Plum Girl (Romance) Read Online Free PDF Page B

more embarrassing moments of her life.
    It was also one of the more infuriating, and ultimately, defining moments. Okay, so Eric didn't want to take her to the formal, but did he have to be so thoroughly un charming about it? After that, Lonnie had absolutely no use for Eric Yagher, or his blond hair that felt like feathers. And she'd entered into what some people might call a "dating slump," but what she considered life as usual.
    Slump life went on hiatus when she was twenty-two. She'd sat down next to a brilliant Ph.D. student named Jake on the first day of her Religion and Society graduate seminar, and they'd immediately clicked. Unfortunately, she thought now as she rolled onto her other side.
    Throughout their yearlong relationship Lonnie was completely in love with Jake. It had to be love, she figured, otherwise why wouldn't she have noticed the way he constantly used hackneyed BS to keep her pacified? With all his sweet talk, she had honestly never seen the "reconciliation" with his ex-girlfriend coming. That was the euphemism he'd used for screwing around with her behind Lonnie's back. Up until that point, things had seemed perfect between them. But what did she know? Lonnie had never been one of those girls with a boyfriend since age twelve. Her experience with relationships was limited, to say the least. Not to mention, Jake was the only man she'd ever slept with. In the biblical sense, anyway. And that was four long years ago.
    Terry was the first person she'd gotten involved with since she and Jake broke up. They'd spent many warm nights kissing and cuddling in his New York apartment, but they'd never made love. He never pushed her. Not yet, anyway. Terry had told her more than once that she was different from the groupie-like women he met at the comedy club. He'd told her she was "pure" and "perfect"—the "marrying kind."
    She could never tell if he was serious or not when he made comments like that. With Terry, everything came off as a joke. Nothing was serious; nothing was heavy: nothing was painful. It was such a relief. And she hardly had the presence of mind to get offended by his sexist thinking when it seemed to be getting her off the hook so well. The truth was, she'd had little desire to make love since Jake had broken up with her. As weird as she knew it was, the mere idea left her cold.
    Lonnie didn't want to believe any of her issues had to do with old-fashioned ideas about love and sex. She didn't want to be wired that way, but it was hard not to see some connection. And as much as she liked Terry, she had a strong feeling that she'd never be in love with him. There was just something missing. That special something that had made Jake's leaving her for his ex-girlfriend more gut twisting than she ever would've thought possible. That special something that forced her to indulge in so many revenge fantasies, she began to wonder if she was a normal, sane person after all.
    For a long time, she'd mentally replayed things Jake had said to her: stale promises he'd made about their non-existent future, and all his cheesy words of love (gag). Okay, so obviously rage had skewed her memory of things a bit. But his betrayal hadn't made any logical sense to her, and in the end she'd decided that she didn't believe in love after all. That's why meeting Terry was so fortuitous. What she had with him was perfect: convenient, uncomplicated, fun.
    Then Dominick Carter dropped into her life out of nowhere, and for the first time in so long, she started having carnal fantasies that didn't stop short. They didn't stop period. She pictured him naked. Naked and aroused. She imagined what his erection would feel like against her bare flesh. Between her legs. Pressing inside her, deeper, deeper...
    She didn't know him well enough to love him, but she desperately wanted him, and it scared her to death. What if she got in over her head (again)? What if she fell for Dominick, let herself feel secure with him, and then it all