A/N Hooray! A longer chapter! This is where it starts getting juicy! Please review, you guys are amazing with that, I mean, 230? That's a record for me! Don't stop now guys, keep 'em coming!

Chapter 25

"Ooh, you look hot!" squealed Lizzie, once I'd finished applying lip gloss.

Jesse snorted. He was, as usual, sitting on his window seat, reading (A/N though not HP, allamericangirl109!).

I rolled my eyes. Whatever. I so did not have time for him. Today was Wednesday.

Uh- huh.

I'd caught a ride home with Kelly and Lizzie, and let Liz curl my hair. I told her I was going to meet a friend from Brooklyn, not Paul.

"Not that your friend will care," Liz continued. "Coz she's a she. Omigod, if its a he though, I totally have to meet him. New Yorkers are hot."

"Its a she, Liz," I said, rubbing in my gloss. "And believe me, the guys from my 'hood are so not hot. Unlesse pimples are attractive."

"Ew," Liz scrunched up her face. "But you look totally hot. I'm surprised no guys from the Mission have offered to take you to Big Sur. I mean, even one's asked Debbie, and she's a dog."

I was surprised to hear this. I'd always assumed Debbie was up there with Kelly. But Lizzie wasnt wrong. Debbie's nose did her no favours.

I laughed uneasily. "Oh," I said. "I guess all those guys know I'm taken. What with Jake going there-"

"Are you though?" asked Lizzie thoughtly, rubbing gloss into her own lips. "I can't remember the last date you guys went on."

"Hey!" I cried, a little more defensively than was needed. "We went to the beach together last week."

"And took David with you," added Lizzie, scornfully. "I bet you guys didnt even kiss."

"Whatever," I said, giving my hair a shake. "I got other stuff on my mind. I'll talk to him later. Right now I have to meet Pa - I mean, Gina."

Lizzie flounced off to the bathroom. I stared at my reflection. It wasnt me, who I saw in the mirror. The girl I saw was some manufactured, little Barbie doll. The girl that I knew was really inside me, was the one that loved playing baseball with her dad in the park on Sunday afternoons. I grabbed my purse.

Here goes.

I closed the bedroom door behind me, and turned to go when I was faced with Jake.

"Hey," he said. "You look hot. Where are you going?"

"Thanks," I replied, a little taken back. "And I'm going to meet my friend from Brooklyn. She's flown over from New York."

"Awesome. But how come I didnt know about this?"

"It was kinda last minute." I met his lips with a kiss. "See you later?"

"Yeah," whispered Jake, leaning his forehead against mine. "We could play video games or something."

"OK," I said. "But right now, I gotta go."

Jake kissed me goodbye, and I hurried downstairs. I leapt into the Land Rover, and drove steadily to Seventeen MIle Drive. As I walked down the path in Lizzie's Stuart Weitzmans, I was met by Paul.

"Hey," he said, slipping an arm around my waist. "You look hot."

Wow. I must really look hot.

He kissed my neck and nibbled my ear-lobe, until I shoved him off and said, "Paul! Inside?"

He shrugged his shoulders innocently and pulled me inside by the hand. I shut the door behind us.

"So," I said. "Time travel?"

"Yeah," he said expressionlessly. "Come up to my room."

"Paul, I'm here to learn about Mediator lore, not to find out how good you are between the sheets."

Paul grinned. "The books are in my room, dumbass."

"Oh," I said hurriedly, blushing. "Oh. OK. I'll come up."

I followed him upstairs and into his cold, modern bedroom, which had yellowed hard-backs scattered across the duvet.

"What did you start to say about Jesse at Kel's, Paul?" I asked, fingering the withered pages of "Mr Monterey". There was a glamourous painting of some girl, Maria.

Maria De Silva.

No way. Jesse's ... wife?

"Do I have to remind you?" asked Paul, edging closer.

"Jesse's dead," Paul said. "But that doesn't mean you have to act like you are, too."

