The Trouble with Dating Sue (Grover Beach Team #6)
Read The Trouble with Dating Sue (Grover Beach Team #6) Online
Authors: Anna Katmore
The Trouble with Dating Sue
A grover beach team book
ANNA
KATMORE
GENRE: YA/CONTEMPORARY ROMANCE
Copyright © 2015 by Anna Katmore
All cover art copyright © 2015 by Anna Katmore
Edited by Annie Cosby,
www.AnnieCosby.com
All Rights Reserved
First Publication: November 2015
All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.
Table of contents
For Chris
He knows why.
LAUREN PARKER-LEE was a satanic tease. She detached her lips from mine, fastened her long black hair—which I’d just had my hands in—with a clip at the back of her head, and grinned at me. “Learn to conjugate future perfect tense and you’ll get a bigger reward next time.”
Dammit, she knew how to make my heart go
boom
. Or maybe it wasn’t so much my heart that exploded at this incentive as my imagination. Her body was just as exotic as her Thai eyes and always a pleasure to explore. But today her lacy underwear still covered all the good parts, which meant I hadn’t studied hard enough the past week. We were in the same Spanish class, both seniors at Grover Beach High, and since we’d started seeing each other for noncommittal fun under the cover of her tutoring me, my grades had shot straight up to a solid B.
I reached for Lauren’s cell on the nightstand and swiped my thumb across the display. It flashed ten past four—time to run. Detangling from her mile-long legs turned out to be a tough job. When I’d finally managed, I climbed out of bed, finding my shirt and jeans on the parquet floor. Basketball practice on Monday was something I wouldn’t miss—not for any of the girls I occasionally hooked up with, and not for a smoking-hot Spanish lesson with Lauren either.
“Remember that we have a test a week from Friday,” she cooed, slowly sliding the dark red satin sheets over her body just far enough to touch the curve of her rack. Jeez! With my jeans pulled up halfway, I stumbled and caught myself on the backrest of the swivel chair in front of her desk. That girl knew how to tempt an eighteen-year-old for sure.
Well, two could play this game.
I buttoned my pants as I prowled back to her bed. Hands braced on the pillow at either side of her head, I leaned down so she had to roll from her side onto her back. Merely an inch separated our noses. Lauren squinted at the bright sun scratching at her window above her bed. A smirk on my lips, I drawled, “Guess that means I’ll be seeing you a little more often the next two weeks.” Without giving her the goodbye kiss her flirty pout demanded, I pulled my t-shirt over my head, slipped on my shoes, and was out of her room before the testosterone in my body got a chance to object.
Her voice caught up with me. “You forgot your textbook, Chris!”
Right. Rolling my eyes, I skittered to a halt in the hallway, turned around, and headed back into her room. The book lay on the desk, pretty much untouched the entire afternoon. I shoved it into the duffle bag that held my jersey and shorts, gave Lauren a tight-lipped grin, and was gone the next minute.
Lauren lived so far out of town that it took me fifteen minutes to get back to Grover Beach. It was a shame when half a year before your graduation you still didn’t have your own car. But Mom’s black SUV was good enough for now. And hey, look at that, my brother’s car was parked two spaces down in front of school.
What was Ethan doing here so late? As far as I knew, he should’ve been home, in his room with his lonely self. At least that’s what I’d seen him doing for most of this fall. The complete opposite of me, my identical twin wasn’t what one would call a social guy—at least not anymore.
Until last spring, he too had been part of the Dunkin’ Sharks, our basketball team. The two of us had hung out with the rest of the gang every minute of the day. That changed when one of the guys started rumors about Ethan. Rumors of the really bad kind. At some point, it just got to be too much for Ethan to cope with. He should have shoved a fist into Will’s mouth—that’s what I would have done. But my brother, much to my irritation, simply quit the team instead of retaliating.
Frankly, that sucked. On the other hand, I could kind of see why he’d rather avoid a confrontation that would be happening under the header:
Dude, are you gay?
I didn’t care if he was or wasn’t. Gay or straight, Ethan had been one of the best players on our team, and giving up basketball because of dickhead William Davis was a stupid thing to do. But who was I to tell Ethan how to live his life?
Abandoning thoughts of my brother altogether, I snatched the duffle bag from the passenger seat, headed into the changing room, and got ready for my favorite ninety minutes of the day.
*
“Chris!” my mom yelled through the door. “Dinner!”
