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By
Linda Kage
Deleted PROLOGUE
(Raw and Unedited!)
Twelve-year old B.J. Gilmore slouched, good and relaxed, in the middle of her sofa, watching NASCAR and eating from a microwave bag of Orville Redenbacher when her seventeen-year-old babysitter plopped down next to her.
“Where’s Rudy?” Amy asked, shaking a closed bottle of pale pink fingernail polish.
“Don’t know.” As she answered, B.J. tossed a single fluff of popcorn into the air so she could try to catch it with her teeth. When she did, she glowed in triumph and munched happily, leaning around her sitter to see the television.
Amy let out an annoyed sigh. “You know, B.J., it’s not considered ladylike to throw food in the air and catch it with your mouth.”
B.J. rolled her eyes. Humph. As if she wanted to be a lady. All the supposed ladies she knew were stuck up snobs who only liked to gossip about everybody else behind their backs. Why in the world would she want to be like that? Besides, if being a lady meant she had to wear a dress, then she’d rather pass anyhow.
Defiantly tossing another kernel in the air, she once again caught it in her teeth. “Cool,” she said, grinning over and nudging Amy with her elbow. “Did you see that? Two times in a row.”
“Yes,” Amy replied dryly. “It was soooo impressive.”
B.J. frowned, folding her arms over her chest as she turned her attention back to the race. Well, she thought it was impressive.
Crossing a pair of tanned legs, Amy stopped shaking her bottle and twisted the cap off. She applied the lacquered polish and hummed lightly under her breath. B.J. figured she was trying to make a point that all ladies should cross their legs and sit with their backs as stiff as sheetrock while singing a pretty tune. Well, no way was B.J. going to do that. She was going to stay slouched there until—
The smell of the polish finally hit her. Wrinkling her nose, she lifted the collar of her t-shirt, covered all her breathing holes, and stared wide-eyed at the opened bottle. “Lord have mercy, Ames. That crap stinks to high Heaven.”
“But doesn’t it look nice.” Amy grinned and held out her hand to admire her finished thumbnail.
B.J. lifted a brow. “Whatever.”
At her blasé answer, her babysitter sucked in a breath and sent her a brief, irritated glance. “Don’t tell me you’ve never worn fingernail polish before?”
“No,” B.J. spat, appalled.
Living with a widowed father, two older brothers, and one younger brother, B.J. had to guess this was the first time fingernail polish had ever found its way inside her home.
But fingernail polish? Bluck.
“You’ve got to be kidding me?” Amy said, her eyes wide before they gave a single long-lashed blink.
B.J. snorted. “Why would I put that junk on? It’s gross.”
“Gross?” Amy repeated, and threw her head back to laugh. “You know, B.J.,” she added on a delighted sigh. “You have the oddest notion about what’s gross. I bet you’d like fingernail polish if you used it.”
“Yeah, well, I’ll just take your word for it,” B.J. grumbled, crossing her arms over her chest and hiding her nails behind her armpits so her beautiful and extremely girly babysitter couldn’t see the mangled mess.
She knew what was coming even before Amy said, “Want me to paint your nails?”
“Hell, no.”
“B. J.” Amy sighed. “Please watch your language.”
“Heck no,” B.J. revised. “Get that stinking goo away from me.”
“Oh, come on,” Amy coaxed. “Just let me do it this once.”
“No.”
“You’ll like it. I promise.”
“No. I promise I won’t.”
Firmly screwing the cap back on, Amy said, “Just give me your hand. We’ll test one finger first and if you don’t like it, I swear I’ll take it off.”
“How about we don’t and say we did?”
“Give me your hand already.”
“No.”
Without warning, Amy dived for B.J.’s arm and tried to pry her hand from behind her back. What followed was a brief wrestle of which B.J. refused to budge and Amy worked harder. Finally, B. J. leapt off the couch and ran for all she was worth.
Amy chased after her.
Every time her sitter caught a hold of her, B.J. managed to wiggle free and dash off again. She could tell the seventeen-year old had grown tired five minutes later because Amy started taking longer to find her. She was hiding in the kitchen pantry and grinning over her stealth when the doorbell rang. Knowing Amy would be busy answering it, B.J. inched open the closet. When she saw the coast was clear, she stepped out and curiously wandered toward the front room to see who was calling.
Amy’s boyfriend had come to visit.
“I rented a movie,” he announced as Amy him let inside.
“How sweet,” She cooed, then grinned and sighed as she slumped her back against the door after shutting it, her gaze one huge pool of adoration.
B.J. rolled her eyes at her sitter’s way-too-obvious affection, even though her own thoughts turned kind of mushy themselves. But good golly, Miss Molly. Seventeen-year old Grady Rawlings had to be the most beautiful human on earth. He towered over six feet by a good four inches, though he looked taller because of his lean, wrangly frame. He may have been in tennis shoes and a baseball cap, but he was undeniably prime Texas stock.
