V is for Virgin (33 page)

Connie watched the two of us sitting next to each other. She beamed with pride at being the one to have reunited us. “So, Kyle, Val was just telling us she was sure you’d forgotten all about her. Is that true?”

“Connie, there are some people that could never be forgotten.”

“I have to agree.” Connie laughed. “Tell us what you’ve been up to.”

“Well, I’ve got a solo album coming out soon, but other than that I’ve just been taking it easy. Waiting for the right woman to come along and make an honest man out of me.”

Kyle squeezed me suggestively.

Connie smiled.

The audience swooned.

I blushed.

“You’re looking to settle down then, are you?” Connie asked, her bright eyes drifting my direction.

I could feel Kyle’s eyes on me as he replied, “Something like that.”

Kyle suddenly reached across his lap with his free hand and grabbed hold of my hand. I watched, incredulous, as he weaved his fingers through mine.

I started to pull away but then something caught my eye and I gasped. Tied around his wrist was a worn leather bracelet. I’d noticed it when he’d walked out—I’d never seen him wear any jewelry before—but I hadn’t noticed the tiny little A dangling from it.

“What is this?” I asked, fingering the bracelet in disbelief.

“You don’t recognize it?” Kyle asked. I could hear the laughter in his voice. “You gave it to me once, a long time ago.”

I couldn’t believe it. It was the bracelet I’d shoved at him at the festival all those years ago. I didn’t even know he’d taken it that day.

“Yeah, I recognize it,” I said, looking up at Kyle. The way he smiled down at me disarmed me. I lost my train of thought.

Kyle smirked. “Eight months, now.”

At first I didn’t know what he meant. “Eight months, what?”

Kyle arched one of his eyebrows. “Haven’t you heard? The A stands for abstinence.”

And then I got it. “
You
?” I gasped.

Kyle laughed at my shock and then shrugged. “It was my relationship with Adriana. I loved her, you know? When we broke it off I realized I hadn’t been with anyone else since I’d met her, and that I didn’t want to be with anyone else. The woman ruined me because now I don’t want to sleep with anybody I’m not in love with. Believe me, I tried. When she cheated on me I wanted to sleep with a million girls just to get back at her, but I couldn’t do it.”

He shifted in his seat like he was uncomfortable. Whether it was because he was talking about his ex fiancée or because he was talking about his feelings I wasn’t sure. Either way I was surprised.

“I figured since I wasn’t doing it anymore anyway, I might as well wear the bracelet.”

I looked up at Kyle with grudging pride. “Good for you, Kyle.”

Kyle squeezed me tighter and brought his lips to my ear again. “I’ve figured it out, Val.”

I wanted to ask him what, exactly, he’d figured out, but Connie was already talking again. “Are you going to perform something for us today?”

“Uh, yeah.” Kyle sat forward and rubbed his hands together in anticipation.

He headed across the room where a stage had been set up. His back up band was ready and waiting for him. As he adjusted the microphone he said, “I’ll be singing the first single off my new album, and in grand Kyle Hamilton tradition, I’ve written it for a certain someone who I couldn’t manage to get out of my head.”

He laughed at the expression on my face and then winked. “It’s called, ‘Worth Waiting For.’”

Acknowledgements
:

First and foremost I thank my Father in Heaven for the endless blessings in my life. I owe Him everything.

Thank you to my amazing husband, Joshua, who’s been more supportive of my writing than I ever could have thought possible. Without him this book, and all my others, would never exist. And thank you to Josh Jr., Jackie, Matthew, and Daniel. (Without whom this book might have been written a lot faster, but my life would be incomplete.)

Thank you to my beautiful betas Dee Dee—for always making sure there is enough romance in my stories, and Robin—for making sure I don’t go overboard with it! And especially thank you for listening to me drone on forever, even when you haven’t read the stories yet and don’t know what I’m talking about.

To my editor, Mary L. Holden, thank you for your complete faith in this project. I’m grateful for all of your advice and encouragement.

And, last but not least, a great big bear hug and a thank you to my gorgeous, talented, amazing, musically gifted, genius of a baby sister. I LOVE YOU CARA! Thank you for helping your lyrically-challenged sister, and writing such an awesome song. “Cryin’ Shame” is perfect and so are you. Miss your face!

BONUS MATERIAL

Coming soon from Kelly Oram

Chameleon (Supernaturals #1)

CHAPTER ONE

“Dani!”

Great. I was even hearing his voice in my sleep now.

“Psst! Dani, wake up.”

Or not. I pulled myself from the deepest corner of sleep and opened my eyes. It was dark and I was disoriented, but I didn’t need light to know who was hovering above my head.

“Russ,” I groaned. “Go home right now.”

“Scooch over.”

“No. And be quiet on your way out. If my parents find you here—”

“We won’t get busted. Sit up. I have something for you.”

I glanced at the clock on my nightstand and groaned again. All I wanted was to roll on my side and throw the covers over my head until my alarm went off at seven. But Russ was in one of his moods, and I knew he’d never leave me be until he got whatever it was he came for, so I sat up.

Russ plopped down on my bed in front of me, crossing his legs Indian style to match mine. He sat close enough that our knees rubbed against each other, and even though my covers separated us the touch seemed intimate.

I looked at him and in that moment realized, maybe for the very first time, that he was actually kind of beautiful. In the moonlight his hair looked a lot darker than the honey brown it is in daylight. And his eyes, normally crystal blue, were indistinguishably dark. His usually clean-shaven face was also covered with a light layer of stubble, accentuating his high cheekbones and square jaw line.

This was a side of Russ Devereaux I’d never seen before, and I found it very unsettling.

