Read Online Sirius Academy (Jezebel's Ladder) by Scott Rhine - Free Book Online Page B

were
raging. The last thing I remember was working my way down her neck, nibbling.
Then she looks in the mirror . . .”
    “Ouch.”
    “And asks where the left earring
went. We spent the next twenty minutes ruining the mood and searching for it.”
    “You could turn that around,”
Daniel said as they switched to the bench press.
    “We found the back of the earring
on the floor and my lip was bleeding. I remember swallowing something, but I
thought it was just glitter.”
    The professor started laughing so
much that Zeiss had to grab the weight. “You ate the diamond? Hah!”
    “And spent the rest of the night in
the emergency room,” the TA confessed, “with that shrew and my sister badgering
me the whole time.”
    After he got done chuckling,
Sorenson said, “You can’t give up because of one failure. You’ve got to get
back on that horse.”
    “No more sex analogies, please.
When’s the last time you had a date?”
    Daniel remained silent. Zeiss
nodded at Professor Horvath in the Pilates class. “I see you looking at her
every day.”
    “She has a truly magnificent ass
and legs like a thoroughbred.”
    “Shh.”
    “Aw, she hears it all the time, a great-looking
woman like that.”
    “For her age.” Zeiss shrugged. “Okay,
any age. I hear comments about her all the time from the male cadets. You’re
not just in it for the sympathy lay? You really like her?”
    “There are no words. Why?”
    “Because she has a huge heart and I
wouldn’t want to see her hurt.”
    Daniel turned to face the young
man. “How would you know? Everyone else says she’s Cruella de Vil.”
    “A lot of my students complained
about her, so I checked her out. I watched her teach, even when she wasn’t in
her class. She’s doing everything she can to make sure those kids don’t get
hurt, now or later. She helps them even if it means missing lunch; you can’t
fake that kind of dedication,” Zeiss said, increasing the weight. “Ask her
out.”
    “You think I could?”
    “I think she’d be lucky to get
you.”
    “That’s a big risk,” Daniel
complained. “What are you going to put on the line?”
    Zeiss sighed. “What did you have in
mind?”
    “One more secret. You talk a lot
about your mom but not your father. His name wasn’t on your application.”
    “He divorced my mom when she was
diagnosed.”
    “That tells me he’s an ass, not his
name. Why did you choose to take care of her instead of go with him?”
    “When I refused to play hockey, he
didn’t take it well. He disowned me.”
    “Harsh. Why? You like hockey. You
wear that Snoopy shirt with the Zamboni.”
    “I like the comic strip and it’s a
funny word. Any sport where they put on cups fifty years before they required
helmets has its priorities out of whack. I had friends with missing permanent
teeth and memories.”
    “I agree, but I think you’re
exaggerating about your dad.”
    “He had me genetically tested to
make sure I was really his son.”
    “You win. Major sphincter. I’m
sensing more to this story than wearing a cup.”
    Conrad weighed the silence for a
moment. “During tournament semi-finals, he told me to check the other team’s
lead scorer, slow him down. Our coach told another boy the same thing. We both
hit their star player. No one knows which shot injured his spine. But I was
always big for my age. I had to have done more damage.”
    “Oh, shit.”
    “The old man disowned me the day I
sat with Ulrich in the hospital instead of going to the finals. He didn’t
understand that I could never hit another human that way again.”
    “That’s what made you a pacifist?”
    “What followed did. I prayed a lot
that week. Ulrich was approved for that new nano-nerve stimulation treatment
based on alien technology.”
    “I’ve heard of it,” Daniel said,
voice laden with irony. He’d been among the first test subjects. “The shot
repairs recent damage in about 60 percent of the cases, but you can only use it
once.” By this