The Butterfly Effect (Boggy Creek Valley #1) - Kelly Elliott Page 0,1
my dreams, and I wanted Aiden to be my first. The man who would take away my innocence. High hopes for someone whom Aiden clearly thought of as his little sister. He hadn’t really paid much attention to me over the years, except for the occasional pat on the head, or an invite to go to the pond on his folks’ property.
Of course, I had always dressed like a tomboy so that I could keep up with Hunter and his friends. I wore baggy clothes and kept my hair tucked into a ponytail that I could hang out of the back of a baseball cap. And I’d never worn makeup before. That changed over Christmas break when two of my best friends, Ellen and Brighton—or Bree, as I called her—talked me into going shopping for more girly-type clothes.
Brighton was the one who knew all the fashion and watched every makeup tutorial on YouTube she could find. At her and Ellen’s direction, I got my hair cut and lighter highlights put in and learned how to put on the right amount of makeup so that it looked like I didn’t have any on at all. The one thing I loved about my new look was how my eyes seemed to stand out more, especially with the mascara.
This semester, Aiden would notice me. He had to. He was leaving in June for the Navy, and if I didn’t get him to realize that I had grown up and was well on my way to becoming a woman, he would never notice me. And worse yet, he might give his heart to another woman. This was my last attempt at getting him to look at me as someone other than a sister figure.
“I heard Aiden stayed the night last night,” Lacy mused.
I moved slightly in my seat. At any mention of Aiden, my stomach always did a weird little flutter. “Yep. Shouldn’t surprise you, he’s almost always here.”
She gave me a knowing smile. “Does him being here have anything to do with the sudden change in appearance?”
I gave her a gruff laugh and shook my head as I answered entirely too quickly. “No.”
“Liar.”
“Whatever, Lace,” I bit out with a roll of my eyes.
She ate a few more bites of her cereal. “He’s too old for you, Willa. And Hunter would never let it happen.”
I rolled my eyes once more. “It’s not like I’m sporting a mini skirt with a low-cut shirt on.”
“No, it’s worse. You’re in jeans and a shirt that shows off that new little body you’ve got forming.”
I stared at her and then said, “Aiden’s never looked at you like that, and you’re bigger breasted than me.”
She glanced down at her chest and then back over at me. “Um, I think you were gifted with the boobs in the family. I’m pretty sure your cup size is a B or C. I’m an A.”
That made my mouth twitch with a grin, but I remained silent. My sister did not need to know I was indeed a B cup and well on my way to a C, according to the lady my mother had taken me to last week for new bras. Mom said the number-one rule as a woman was to always have the right size bras. She said it made a world of difference.
As if on cue, Aiden walked into the kitchen in low-hanging sweatpants and no shirt, his broad chest on full display. My sister Lacy and I stared open-mouthed at him. If he noticed us gawking, he didn’t show it. He looked at us both with those soft gray eyes of his, then flashed his famous crooked smile. If you were lucky and he smiled widely enough, you were rewarded with his dimples. They didn’t come out as often as one would hope, and when he smiled at me like that, it felt like he was giving me a gift.
I was positive my insides melted—and I’m pretty sure Lacy’s did too, even though she would never admit it. She always said Aiden was a player and too handsome for his own good. That he would never be true to one woman, especially since he was going into the military.
Aiden finally spoke, looking between the two of us. When his eyes landed on me, his smile faltered for the briefest of moments. “Morning…Squirt.”
Did he pause before he used that stupid nickname he and my brother called me?