by Susan Wiggs
Lines were forming along the aisles in preparation for communion. Nina had resigned herself to staying put, letting friends and family speculate about what heinous stain on her soul was keeping her from Holy Communion. Then she saw that Father Reilly’s right-hand attendant, the boy designated to hold the chalice of hosts, was Grady Fitzgerald. A year ago, Grady Fitzgerald had been scrawny, pimply and dull. Now he was tall and cute, right down to the peach fuzz mustache on his upper lip. And he kept looking at Nina in a certain way. She was sure of it.
This had to be a sign. She was meant to go to communion. She shot to her feet and took her place in line. Each step brought her closer to Grady. When it was her turn, she was supposed to tip back her head and delicately open her mouth as the priest said, “The body of Christ.”
Instead, she kept her eyes open and glued to Grady. “Amen,” she whispered huskily, feeling the insubstantial wafer dissolve on her tongue. She returned to her place, where she was supposed to kneel and contemplate the ecstasy of the miracle. Instead she knelt, closed her eyes and pressed her hands to her forehead, realizing she had hit a new low. She had used the sacrament of communion as a chance to flirt with a cute boy.
She was going to hell for certain.
After Mass, as the congregation filed out of the church, Father Reilly made a beeline for her and she braced herself. This was it, then. The jig was up. He was going to expose her as a liar and a fraud.
“Miss Nina Romano,” he said in full view of her parents. “A word with you.”
“Yes, Father?” Nina’s stomach churned. She was going to barf, right here, right now.
“The way you were at communion today…”
No, don’t say it. I’m sorry. I didn’t meant to—
“It was quite something, that bold look and loud ‘Amen.’”
“Father, I—”
“I wish more young people had your conviction. Your fervor. Well done.”
Oh. Oh. “Thank you, Father.” Nina lifted her chin, squared her shoulders.
As her parents beamed at her with pride, Nina packed away a life lesson. In every situation, people tended to see what they wanted to see.
Five
Nina found herself swimming in a sea of boys, and it wasn’t even a dream. She was surrounded by ninety percent men. She was wide awake, in the ballroom of the Avalon Meadows Country Club, attending the annual salute to West Point’s incoming class of cadets. The founder of the country club was a West Point alum, and the large, lavish party had become a tradition. Some of the appointees drove for hours to get there. The following week, basic training would begin for the cadets, so this was their farewell to fancy food and music, girls and partying and long hair. Soon they would have their heads shaved, their uniforms pressed and their every moment scheduled for them. No wonder they were all acting a little wild.
So many boys, Nina thought, bedazzled, so little time. Maybe she would go to West Point for college. Fat chance, she reminded herself. You had to be a brainiac and have perfect grades and play a sport. Nina had none of the above—not the smarts, not the grades and certainly not the sport. Her only athletic activity was outrunning Sr. Immaculata when cutting class.
Her date was Laurence Jeffries, and she’d walked into the country club on his arm, hiding her terror that any second someone would recognize her and rat her out. But there was almost no chance someone would recognize her at the country club tonight. Carmine didn’t work here anymore, and as far as she knew, no Romano had ever belonged to Avalon Meadows. Golf and tennis and martinis on the patio were for WASPy types who sent their one-point-seven kids to prep school and summer camp. This only made her deception all the more delicious.
When the festivities first started, she thought she’d made a mistake coming here. There were boring tributes to the appointees—“Those who dare to serve our country, blah blah blah…”—and no alcoholic beverages, because the new recruits were all underage, in the seventeen-to nineteen-year-old range. Nina was contemplating finding Laurence Jeffries and slipping away immediately. But everything changed when the adults headed into the cocktail lounge, the lights dimmed and a hired DJ took over. That was when the sea of boys flooded the dance floor, surrounding Nina like a testosterone forest. A bottle of something sticky-sweet appeared, and they passed it around until it was gone. Nina was fairly new to drinking, but she gamely swigged down the strawberry-flavored Ripple. It made everything seem easier and funnier. It made her a better dancer, for sure.
