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Chapter 8
Abby
Abby stood outside the front door of the Valentine residence with Gen and Ella after ringing the doorbell, her palms sweating and stomach full of butterflies.
Of course, she was nervous about attending a dinner party with her favorite country singer, Ginny Valentine. She’d loved her music for years. The last name was what had originally attracted her attention, like a novelty. But when she’d listened to the songs, she’d fallen in love and followed Ginny’s career ever since.
So to socialize with her was a dream come true. Obviously.
But, to be honest, that wasn’t the true source of her jitters. No. those came from the fact that this would be the first time she’d seen Jet since the night.
Would it be stilted and awkward? Would he be sweet to her, as he’d been in the back room of the shop, or would he be cold and ignore her?
But most of all, she just wanted to know if he’d look at her with that glint in his eye, the one that made her feel like the most adorable, sexy woman in the world. She wasn’t quite sure how she’d handle it if he acted like she was just some random girl from his hometown. Like she was nothing special.
The door opened, and Mila greeted them with a wide grin.
Well, here we go. Whatever it’s going to be like, we’re about to find out.
“Oh my gosh, you guys are here! Come in!”
Abby had to smile. One of her favorite things about Mila was how every single one of the sentences she spoke seemed to have an exclamation point after it. Young teenagers like the thirteen-year-old Mila were often very enthusiastic about things, but this was something Mila had been doing since she was a little kid.
The three women stepped inside the house, each in turn giving the teen a quick hug.
“Where is everybody?” Ella asked.
“Troy and Donovan and Gavin are in the kitchen. Jet’s still upstairs. Dax and Ginny aren’t here yet.”
“Well, that’s my cue,” Gen said. “If my man’s in the kitchen.”
“Right behind you,” Ella added.
The two of them crossed the living room, Mila in their wake, but Abby paused a moment to look up the staircase. God, just knowing Jet was up there filled her with tingly anticipation. It was like her skin could sense he was here in the house with her, like an internal radar system that was tuned only to sense him.
As if summoned by her thoughts, Jet rounded the corner of the landing at the top of the staircase, locking eyes with her as he descended.
Oh, lordy lord lord. Every second that she’d spent worrying that his gaze would be flat and detached when he looked at her, that it wouldn’t make her feel special and desired, was a waste of damn time. Heat pulsed through her when their eyes met, and the temperature only built with every step he took down the stairs.
When he finally reached the bottom, he leaned in close and whispered in her ear. The sensation of hot air blowing across the skin of her neck as he did, rustling her hair slightly, was so heady and overwhelming that she didn’t even process what he’d said at first. When she did, it carried her off on another wave of lightheadedness so that she wouldn’t have been completely surprised if she just up and floated away.
“What do you say we ditch this dinner and get out of here? You look so freaking sexy, I don’t know if I can keep my hands off of you long enough to eat, let alone make small talk.”
She closed her eyes and let the words roll over her like the fog that came in most mornings in their Oregon coastal home, summer and winter. It felt just like that, in fact, thick and impenetrable. The only difference was that the fog was cold and damp, often leaving little beads of near-freezing water on your skin. The sensation that washed over her as Jet whispered in her ear was the opposite– hot and steamy as a Savannah summer afternoon.
Then a realization snapped her into the present. She took a step back and swatted him playfully on the chest. “No way, buster. You think I’m gonna miss the chance to meet my favorite country singer? Not gonna happen.”
He shrugged, his lip twitching. “Hey. Can’t blame a guy for trying.”
She ran her finger down his chest. “I don’t. And just because I don’t want to miss the dinner doesn’t mean I’m not open to some suggestions about where the rest of the night might take us.”
He chuckled, the sound low and sexy in her ear. “Well, then I’ll have to think of some good ones.”
She was just about to fire off a sassy, sexy comeback but was cut off by the doorbell. Her head snapped in the direction of the front door. “Oh my God, it’s Ginny,” she breathed.
Jet narrowed his eyes at her as he crossed to the door. “You realize you sounded exactly like Mila when you said that.”
The rest of the crew came flooding in from the kitchen as Jet opened the door. Abby sucked in a deep breath. There, looking like she’d stepped right off of an album cover, was Ginny Valentine– and standing next to her, looking like a renaissance statue, was a very handsome man, one that Abby recognized from some online articles she’d read about their romance. It was Ginny’s bodyguard-turned-love, Dax.
