Her Last Temptation. Leslie Kelly

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      LATE THAT NIGHT, as Dylan helped the rest of the guys load their equipment and instruments into Josh’s van, he tried to ignore Banks’s curious stares. Banks had been watching him, a knowing grin on his face, every time Dylan had wandered over to the bar to talk to Cat when they were on break. During their final set, he’d thought his friend was going to explode with curiosity. Only the fact that the crowd had been so responsive—not letting them wrap up the night until they’d played an hour longer than scheduled—had distracted the guy.

      But now they were alone. Josh and Jeremy had gone back inside for the last of Jeremy’s drums. Banks made full use of the opportunity. “So, what happened? You going back in there for a late-night rendezvous?”

      “Big words, Banks. Still working on being the smart one?”

      “I don’t think anyone’s going to figure out I’ve got a 130 IQ just because I know how to pronounce the word rendezvous.”

      “One-thirty, hmm? I’m so sorry.”

      It was an old bone of contention and a constant source of baiting. Because Dylan’s was just a smidge higher.

      His friend smirked. “Warning, warning, comparing IQs…your geek-o-meter is in the red zone.”

      “F. You.” But Dylan was smiling as he said it. He finished storing the microphones and amps, then helped Banks load up his keyboard.

      “So, seriously, man, what are you going to do about the Cat woman?”

      “Don’t call her that.”

      “Right, ’cause, uh, she was much younger when you went nuts over her? So, it’s Cat girl, huh?”

      “Do you ever shut up?”

      “You roomed with me in college, so you already know the answer to that question. Now stop stalling. Did she recognize you? Did she realize you were the same nerdy little nobody who used to practically wet your Dockers whenever she came around back in high school?”

      Banks. Couldn’t live with him. Couldn’t kill him and throw his body off the Chrysler Building.

      “She didn’t remember me.”

      Banks had the courtesy not to laugh. In fact, he frowned a bit. “Well, you can’t be too surprised, can you? I found your high school yearbook one time in college. You look nothing like you did back then.”

      High school. Seemed like a lifetime ago.

      He’d only attended public school for one year—his senior year—and he’d been only fifteen years old the day he’d started. A skinny kid who’d been accepted into a dozen colleges before he’d even started shaving.

      He’d wanted to be normal. Just…normal. Instead of the whiz kid who’d skipped a few grades in the exclusive private schools his parents insisted he attend. His one outlet—which had driven his parents nuts—was his nonstop devotion to his music. Even though his mom and dad had ranted about how he was burning his brain cells, betraying his intelligence and making a mockery of his brilliant musical gifts, he’d never stopped working out his teen angst with his stereo or his guitar.

      Until that year. When he’d finally gotten them to agree to let him finish out school with regular kids for a change, in a public high school.

      Their agreement had come at a cost. A high one.

      His music. For the entire school year.

      That’d been the price—he could spend his senior year at Kendall High if he agreed to let his father lock away his guitar and his entire CD collection.

      God, it’d been hard. Particularly when he’d СКАЧАТЬ