Night After Night by Janelle Denison Page B

taking advantage of this opportunity if he walked away now.
    After the last note of her song drifted away and the room went quiet, he finally spoke.
    “You have a beautiful voice,” he said, startling her.
    She jerked around, and as she realized that she was no longer by herself a mortified look came over her face, followed quickly by a wariness that would have sent most guys scurrying back out the door. Not him. He’d walked toward her, complimenting her on her song, trying to put her at ease while attempting to ask her easy, casual questions that would start a conversation between them.
    She’d stonewalled him with one-word answers and still he wasn’t discouraged. He invited her to join him and a group of his friends to a party on Friday night, and she’d politely but flatly refused. Then she stood up, told him that it was late and she had to get home, and he let her go…even though he wanted to ask her to stay.
    As captain of the basketball team, he could have had any girl in high school, and there were many who made it very clear that they were more than willing to put out for a star athlete like him. He hadn’t even been tempted. Unfortunately, the only girl he was interested in didn’t want to have anything to do with him.
    Undeterred, he set out to change Jessica’s mind and spent the next month courting her. He gave her silly, flirtatious notes. He put handpicked flowers into the slats of her locker to surprise her. He walked her to every single one of her classes and carried her books, despite her insistence that she could carry them herself.
    He joined her and Zoe at their lunch table and discovered that Jessica loved peanut butter and strawberry jelly sandwiches. He did everything he could think of to make her feel special and valued when it started becoming painfully clear to him that her home life was less than ideal and her time in the choir room after school was a form of escape for her.
    In time, his efforts paid off. Slowly, eventually, she started to smile at him. Laughed at his stupid jokes. Glanced at him with pleasure and longing, instead of distrust. Let him listen to her sing without being embarrassed. And, most important, she started sharing things about herself that gave him better insight as to why she was so guarded.
    Weeks later, in the choir room, he kissed her, and ridiculous as it sounded, he saw fireworks and his future with her. Their slow, evolving friendship turned into something more intimate, and he discovered that falling in love with Jessica Morgan was the best feeling in the entire world.
    He learned that he was the first guy she’d ever kissed.
    Her first boyfriend.
    Her first lover.
    He wanted to be her last.
    They remained together, practically inseparable, for a year and a half. She spent most of that time with his family, staying away from her mother, and her emotional abuse, as much as she possibly could. She and Noah talked about getting married someday, after college, and having a big family. They had huge dreams, and he wanted to make every one of them come true for her. For them.
    Then came high school graduation, and two months later, in August, he departed for Allegheny College, where he’d been granted a full-ride basketball scholarship. In Pennsylvania, all the way across the country from her, while she remained in Vegas, where she planned to attend The University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
    It never happened. Within a few weeks of him being gone, something changed. Jessica changed. During phone calls home she was cool and distant, and whenever he pressed her to tell him what was wrong, they’d argue and fight and she’d shut him out. Then, out of the blue and without a reason why, she broke up with him.
    He thought it was a matter of giving her time and space to deal with whatever was bothering her, but a few days after that she just…left. Gone, without an explanation. Disappearing on him and everyone else without telling anyone what she was doing, where she