The Virgin Rule Book (Rules of Love 1) by Lauren Blakely (best fiction novels of all time txt) 📗

I roll my eyes. “It’s not code for sex. I’ve known Crosby since he and Eric were ten and built dams in the stream behind our house in San Rafael. Since they were twelve, filming themselves with lightsabers doing Star Wars moves in the garage. That’s why it says ‘buddy up.’ I’m his buddy too.”

“Why are your cheeks flushing, then?” she asks, amused. No, utterly delighted.

I raise a hand to my cheek as if to hide the heat.

But it’s spreading.

“It’s just . . . hot in here,” I mutter.

Her eyebrows wiggle. Her lips twitch. “Is that so? Or is this Crosby a McHottie? I just can’t remember from the last time you mentioned him,” she says, egging me on. “Let me refresh my recollection of the man you’ve known for so long.” She taps around on my phone for a moment, then gasps. “Aha! He is!”

She shows me Crosby’s team headshot as if she’s never seen his image before either, but obviously I know what he looks like too. Heck, there are photos of him and Eric in our family home. Pics of Crosby, Eric, Brooke, and me. He’s a feature in our lives.

But damn, does he ever look good in his team headshot, with his ball cap on and his uniform snug across his broad chest, the short sleeves showing off those hard-won biceps and those pants hugging his muscular thighs.

My God, baseball uniforms are just delish.

Of all the sports uniforms, those are my favorite.

But the best part is he’s cracking a hint of a smile, his jaw is lined with his trademark stubble, and his blue eyes are sparkling with the promise of naughty secrets.

He’s got the whole sexy-athlete vibe working overtime.

And Scarlett knows it. “Have fun buddying up with the hottest player in Major League Baseball at your brother’s wedding.”

Buddies.

We’re just buddies.

That’s all.

As soon as she leaves, I pounce on my phone and call him back so fast.

“Hey, Wild Girl,” he says in a voice that makes me feel like he can deliver on the promise of those blue eyes.

3

Crosby

Wild Girl.

It’s hard for me to call her anything but the nickname I gave her when we were kids.

Ever since I met her when we were in grade school, Nadia Harlowe’s been a Tasmanian devil. A whirling dervish of energy, spark, and all kinds of sass.

Two years younger than I am, she was the definition of the word spitfire. She was always joining Eric and me for sports in the park, swinging a bat or playing running back in a flag football game. At home, she loved to blast her music loud in her bedroom, pretend she was singing into a hairbrush, and challenge us to sing-offs, usually Kelly Clarkson, Gwen Stefani, or Lifehouse. Full of confidence and smarts, Nadia was never quiet at the dinner table. Over chicken and rice, she’d rattle off questions about the electoral college, equal pay, or famous female scientists.

She made every meal at the Harlowe house an engaging debate, and that fiery spirit traveled with her out of the house too.

One weekend when I was seventeen and she was fifteen, her family took me skiing with them in Tahoe. Fearless to the max, Nadia raced down the trails at Sugar Bowl on her snowboard, schussing over moguls, cruising around bends, and tackling every kind of terrain.

Always ready to do it again.

That’s why she’s the Wild Girl, the name I gave her in my phone.

While walking down Fillmore, passing a boutique with scarves and wrap thingamajigs in the window, my phone rings and a picture of her flashes across the screen.

It’s a shot of her from the LGO Excellence in Sports Awards Gala last year. We both attended—her for the football awards, me for baseball. When I saw her at the gala, I marched up to her, wrapped her in my arms, kissed her cheek, and said, “Please tell me you saved a spot on your dance card for me.”

She laughed, hugged me back, and said, “If they ever have dancing at these awards, I’m outta here.”

We grabbed a drink instead, caught up, and toasted to next year, since neither of us had won that night.

But damn, did she look good. And I’m glad I took that shot of her decked out in a ruby-red dress that worshipped her curves, her dark hair pinned up in one of those fancy buns and her eyes looking all smoky.

I smile when smokey-eyed, red-dress-wearing Nadia appears on my screen.

“Wild Girl,” I say, nice and easy when I answer.

“Wannabe All-Star,” she tosses back, using her nickname for me when we were younger and I was all hopes, dreams, and bright-eyed bravado.

“You do know you can just call me All-Star now? You can drop the ‘wannabe’ part,” I say as I adjust the phone against my ear.

“Hmm. But I do like keeping you on your toes. If I don’t, who will?”

Considering what just went down at Gabriel’s, a whole damn menagerie of dudes will. But I don’t want to think about the guys while talking to a woman who makes red dresses look like they throw themselves at her feet and beg for the chance to grace her curves. “You’re the only one, Nadia. So keep it up.”

“Speaking of your toes, how are your lucky socks faring?”

Stopping at the corner, I wiggle them in my shoes. “Happy as clams to be home and safe with their keeper. I even have on my purple ones today.”

“And is it your lucky day?”

With a grin that she can’t see but I bet she can hear, I say, “I’m on the phone with you. How could I be anything but the luckiest?”

“Perfect answer, Mr. Purple Socks,” she says, her laughter floating across the phone line.

“Tell me stuff,” I say as the light changes and I cross the street. “Are you stoked to come back to San Francisco?”

“I am counting down the days,” she says, but her tone is mixed—a little too cheery, and a little bit melancholy.

“Bullshit,” I say