Chapter 1

Down on the smooth gleaming sand reflecting the soft shimmerings of moonlight, the two figures of a boy and girl clad only in bathing suits lay stretched out on a long orange beach blanket. Behind them was the sound of booming surf, and up the dunes several yards away from them the girl could see the silhouettes of several couples dancing to loud music coming from a portable phonograph.

"No, Bob, you mustn't," the girl said, pulling away from the boy's hands that were moving down over the top of her bikini and gently fondling beneath the light nylon material that covered the girl's large firm breasts.

"Dammit, Ellen, it's not as if we've just met each other, We're practically engaged," Bob said, his voice rising in anger.

"I know, but something inside me says 'not yet'. As foolish as it may sound, I still believe in keeping myself for you until after we are married."

The youth lay back on the blanket and was silent for a minute. Ellen could hear his deep breathing come heavily, and she looked down at his face and smiled a deep warm smile.

"Listen, Bob, I love you," she said, grasping his hand for a moment, then moving away as she sensed his strongly aroused body push against the smooth tanned skin of her naked belly. "I want you to touch me, as much as you want to, but I know it will make a difference. Now, do you understand?"

"Yes, I guess I do," he said softly. "But there's no law that I can't give it a try once in awhile. We have been going together for more than a year, and a guy gets tired of waiting."

"I know it's hard, and maybe that will make what we have later on more worth while."

Ellen knew that these words only angered her boyfriend further, but she didn't know any other way to describe her strong feelings about it so that he would understand. Purity, honor, and virginity--these were words that she had been taught so thoroughly by her mother and father to cherish. The girl knew it would be difficult for any boy to understand her deeply rooted feelings, especially when her own parents had divorced recently, going against the ideals they had so carefully attempted to develop in their two children. She was excited by Bob's closeness to her, and it was obvious that he knew it, but she just couldn't give in to these emotions that were growing more and more intense with each time he touched her.

Bob moved closer, his hand running affectionately across her bare shoulder before slowly beginning to stroke her hair with comforting softness. He put his mouth close to her ear and said softly: "Darling, I will try. I think I understand how you feel. I--I don't know what got into me there for a minute."

Pleased, she turned and gently kissed him, and felt his warm mouth respond as he moved his hand from the soft silkiness of her hair and began to caress the smooth-tanned flesh of her shoulders and back. Again there was that urgent tingle of quickly suppressed pleasure. She pulled her mouth away from his and said, "I love you so much! I want you to know that. Sometimes I think you feel I don't love you because I won't go all the way."

The boy laughed and sat up from the blanket, running his hand down her tanned arm that shone a creamy gold color in the glow of the moonlight. Then, clasping her hand tightly, they sat silently for a moment in a warm affectionate embrace and gazed out beyond the surf into the silvery stillness of the Atlantic Ocean.

"I suppose I should be looking for Jennifer," she said, tapping her finger lightly against his chin. "I don't see her up there with the rest of the party."

"She's probably making out behind some sand dune with my brother, if I know Jennifer," Bob remarked and laughed sharply.

"What kind of comment was that? Your older brother is no angel. I hardly trust him with my sister, and the joke of it all is that they're supposed to be chaperoning us to this party!"

"Jennifer is a grown woman now," Bob said, a note of sarcasm entering his voice. "She knows what's good for her, after all her experiences with that fast college crowd she's been hanging out with."

"Now that is mean! How could you say a thing like that about my sister," she exclaimed. "But I am getting a bit concerned about her. Since Mom and Dad got divorced she just hasn't been the same person."

"I wouldn't worry too much about it," he comforted, holding her hand softly. "It's probably just as you say. She's having a little fling, and she'll come out of it fairly soon... I think."

"I wouldn't be so concerned if she were just staying out all night," she sighed. "But it's the pot smoking that I don't like."

"Now that's something we can't do anything about," Bob said slowly. "Your mother's me one who is at fault there."

"I--I don't know. It's so hard for Mom to control her, you know. If Dad were only living with us I think the whole problem would clear right up. As it is, she just laughs right in Mom's face and says that her life is her own business."

"Ellen, I really wish you wouldn't get so darn worked up about all this. Jennifer is twenty-two years old, and by all standards she is a mature adult. If she insists on carrying on and going to bed with every man she meets that's her own affair."

"Now, you stop that!" Ellen shouted at him in sudden anger. "You have no right to talk about my family that way."

"I do if I'm going to marry their daughter, the nice daughter that is," he said abruptly, pulling his hand from her tensed fingers.

"That's enough! There's no reason to condemn her just because of some idle rumors we've heard."

"From what Phil says," Bob replied, "they're more than rumors."

"Oh! You're not being fair! Jennifer has always been someone I looked up to, and if she's having some problems I think we should try to understand them rather than condemn her this way."

Ellen reached across the long beach blanket and picked up the jeans and tee shirt she had worn to the beach party over her bathing suit. "I think I'm going to take a little walk," she said, trying to hold back the flood of tears that was beginning to build in her eyes. "I just can't stand hearing all this talk about Jennifer. She's my sister, and we've always stood up for each other... and it's not going to be any other way."

The girl quickly rose from the blanket and drew her striped tee shirt over her head, pulling the light clinging material across the large full orbs of her young breasts and lifting her jeans up over the smooth curves of her firmly rounded thighs. Bob looked up at her voluptuous figure standing in the moonlight. An off-shore breeze blew gently through her long blonde hair and sent light ripples through her shirt that softly accented the full curves of her sensuously budding young body.

"Dammit, I wish you'd understand that I'm not criticizing you or your sister," he said, springing up from the blanket. "I just wish you wouldn't get so involved in her problems."

"I need time to think, Bob, really I do," she said, turning to him for a moment. "I think I'll go up to the party and get a can of beer and sit by myself for awhile."