"I don't," I protested. "I-"

But I didnt get to finish my little speech because right in the middle of it, Paul leaned over.

And kissed me.

I shook my head. Was that a vision-y thing, or not? Paul was wearing the exact same shirt right now, and his curls caught the light in the same way.

"Did you do that?" I asked.

"Do what?" replied Paul, backing off, looking a little freaked. "Oh wait, did you have one of your little visiony thingies?"

My mouth dropped. "How-"

"De Silva doesn't keep his mouth shut for long, you know," smirked Paul, taking my hand.

"Jesse wouldn't, he wouldn't!" I pulled away. "Don't twist things Paul, don't mess with my mind!"

"Don't like that, do you Simon? Never thought your little boyfriend would spill the beans! That's right, and I know all about your antics too. Alcohol, drugs, indecent proposals... we are a naughty girl, aren't we, Susie?"

"Shut up!" I yelled. "Shut up, shut up, shut up!"

I couldn't believe it. Had Jesse really told Paul EVERYTHING? And he hadn't even told me he'd been married? It wasn't Jesse. This wasn't the Jesse De Silva I was madly in love with.

"How do you know so much about me," I asked cautiously. "And how much do you know?"

"Are you really dying to know?" asked Paul, smiling. He got even closer, and put his hand on my chest, sticking his tongue in my mouth. I pushed him off in disgust. I was stronger now, I could resist.

"Paul, spill. Or I'll make you."

I met Paul's gaze to show I was serious. He saw my gaze and sighed.

"OK, OK, you caught me. I've been spying on you."

"What!"

"I was kinda hoping to find stuff I could blackmail you with later."

"Nice, Paul," I said angrily, approaching him, ready to beat the crap out of him.

"Wait!" Paul held up his hands in defence. "Jesse saw me, and he didn't stop me. He practically encouraged me..."

I stopped short. "Really?"

"Yeah," gulped Paul, lowering his hands. "You mad?"

I saw the gleam in his eye. "Liar," I stated simply.

"What?"

"You heard me. I say you're a liar. A big filthy liar."

"Suze, its true!" He took my hand. "From shifter to another, I swear -"

"I'm a shifter, too!" I shrieked. Paul put his hands over his ears.

"Yeah! Please stop shrieking, its really hurting my ears."

"Sorry," I muttered. "But I'm a shifter too? Like you?"

"Didn't Jesse ever tell you?"

"Why?" I asked, grinding my teeth. "Why do you always have to bring him up?"

"I'm just showing you, Suze, that he isn't as perfect as his abs lead you to believe."

"I'm not that shallow, Paul."

"Whatever. Listen, I got a plan."

"As long as it involves both of us fully clothed," I said. "I'm in."

"You're mad with the De Silva guy for letting me get away with spying, right?" asked Paul, picking up My Monterey and flipping it to the page that held Maria De Silva. "And for not telling you about her?" He tipped the book vertical, showing me the portrait.

"I know who she is, Paul," I replied.

"Really?" Paul sounded genuinely surprised.

"Maria?" I said, with a hint of duh in my voice. "Jesse's wife?"

The astonishment disappeared from his eyes. "Fiancee," he corrected me. "Jesse died on his way to his marriage."

"Oh."

Then, too late, I remembered the secret Jesse had once confided in me, the secret only I knew... that he had been on his way to the De Silva ranch all those years ago not to marry Maria, but to break things off with her...

"Oh," I repeated. "How?"

"Murder," said Paul simply, chomping Cheetos. "Felix Diego, Maria's lover, wasn't having his woman marrying another man."

Bull. Diego wasn't having his woman humiliated, more like.

"Anyways," continued Paul. "De Silva. You mad?"

"Of course," I replied. "But why?"

"I can get him back. It will make you happy too."

"Paul, I am not-"

"-sleeping with me, I know. I kinda got that. I'm talking about time travel."

My mouth dropped. "Back to Jesse's time?"

"That's right," replied Paul, shutting my mouth with his thumb. "We are going back to 1850, to save Jesse De Silva's life."