Angel Boris knows how to light up a room, and to add a bit of song. More than once during our dinner at a smoky Chicago bistro she pauses to accompany flawlessly the country music being piped into the restaurant. "I love to sing, and I do it everywhere," she tells me between songs. "I also love listening to music, and I can't sleep or warm up for acting class without it. Music helps me relax." Angel looks at ease here, too, enjoying her new favorite food, Thai noodles. I ask how she got her name. It was given to her, she says, because her father believed she was a gift from God. "The year before I was born he was injured on the job when a 450-pound drum fell on him, and he ended up in a body cast. When he came home after 11 months in the hospital, he and my mom were, as might be expected, eager to make love. She quickly got pregnant, and my dad felt God was giving him a reason to fight the pain he was feeling."

Angel became the family performer. She remembers her childhood as a whirlwind of singing and dancing at pageants, with her father in tow. "She has shelves filled with trophies and crowns," her father says proudly. "Everybody knows her. I'm always being asked, 'How's Angel?'" Playboy began asking about Angel after she won a bikini contest sponsored by Hawaiian Tropic. You may remember her from our Girls of Hawaiian Tropic feature in April 1995.

Angel has taken her name to heart in other ways. Her Florida apartment is filled with angel candles, angel figurines, angel stamps, angel plates, angel soap. She even has an angel checkbook. Her favorite song lyric? "My angel is the centerfold," from the classic "Centerfold" by the J. Geils Band. Our Angel is too.

-- Chip Rowe