Nina knew some girls would be intimidated by being in the midst of so many guys, especially guys like this—football captains and wrestling champions, the elite from high schools across America. Not Nina, though. She knew the truth about boys. No matter how smart and athletic, they were all just a mass of hormone-driven urges.
She felt like the belle of the ball, dancing with one guy after another. One of them told her that all fifty states were represented in the class.
Laurence was the perfect date, and perfectly clueless about her true age. She’d first met him last fall, when his football team came to town and defeated the Avalon Knights. Most of the town hadn’t taken the loss well, but Nina couldn’t care less. Laurence was the quarterback, he was super-hot and he believed she was a senior, like him. In the spring, she’d been delighted to learn he was the pitcher for his school’s baseball team, and they took up their flirtation again. They’d made out under the bleachers before, so technically, this was their second date.
He had wanted to pick her up at her house, but she’d made an elaborate excuse and convinced him to meet her at the club. Now he appeared before her like a pagan god, tall and broad-shouldered, his lean, ebony face beautifully chiseled. Even the reflected light from the revolving fixture on the ceiling seemed to highlight his importance, illuminating him from behind, like a rock star. He was by far the best-looking guy in the room, and the best dancer. Nina happily took him as her partner. Over the gut-deep thump of “Get It Started” by M.C. Hammer, they got to know each other better. He was just seventeen and was leaving home for the first time. She was lying about her age and had sneaked out for probably the hundredth time, but she didn’t tell him this.
They danced closer and closer, until they were touching, and Nina was on fire, as if he was a match striking to life against her. Maybe this was it, she thought. Maybe tonight was the night. And why not? He was the perfect guy to be her first—kind, handsome and honorable. Nina had eavesdropped on her older sisters enough to know these were the sort of qualities you didn’t find every day in a guy. She’d be nuts to turn him down.
After a while, he bent down and said, “Let’s go outside,” and led her by the hand to the terrace overlooking the golf course. She tipped back her head, welcoming the faint breeze over her face and neck.
“It’s so hot tonight,” she murmured, feeling wicked and powerful and filled with a crazy need to touch and be touched.
“Thirsty?” He held out a bottle of Snapple. “It’s spiked with vodka.”
“I’m cool with that.” Boldly she tipped back her head and drank half of it, forcing herself not to gag on the sharp taste.
They walked together down to the darkened golf course and left their shoes at the edge of the eighteenth green. The perfectly groomed grass felt like a cool carpet beneath their bare feet. A hush of luxury and privilege seemed to pervade the atmosphere.
Laurence chuckled appreciatively. “We’re not in Kansas anymore,” he said.
“How do you mean?”
He explained that he grew up in public housing—a hulking project on the south end in a part of town you didn’t see in Hudson Valley tourist brochures. He’d been raised by a single mother who worked for the welfare department. “Demographically speaking, I’m the kid most likely to be doing time by now.”
“And look at you,” she said. “You’re a star. You’re going to West Point. In four years, you’ll be an officer.”
“It doesn’t even seem real.” He grabbed her and kissed her then, an
d it was an amazing kiss, sweet and sexy at the same time. “You don’t seem real, either,” he said.
“Maybe I’m not,” she said. “Maybe it’s all a dream.” She looked back at the brightly lit clubhouse. The ballroom was dark, flashing with the occasional strobe light. In the opposite wing, the dining room glowed golden, filled with genteel people ordering things Nina had learned about by reading fancy magazines, like Steak Diane and mashed potatoes with truffle oil. She could easily pick out the six members of the Bellamy family, who were known to dine at “the club” every Sunday evening in summer. There were Mr. and Mrs. Bellamy and their four grown kids—Philip was the eldest, followed by two sisters in the middle, and finally there was Greg. Impossibly good-looking in khakis and a crisp Oxford cloth shirt, a tie worn slightly loose at the throat, he exuded an easy charm, looking completely relaxed, as though posing for a country-club brochure.
