Page 26 of Courting Clemson

It worked. He stared at us before turning his back and sulking back to the sand court.

“Let’s go! Let’s play!” he shouted and aggressively tossed the ball in the air a few times.

“Are you going to play?” I asked Clemson, not wanting to let her out of my sight now that she was right in front of me.

I wanted to blurt out how many of her photos I’d looked at in the past few weeks and how I stalked her social media accounts trying to absorb any information about her that I could.

Thankfully, I kept that all under wraps. Even I could recognize how creepy it would sound, regardless of knowing it was innocent, well-intended interest.

“Sure,” she replied. “I love volleyball. Are the teams even, though? I don’t want to throw things off if the other girls aren’t playing.” She looked at her girl gang to see if anyone else was interested. “Grace, you playing?” she called to a friend who had her back turned.

The girl whipped around at the sound of her name and bounced over to where we stood.

“This is my roommate, Grace. Grace, this is Luke…” Then said to me, “I’m sorry, I don’t think I know your last name.”

“Lucas Allen,” I said and offered a hand to the woman. “Clemson and I met at the shelter a few weeks ago. Hell, it may be over a month already.” I forced myself to stop there. I had a terrible habit of babbling nervously, and it always made me feel awkward afterward.

“Oh, cool. Yeah, I’ll play. But then I want to work on my tan. I have these awful tan lines from that one-piece I wore last time, and I want to get rid of them.” She pulled at the neck of her T-shirt to expose her skin.

I couldn’t see the dreadful marks she was talking about, but whatever.

Clemson lined up with my team on one side, and her roommate went to the other side. Liam swooped in immediately and started chatting with the brunette. He was so slick with women, he had the girl laughing and blushing within minutes.

I was anxious to ask him if he’d met these two before. If they were part of the party crowd he’d been hanging out with. He seemed more familiar with a few of the other girls in the group, but after their initial hugs hello, they hadn’t said much to each other.

The two girls on the court took the game seriously. They both played well, but Clemson was the natural athlete. She moved with speed and grace and even scored a point when playing at the net. We couldn’t get into much of a conversation during the game, but I couldn’t take my eyes off her. I was completely obsessed with her long legs and missed an easy return when daydreaming about where I’d like to see those legs in relation to my face.

“Shit, sorry,” I called out, knowing I just gave up an easy point.

“Head in the game, Allen,” Clemson shouted from the opposite end of the court.

When I met her gaze across the other players’ heads, she was grinning playfully. I chuckled and shook my head and watched her get ready for the next serve.

Our team ended up losing that game but rallied back in the next one to take the set two to one. We all agreed we needed a water break and headed toward the cooler for some drinks. I packed a variety of options that morning and grabbed a water for myself before turning to search for Clemson in the gathering to see what she wanted.

The dibs guy was twisting the top off a bottle for her when I located her, and she gave him a quick thank-you. It was obvious she wasn’t interested in him based on her body language, but he was persistent. Throughout the day, it was painful to watch him continue to try to win her favor, not picking up on her disinterested signals.

How the hell were some guys so oblivious? Not my problem in this case, though. It did give my gender a bad rap, though. Not all men were so blind to the signals a woman put out.

After spreading my oversized towel out on the sand, I stretched out to catch some sun. I was just getting settled when a husky feminine voice asked, “Mind if I set up camp beside you?”

With my hand, I created a shield from the sun’s glare and looked up the long, incredible length of Clemson’s body.

“Not at all,” I said with a hard swallow.

Christ, this girl’s body should’ve been illegal in that bathing suit she wore. High-cut legs made her endless limbs seem even longer. I had never known myself to be a leg guy, but things changed immediately. I couldn’t keep my imagination from wandering down all kinds of paths about those legs wrapped around my body in all sorts of creative configurations.

Before I had an erection that would be impossible to conceal in board shorts, I needed to focus on something else. Quickly.

She laid her towel beside mine and sat down, wiggling her ass in the cutest way to make a divot in the sand.

I chuckled.

“Don’t you do that? Make an impression of your body in the sand before you lie back?”

“No. This is a new technique to me. You’ll have to give me a lesson,” I teased and immediately wanted to smack myself.

If I had to watch her shimmy her body like that again, I might expire right here on the sand.

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