And though B.J. was one hundred percent tomboy, she was also one hundred percent boy crazy about her babysitter’s boyfriend. As Amy leaned in for a kiss, B.J. watched with fixed fascination. Grady closed his eyes when he pressed his mouth to Amy’s. She wondered why. Did it make Amy taste better? How’d he know where to put his lips when he couldn’t see nothing?
He lifted his hand to capture the back of his girlfriend’s head. B.J. studied his wide fingers spreading across Amy’s scalp, speculating what it’d feel like to have a boy’s mouth pressed against hers. Amy certainly seemed to like it. She melted against him and gave him a dewy, dazed smile when he pulled back. In return, Grady sent her a smile that made B.J.’s stomach feel funny.
Before she could duck out of sight, he lifted his face, and his eyes moved across the room, pinning her to the spot.
Feeling frozen, B.J. gaped back.
“Hey, B.J.,” he said, his gaze changing from the heavy-lidded look he’d been giving Amy to a wide, friendly grin.
“Hey,” she muttered, glaring a little so he wouldn’t know what she’d been thinking.
“Oh, oh!” Amy exclaimed, turning toward her as if she’d forgotten B.J. was in the house. “Can you catch her for me, Grady?”
B.J. jerked a cautious step back. If Grady chased after her, he’d catch her in no time. As the high school’s star football player, he was the fastest guy on the team. No way could she outrun him.
But instead of immediately taking off after her, he glanced toward Amy. “Why? What’d she do?”
“I want to paint her nails,” Amy explained. “But she won’t let me. She escapes every time I get close. So, if you could catch her and hold her still for me while I—”
But Grady was already shaking his head. “I’m not chasing her down for that.”
His girlfriend scowled. “Why not?”
His eyebrows lowered over his blue gaze as he frowned back. “Because I don’t blame her for running. I wouldn’t want you forcing paint on my nails either.”
While B.J. decided right then and there, he was totally worthy of her crush, Amy sighed in surrender.
“I just wish she wasn’t such a tomboy.” She set her hands on her hips as she sent B.J. a discouraged look. “She’s so cute. Just look at her heart-shaped face, high cheekbones, and big soulful brown eyes. And that hair. If she didn’t tie it in a ponytail all the dad gum time, I swear it’d fall down her entire back. I can already tell she’s going to have the body of a model too. Tall and slender like she is, with those long legs…” Amy shook her head. “She has so much potential, and she’s just throwing it away.”
When Grady turned back to B.J. with a thoughtful expression, a strange feeling swirled in the bottom of her stomach. Realizing he was checking out her long legs and heart-shaped face, she fidgeted, feeling a little dizzy.
“I think she looks pretty enough as she is,” he finally murmured.
Her heart nearly thumped out of her chest.
Grady thought she looked pretty? Never having cared about her appearance before, she wanted to run to a mirror and primp. But when Amy led him toward the living room, she trailed them instead, wanting to remain in his presence, to stay as close to him as long as she possibly could.
She loved being near Grady. He smelled good. His scent was like nothing she’d ever sniffed before. It wasn’t any kind of perfume or soap but was a musky, human fragrance she figured had to be pure him.
As he settled on the sofa—right where B.J. had been planted earlier—a cacophony of sound erupted from the stairs. It resembled a buffalo stampede, but B.J. knew it to be only one little boy.
“Grady!” her nine-year old brother, Rudy, yelled as he tore into the room.
Grady laughed as the hellion leapt. “Hey, Rud—” he said and ummphed as the boy dive-bombed into his lap. B.J. was impressed how Grady caught Rudy before her brother accidently racked him in the privates.
As he tickled his fingers under Rudy’s armpits, making the boy squeal with laughter, Amy slung her arm over B.J.’s shoulder, and leaned their heads together, sighing. “He’s going to make such a good daddy some day.”
B.J. rolled her eyes and wiggled out from her sitter’s hold before Amy remembered her plot to paint B.J.’s nails. As not to make any sudden movement and bring attention to herself, she slunk a few steps from her sitter and sat in Pop’s lazy boy. But Amy must’ve already forgotten her mission because she went about starting Grady’s movie without another word. Blowing out a breath of relief, B.J. reached for her abandoned popcorn… which caught Grady’s attention.
“Hey, can I have some?”
Though she was more than eager to share with him, B.J. once again masked her feelings. Frowning, she muttered, “I guess,” and held out the bag with a limp arm as if it was such a hardship to share her beloved snack with the most handsome boy on the planet.
Winking at her, he took a handful and promptly tossed a kernel into the air, only to dip his head back and catch it with his teeth. Mouth falling open, B. J. whirled toward Amy. Sending her babysitter a pointed look, she folded her arms over her chest and waited for an apology, because if Grady, whom Amy claimed was perfect, could catch popcorn in his mouth, then, by God, so could B.J.
But Amy only lifted her nose. “Well, Grady doesn’t need to be ladylike.”
Grady glanced from Amy to B.J. and back to his girlfriend. “Pardon?”
“Oh, nothing,” Amy said. “B.J. was just being a total brat before you arrived.”