“…come here often?” Laurence was asking her.
“Sure,” she lied breezily. “We’ve been members for years.”
Holding hands, they strolled to the middle of the fairway, and Nina was consumed by a curious certainty—she was going to go all the way with this boy. They both wanted it. She could tell. The knowledge and the anticipation breathed from their skin.
He turned to her and bent down and kissed her, and she felt herself lighting up with a burning need. She silently reviewed all the information she had from her sisters. Sex was natural, it was fun with the right guy…but a girl should never leave safety up to the guy. Nina had a tri-fold pack of condoms in her purse. She was fully, embarrassingly prepared to whip them out if necessary.
The starlit night surrounded them with magic. Then Nina heard a quiet popping sound, followed by a staccato hiss. A slap of cold water hit them.
“Hey,” she yelled.
“The sprinklers just turned on.” Laurence grabbed her hand and they tried running for cover, but the sprinklers had sprouted everywhere, forming a gauntlet of arching fountains along the fairway. By the time they escaped the spraying water, they were completely drenched. Ducking the sprinklers, they made their way to a gazebo between two fairways.
Nina got the giggles, and couldn’t stop until Laurence kissed her again. These were new kisses, imbued with a searing intimacy, almost a desperation. It was a relief when he stepped back and peeled off her soaking wet dress, spreading it across a privet hedge. She needed this, needed to be close to him, skin-to-skin with nothing between them, nothing at all.
He laid his blazer on the deck of the gazebo and they sank down together, spellbound, intoxicated, consumed by urgency. He paused to grope in his pocket, coming up with a condom, which made Nina weak with relief. Thank goodness he’d spared her the embarrassment.
So this was it, then. Here and now, in the shadowy gazebo with the sprinkler system hissing all around them, the veil of secrecy was swept aside. She wrapped her arms around him and dropped her head back, opening herself to him, and then they kissed and fit themselves together, and it was more incredible than she ever could have imagined. More uncomfortable and awkward, too, but with a sweetness that brought tears to her eyes. And quicker. Laurence almost instantly made a surprised, strangled sound, and then shuddered, covering her like a blanket. Then they both lay still, their hearts beating as one, their bodies still joined together.
After a while, he drew back. “You all right?” he whispered.
She was intrigued, feeling as though she teetered on the edge of something big. “I’m all right.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have—”
“Hush. I wanted to. Maybe we can have another go at it.”
“I only brought one condom and—oh, shit.”
He wasn’t as experienced as he seemed. Somehow, the condom hadn’t gone where it was supposed to go. “Damn,” he said. “I’m sorry. I swear, I don’t have a disease or anything—”
“Me neither.” Suddenly embarrassed, Nina jumped up and struggled into her wet clothes. The issue of the failed condom put an end to the evening’s romance.
Laurence must have felt the same way as he shook out his clothes and put them on. “Hey, I feel bad,” he said. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“Nothing’s hurt, but I’d better go,” she said, suddenly eager to get away. “My car’s at the far end of the parking lot.” Another lie. She’d brought her bike.
Carrying their shoes in their hands, they crossed the parking lot. “Tell me your phone number,” Laurence said. “I’ll call you.”
She was tempted, but only momentarily. The kind of lies she was telling tonight couldn’t be sustained for long. “I don’t think so.”
“You’re probably right.” Relief rang clearly in his voice.
“And you’re awfully quick to agree with me.” She was only half teasing.
“Look, I think you’re really something, but I got to think of the future. I’m a kid from the projects. If this doesn’t work out for me, well, let’s just say the options aren’t good. I better stick with the academy. As soon as I start, I take an oath of honor.”
“And I’m, like, this huge stain on your oath.”
“No, but—”
“It’s all right,” she said. “I’m not going to cause any trouble for you, and that’s a promise.”
“You’re no trouble, girl.”