I also wanted to smack myself for my current train of thoughts. I swear I’m not one of those sad sacks who has spent her entire life secretly pining over her best friend. Honest. I’m not even sure how I’d feel if he ever did try to make some kind of move. We’ve just never been like that.

But over the last couple weeks I’d been getting this really strange feeling. Not sexual really. Just… like I needed to be around him. All the time. It was kind of annoying, actually.

I shook myself from my daydream to find Russ watching me with intrigue. “Mesmerized by my stunning good looks?” he asked teasingly.

“What?”

“You were staring at me.”

“That was just me sleeping with my eyes open,” I snapped. “It’s three in the morning. What are you doing here?”

I hoped my irritation covered the sense of nerves I had. I’d never been nervous around Russ before, and I really didn’t want him to figure out I felt nervous now.

Instead of answering my question Russ said, “What happened to the Disney Princess nightgown you wore the last time we were in bed together? That was hot.”

I followed his gaze and to my horror realized I was wearing nothing but panties and a tight camisole. And no bra. Not that there was much there. My barely B’s almost didn’t need a bra, but I hadn’t bothered to turn on the space heater in my room and the fact that the nights were starting to get cooler was painfully obvious.

“You’d better have a damn good reason for being here or you’re going to be very sorry,” I hissed, scrambling to pull my covers up over my chest.

“Since when do I need a reason?”

I started to say something but Russ held up a hand to stop me. “Patience, grasshopper,” he said and turned his gaze to the alarm clock on my nightstand.

We sat in silence for a full two minutes, then he said, “There. It’s three eleven in the morning on September twenty-third. You are officially sixteen.” He flashed a dashing smile and pulled a huge, beautifully wrapped box up off the floor. “Happy Birthday, Dani.”

I was speechless.

“Surprised?” Russ asked with a chuckle.

“Actually, yes. Very.”

Not that Russ would ever forget my birthday, he loved making sure everyone in the world knew it was my birthday every year, but this wasn’t some big spectacle like usual. There was no one here to impress but me, and
that
was surprising.

“For future reference, this surprise is a lot better than most of your previous ones,” I said. “Definitely better than last year.”

Russ frowned. “You didn’t like the poem I wrote you?”

“The poem I could live with. Even though I don’t think anything that starts with, ‘Dani, Dani, she’s good for the heart. She likes crap like Shakespeare and hates when I fart,’ really counts as poetry. But the fact that you recited it during a mandatory pep rally thrown in my honor?”

“Yeah.” Russ beamed with pride. “That was a good one.”

“How did you get Principle Green to agree to it anyway?”

Russ grinned like the devil and said, “I’m a very persuasive guy.”

There was no use arguing that. Russ has a gift for charming over everybody he meets. It makes him very convenient to have around because the only talent I have is pissing off everyone I come in contact with.

“Now if I could only persuade you to open this gift already,” Russ said, dropping the package into my lap. It was so heavy it nearly knocked the wind out of me.

I pulled the bow off the box and stuck it on his head. “Should I be scared?

Russ’s eyes were full of mischief so I quickly tore away the wrapping paper. I laughed when I saw what it was. “A ten-pound bag of Jell-o?”

Russ handed me a piece of folded up paper. I accepted it suspiciously but gasped when realized I was looking at a picture I’d drawn back in the fourth grade. It was of Russ and me swimming in a pool of red Jell-o. The words at the top said “My Birthday Wish.”

“Where did you get this?”

“I’ll never tell,” Russ said. “But tonight, Miss Webber, you are getting your birthday wish.”

“No way!” I yelled almost loud enough to wake my parents.

Russ grinned. “Get dressed,” he said hopping up suddenly. As he disappeared out my bedroom window he called back in a whisper, “And don’t forget your swimsuit.”

“You are a freaking genius!” I squealed when we broke into Brad Halloway’s back yard. Or, more specifically, his big, super nice pool.

It was genius because Brad Halloway sucks. His dad owns the plastics factory that keeps the tiny town of Carmine, Pennsylvania—the town in which I live—alive. That means he’s the only rich man in town and the boss of nearly half of our fifteen hundred residents. Somehow Brad thinks this entitles him to be a total douche bag. If anyone deserves to have their pool gelatinized, it’s him.

“Okay, so maybe you’re only a genius in theory,” I told Russ once I began pouring my Jell-o into the pool.

It was one of those fancy heated pools with a rock waterfall and a slide. It was massive. My ten-pound bag of Jell-o didn’t seem all that impressive anymore.

“You’d need like five hundred pounds of this stuff to make this pool solid.”

Russ stuck his hand in the stream of Jell-o spilling from the bag and caught a handful of powder. “Where’s the trust?” he asked. “This is industrial Jell-o.”

“Even still. It’s barely going to be enough to turn the water red.”

“Just make sure you spread it out, Doubty McDoubterson,” Russ said and gave me a shove toward the deep end.

I started pouring the Jell-o all around the edge of the pool and didn’t even get half way around before I was out. “You see?” I called across the water in a whisper. “It’s not even turning red. It’s barely pink.”

“Ah, but you’re forgetting I still have this.”

Russ held up the tiny handful of powder he’d collected. He made a show of holding the Jell-o up to his mouth and whispering something to it—most likely begging it not to make him look bad. Then he held is palm flat and blew the dust out over the pool. The tiny granules sprinkled across the top of the water and dissolved instantly.

“That’s it?” I asked, completely unimpressed. “You are such a moron.”

“I can’t believe you have that little faith in me,” Russ said, insulted. “Go get the skimmer and start stirring.”

It seemed pointless to me but I grabbed the skimmer anyway. I gasped when I started stirring and found the water already getting thicker.