Page 1 of Inviting Trouble
Chapter One
10 Years Ago…
Fifteen-year-old Madison Campbell put her hands on her hips and scowled at herself in the mirror as if that would transform her into the beautiful petite kind of girl Parker Shaw was into. She had to make this beauty thing work because Park, the guy she’d worshipped for as long as she could remember, was about to leave town with her virginity.
He just didn’t know it yet.
She lifted her shoulder-length dark brown hair, trying to figure out how to make it stay up in a twist like she’d seen Miss Popular, Shannon, do. She grabbed a ponytail holder, wrapped it around the mass of hair, and let go. It flopped to the side. “Donkey balls,” she muttered, yanking the hair band out and tossing it across the counter.
How did girls do this? She had no one to ask. Her own mom had split when Mad was only one. She was the only girl, no, the onlywoman, in the house with five older brothers and her dad. All of her friends were guys too. Every time she tried to hang with girls, she felt like she’d accidentally put on the Spanish channel. It all sounded good, but she had no idea what they were talking about. There were good crushes and bad crushes, which seemed like pretty much the same thing to her. And stuff that sounded like a question but wasn’t. So what if she didn’t speak fluent girl? She had no problem talking to guys, even an insanely hot guy like Park. She just had to show him she wasn’t that mouthy twerp he’d grown up with.
She shoved her hands in her hair and tried to fluff it up for that natural wavy look she’d seen on TV. Now it looked kind of frizzy. She turned on the faucet and splashed water all over her head, smoothing it down again. Forget the hair. She grabbed the pink lipstick she’d filched from Shannon’s purse in the locker room during gym and puckered up. Mad wasn’t afraid of sex. She knew everything already, what went where, the condom part, the noises girls made. She had her tomcat brothers to thank for that, sneaking girls home when their dad was at work. She swiped the lipstick across her top lip and then kept going full circle to the bottom lip and back to the top. She carefully capped the lipstick, planning on returning it to Shannon on Monday at school when she wasn’t looking.
She smiled in the mirror and then stopped. She looked like a clown. It was too bright, made for Shannon’s blonde fairer looks, and sort of smeared. She grabbed a tissue and scrubbed it off. This was stupid. She knew what guys liked—big tits.
She looked down at herself. B cup. She grabbed her boobs with both hands and squeezed them together, trying to make some cleavage. Nothing impressive. She yanked her favorite black concert shirt down and lifted her boobs at the same time. Better. She grabbed the top of the shirt with both hands, a favorite hand-me-down from her brother, Ty, hesitated for a split second and then ripped it into a V-neck. Still no cleavage. She ripped the shirt a little lower. She leaned forward and moved her shoulders side to side. There. Now you could definitely tell she had boobs.
What else? She reached for Shannon’s blue eye shadow, swabbed a bunch on the little wand and swiped it across her lids. She opened her dark brown eyes to check out the dramatic results. Suckage. She’d clearly lifted makeup from the wrong girl. No point in trying the blue eyeliner. She should’ve filched something from Shannon’s dark-haired friend Michelle. She blew out a breath. She’d just have to use her body.
She turned sideways in the mirror, throwing her shoulders back, and then turned and looked at her ass. Kind of flat. She looked nothing like the curvy centerfolds in those magazines her brothers hid under their mattresses. She was five foot four with a thin, boyish, athletic bod. Not as petite as Park’s last curvy little girlfriend. She put her hands on her waist. She did have a narrow waist. Maybe if she hiked up the shirt, the narrow waist would give the appearance of more curve in the hip.
She tied the shirt in two knots just above her hip bones, showing off her belly button. She briefly considered attempting a safety-pin piercing to draw attention to her belly button, which was a nice innie, but feared it would look too red. She’d pierced her own ear and, man, that had been red for a whole day.
Someone pounded on the door. “Hurry up! I gotta take a whiz!” a male voice barked.
“Use the other bathroom!” she hollered back.
He jiggled the knob. She’d locked it, of course.Bam. Bam. Bam. Had to be Ty. He was the most physical of her brothers. He’d kick the door open if she didn’t hurry. She shoved the evidence—lipstick, eye gunk—into her jeans pockets.
“Come on, Mad. It’s an emergency. Logan is in the other bathroom.”
“He’s probably just whacking off,” she said, pulling her hair forward over her shoulders, hoping to draw attention to her boobs.
Boom.The door shook. He must’ve kicked it.
She rolled her eyes and gave herself one last long look. Would Park want this? She didn’t know what else she could do to improve the picture. She sniffed her pits. Smelled okay. She should’ve swiped some perfume too.
Boom.The door rattled. “What the hell are you doing in there?” Ty boomed.
She opened the medicine cabinet, hoping there might be something that smelled good, but it was just her brothers’ crap. Most of them still lived at home, except identical twins Jake and Josh, who were in the Army.
“Mad!”
She sighed, turned, and yanked open the door.
“Get out of the way,” Ty said, not bothering to give her the chance. He grabbed her by the waist and lifted her into the hallway. Like all her brothers, he was tall, nearly six foot, brown hair, brown eyes, and bulging with muscles. At twenty-one, he worked at the gym, teaching other people how to get strong. The door slammed behind him.
She headed to the small room she shared with her older brother by three years, Logan. She got the top bunk. Their house only had three bedrooms. Her dad hogged one of them all to himself, though he took the smallest bedroom. The master bedroom had two sets of bunk beds for the four oldest boys. Park had the living room sofa. Her dad had rescued him from a bad home when he was ten and she was seven, and he’d been living with them ever since. She couldn’t imagine how she would’ve survived her brothers without Park. He’d always looked out for her. Who always picked her to be on their team when no one wanted her? Park. Who gave her their ice cream when her brothers devoured the tub before she got a single drop? Park. Who shut her brothers up when her feelings got hurt? The guy soon to take her virginity—Park.
And tomorrow he left for the Air Force for six long years. Her throat got tight.Don’t cry, she told herself.You can cry all you want once he’s gone.
She squeezed her eyes shut and took a deep breath. She had an hour before the going-away party. Her dad had taken Park out to dinner, just the two of them. She opened the closet, kicked some of Logan’s cleats out of the way and tried to decide between sneakers and her black combat boots. Which one said petite pretty girl? Sneakers. Definitely. They were white and mostly clean. She grabbed them, grabbed a handful of tissues and sat on the floor to clean them up.
She spat into the tissue and rubbed at a scuff on the toe, thinking of Park again. Would he see her with new eyes tonight? Would he notice she was different? All grown up? She’d shot up to her full height at twelve, but now she had the body to go with it. Hehadto notice. And if he didn’t, she’d just wrap her arms around his neck and kiss him. Actions always spoke louder than words. She’d never kissed a guy, but she’d spied on her brothers before. It couldn’t be that hard if they’d managed it.
She lifted the back of her hand to practice. Easy. She opened her mouth and added some tongue action.
“What’re you doing?” Ty asked from the doorway.