Just then, a shadow loomed over them.
She stopped walking and looked up. Uh-oh. Maybe Laurence had spoken too soon. “Greg Bellamy,” she said with forced brightness. “Fancy meeting you here.”
Greg stood over the fallen cadet, wondering if he’d broken anything. It had all happened so fast. One minute he was getting a sweater from the car for his sister. The next, he was driving his fist into some cadet’s jaw. The guy was gigantic, but Greg had the element of surprise. Shock was more like it. Shock had cut off the oxygen to his brain, causing him to lose the ability to judge whether or not he was right to clean the guy’s clock.
One thing he knew for certain, he definitely had a problem with a West Point cadet banging Mrs. Romano’s underage daughter. Greg had met her that one time up at the camp, but he couldn’t remember her name. That didn’t matter. What mattered was that she was still a kid. Yet there was no mistaking that just-got-laid look of these two—the damp clothes buttoned crooked, grass in their hair, the sheepish, sated expressions on both their faces.
The girl’s face changed instantly, sharpening with accusation as she glared at Greg. “He’s hurt,” she said. “You had no right—”
“I had no right?” Now, that pissed him off. He gave a disgusted laugh.
On the ground, the cadet moved his jaw from side to side. Okay, thought Greg, so at least he hadn’t done anything permanent to the guy. He wasn’t sure he was relieved by that or not. He nudged the guy with the toe of his shoe. “Get up,” he said.
The guy frowned, blinked in confusion until he spotted the girl. “Nina? What’s going on? Who the hell is this?”
Greg made a mental note of the girl’s name. Then, treating the guy like a recalcitrant camper, he said, “Party’s over, pal. So get your ass up and go back inside.”
“Laurence, I’m really sorry,” the girl—Nina—said in a small, horrified voice.
She was sorry. Sorry. Greg rounded on her. “Do you have a ride home?” he demanded.
She hung her head, turned away from Laurence and mumbled, “I rode my bike.”
He almost laughed. A bike. She’d ridden a damn bike to the country club to get laid. “It’s pitch-black outside,” he said. “Were you planning to find your way home by radar?”
The guy called Laurence climbed to his feet. Damn, he was tall. And still a little dazed. Or drunk. Or both. “Nina?” he asked again.
“Shut up,” Greg snapped, ready to be done with the whole drama, and eager to send the guy on his way before he decided to fight back. “Get back inside, now, and pray I don’t report you. I’m taking her home.”
“Are not,” Nina snapped back, t
hen grabbed Laurence’s hand. “He’s not taking me anywhere.”
Greg ignored her and glared at Laurence. “She’s fourteen, you moron. What the hell were you thinking?”
Laurence dropped her hand as though it was a red-hot coal. He even stepped back, hands up, palms facing out, as though Greg had a gun pointed at him. “Shit—”
“Fifteen,” she said defiantly. “I just turned fifteen last month.”
The guy’s panic was genuine. He truly hadn’t known, the same as Greg hadn’t known that day in the dining hall. Until someone had clued him in, Greg, too, had been fooled by her impossibly curvy body, her smoldering eyes that pretended to know things she had no clue about, her full lips that made reckless promises to morons like this one.
“Go back inside,” he repeated. “Like I said, the party’s over.”
The guy took a step back. “I’m sorry,” he told Nina. “I didn’t know, I—Girl, you should have been straight with me.”
“I said,” Greg reminded him, “it’s over.”
“Laurence, no,” Nina protested. “This…this person has no idea what he’s talking about.”
The cadet offered a wordless look of helpless regret, then turned and hurried back to the clubhouse. Nina started after him. Greg grabbed her arm and held her back.
“Let go of me,” she said. “I have five brothers, and I know how to defend myself.”
Greg relinquished her. “How many of those brothers would approve of what you’re doing here?”
“None of your business.” She began to stomp toward the clubhouse, which was still bubbling over with golden light and music, as though nothing had happened.