Zac right next to me never really had.
"That must be nice. I'd get so much more done if I didn't need to sleep."
"And I think the complete opposite. Sometimes I think it'd be nice just to conk out for ten or twelve hours, to not have to focus, not care all the time." A cloud washed through the dark eyes, but he blinked and it was gone. "Your turn. What did you study?"
I felt my face heat and the sizzling discomfort in my cells returned. People assumed I had a degree for whatever reason. But I hadn't gone that route. I'd left high school and come to Los Angeles. "I don't have a degree," I told him. "I was young and stupid. I probably should have gotten one, had something to fall back on in case things didn't work out with acting." I dropped his gaze. I couldn't have explained exactly why, but I wanted Jace to think highly of me, to think of me as more than just some actress. But the truth was, there wasn't much more to me than that. Zac had seen it clearly enough. Maybe once he’d gotten enough of my body, my mind hadn’t been enough to keep him around.
"Seems like things worked out pretty well though," Jace said, his tone pulling my eyes back to his face, where the gentle smile waited.
"Depends on your perspective, I guess."
Jace looked around. "We're having this conversation in your Bel Air mansion. Your latest feature is playing in every theater in America, and your face is on half the magazines in the grocery store."
"Right?" I said, wishing all of that felt more like happiness. "I can't complain, really."
"If you'd gone to college instead, what would you have studied?"
"Probably theater." A laugh escaped me when I told him this. "I'm not the brains in the family. And acting's all I've really ever wanted to do. But if I had a degree, at least I could teach if things didn't work out.”
He shifted his weight, one of his shoulders rising as he said, "You could still get one."
I thought about that. Putting aside the fact that I couldn't even go to the grocery store without being photographed and mobbed, I had no real idea what it would be like to go to school. But I liked the thought. "Maybe someday. Maybe I could do it online like you do."
"You definitely could," he agreed, and the sheer belief those words carried made me feel it was true.
We were quiet a minute, and as my mind worked through what we'd just said, I realized I was intruding on his studying time. I began to stand. "I should let you study. I'm sorry, I didn't even think about what you might need to be doing."
"Sit, Juliet." His tone was calm but commanding. "I'd let you know if I was under the gun. I'd much rather spend this time with you."
A little thrill shot up my spine like a tongue of fire.
"Tell me about your family. You grew up in Maryland?"
I smiled because thinking of home—of Gran and Tess—always made me smile. I didn't fit in there, but I loved that place in a way a person can only love their home. "I did.”
Jace smiled back, listening.