Grady glanced toward B.J. He once again looked thoughtful as he studied her, his hot blue eyes missing nothing.
Right on schedule, her stomach turned over, churning madly.
“What do your initials stand for?” he asked without warning.
B.J. gaped back and sputtered, “I… I ain’t saying.”
“Oh, come on,” he urged, giving her a smile that made her innards squeeze tight. “I’m just curious. I won’t tell anyone if you don’t want.”
“Well, tough &#%!,” B.J. countered. “’Cause I ain’t telling anyone neither.”
“B.J.!” Amy gasped. “Please try to watch your language. You’re a twelve-year old girl, for mercy’s sake. And twelve-year old girls do not talk like that.”
“Sorry,” B.J. muttered, rolling her eyes.
Grady turned to his girlfriend. “So what’s B.J. stand for?”
Amy shook her head and sent him what Pop always called a Mona Lisa smile. “If B.J. doesn’t want anyone to know then I’m certainly not going to let the cat out. After all, a lady’s entitled to her secrets.”
B.J. snorted at the term lady.
Grady glanced questioningly toward Rudy and asked him what her real name was. But Rudy shrugged, probably not even aware the initials actually stood for something. Grady fixed his attention back on B.J. but she kept her mouth firmly sealed. He pressed a few moments longer until Amy rescued her, interrupting him and announcing she was ready to watch the movie.
And so, Grady didn’t learn what her initials stood for. Instead, the four of them watched the hokey family film he’d rented.
It didn’t capture Rudy’s attention in the least; he fell asleep long before the show was over. Amy had Grady carry him to his bed, and since B.J. was beat too, she stumbled off to her own room. But she woke again half an hour later with a dry throat.
Needing a drink, she shuffled back down the stairs to the kitchen. She figured someone was in the living room because the muted television kept sending out flashes of light into the hallway. Rubbing at her tired eyes, she poured a cup of water and started that way.
But when she reached the opening of the living room, she stopped cold, her bare toes plastered to the spot where the hall carpet met up with the wooden floor in the den
Amy and Grady were on the sofa, stretched out and facing each other, with Grady lying on top of Amy as he kissed her… with his tongue.
B.J.’s jaw dropped. She stood transfixed, realizing she’d never seen the two of them do this before.
She could tell Grady’s hand was under Amy’s shirt. She zeroed in on the lump his fingers made as they crept higher and higher until they covered Amy’s boob. Amy gasped and arched. Her head fell back against the sofa cushions, leaving her throat exposed in invitation. Accepting the proffered gift, Grady swooped down to nibble and lick on Amy’s neck.
He said things to her, quiet, murmured words B.J. couldn’t distinguish. But the tone reached her clear enough. Ravenous need. He moved his head down and replaced the lump where his hand had been with his mouth, and then he sucked on Amy’s tit, right through her shirt. B.J. stopped breathing as his teeth gripped the cloth.
Amy brought her hand to the back of his head and pulled his face closer even as she gasped, “Grady, wait. W-what if Rudy or B.J.—?”
“Don’t worry,” he assured. “I won’t go any further.”
But he did. He kissed her through her shirt and moved down her front, pressing his nose in her stomach. B.J.’s eyes widened as he continued lower. She clamped her legs together, feeling a strange tingling sensation on her own body where Grady buried his face in Amy’s.
“That’s enough,” Amy wheezed, grasping Grady’s shoulder and tugging him back up to kiss her lips.
He made a hungry, growling sound but complied.
B.J. swallowed and sucked in a soundless breath, finally remembering oxygen. Her body tingled from the roots of her hair down to the tips of her bare toenails.
Grady tucked Amy’s hair behind her ear and gave her locks a gentle caress with his thumb, all the while sealing his lips to hers.
Unable to watch any longer, B.J. spun away and silently raced back to her room. Once huddled in bed with the covers pulled over her head, she stiffly lay there, wide awake with her pulse jack hammering through her throat.
She couldn’t help but wonder what it’d feel like for him to put his mouth on her boobs? She didn’t have much past a pair of mosquito bites, but that didn’t make a lick of difference to her. She ached, picturing his tongue in her mouth the way it’d been in Amy’s.
When that queer sensation once again spread up the inside of her thighs, she quickly clamped them together and squeezed her eyes tight, gritting her teeth. She had no idea what was going on, but it scared her as much as it excited. She didn’t understand such a foreign, frightening sensation; it kept her alert for another two hours, petrified… yet curious.
When she finally collapsed into a tired, fitful sleep, she dreamed of him. He prowled into her room and found his way onto the bed at her feet, crawling up until he was all the way over her. She jerked awake just as he started to lower himself on top of her. With a gasp, her eyes flew open.
She scurried out of bed and ran to the window to peer out at the darkened driveway. But both his truck and Amy’s car had been replaced by Pop’s rig and her two older brothers’ fixer-upper Chevy.
Grady was long gone.
B.J. didn’t know if she was relieved or devastated.
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