I slammed my books closed and jogged down the hallway, pleased with my diligence. After basketball practice, I’d engrossed myself in Spanish and studied real hard. I had every intention of seeing Lauren after school tomorrow and getting laid for being such a good student. At the thought, my lips stretched into a grin.
As I entered the kitchen, I saw Ethan had already laid out the dishes, so I took a seat to his left at the dark, round table. We didn’t have a separate dining room, our one-story house was just too small for that. But the kitchen was big enough, and even with the island unit, there was plenty of space to move.
“What’ve you been doing at school so late?” I asked Ethan around a mouthful of chicken salad. “Don’t tell me you got in detention, because even that would have ended way before”—I glanced at my watch—“thirty minutes ago.” I’d checked the time when I heard my brother parking in front of our house. Him coming home at seven in the evening was almost as spectacular as me staying home on a Friday night. Mom, on the other hand, didn’t care about the reason. She was just happy to see Ethan being social again. Her beaming face said as much when she turned in my direction.
“Had something to discuss with Hunter,” Ethan explained, munching on some salad. “He asked me if I was interested in playing on his soccer team.”
“Oh, Ethan, how wonderful!” That was my mom being supportive, hoping Ethan would find a hobby outside his room—which, in the long run, would help him find a girlfriend, too. Of course, she hadn’t been oblivious to the signs that her other son might be interested in boys more than girls, but she would never call him out on it, and neither would I. However, “a mother can hope,” she’d told me once.
Deep in my gut, I had this feeling that her hope was in vain.
Subtly, I shook my head at her to tell her to drop pestering Ethan, but he replied casually as if talking about the weather, “I trained with them today and it was kinda good. It’s actually a co-ed team. Didn’t know Grover Beach High even had one.”
Hmm. I didn’t know that either. Then again, I’d never been interested in anything outside basketball activities, least of all something as boring as soccer. It would be good for Ethan to socialize a little more, however, so who cared if he played soccer, badminton, or pin the tail on the donkey? I’d be there at his first game for sure and cheer him on until my vocal cords got sore. That’s a favor I’d happily return, because he and Mom had come to every one of my basketball games this season. The very last one before Christmas was this Saturday. Mom had marked the day in her calendar in the kitchen. Frankly, I couldn’t wait to kick some Clearwater High ass. They were a damn good team, but we were better. It could be an epic finish for the season.
Mom wouldn’t let the topic go now that she knew there were actually girls on a team that Ethan might or might not join, but I didn’t get a chance to listen to their conversation. My phone rang in my pocket. Since I’d finished my meal, I carried my plate to the sink and then answered the phone on the way back to my room.
It was a call from
Tiffany 6
. She was a blonde I hooked up with last summer. The number next to her name was an indication that I’d like to hook up with her again sometime. I saved all girls to my contacts list with a number from one to ten, which was a ranking of “doable” in my own books. Six was good. Lauren was better. She had a solid 10 next to her name. And since Tiffany wanted to go out with me on Saturday—the Saturday my final basketball game of the season took place—she lost a number in my personal ranking right this minute. If she’d known me at all, she wouldn’t have suggested going out but instead would come and watch me play ball. After I hung up, I changed the 6 to a 5 and tossed my phone onto my bed. Time for more Spanish studying. Future perfect tense it was.
As I slipped into bed later that night, Spanish verbs spiraled through my brain. Honestly, studying alone wasn’t half as much fun as studying with a hot Thai girl on my lap. Actually, studying alone wasn’t fun, period.
I closed my eyes and tried very hard not to dream in Spanish. Whether I managed that or not, I couldn’t tell, because when the alarm woke me in the morning, I didn’t remember any dreams at all.
Running through my morning routine—which was a quick shower, no breakfast, hunting for some clothes to wear that my twin brother didn’t own too, and begging him for a ride to school—I repeatedly went through the one line I’d learned by heart yesterday before going to sleep. I was going to find Lauren before first period, and I was going to impress her. That was my plan for today.
When Ethan let me out in front of school to find a parking spot around the corner, I ran into my friend and captain of the basketball team, Tyler Moss, who most people called T-Rex because he played one hell of an aggressive style. His girlfriend, Rebecca Evers, was with him. “Hey, Becks,” I said to her and slung my arm around her shoulders in a casual greeting as I walked along with them. “Have you seen Lauren today?” The two girls were best friends, and I didn’t want to wait for fourth period to see Lauren in Spanish.
Rebecca, who I knew was secretly hoping that her friend and I started dating seriously so the four of us could hang out on double dates, raised her brows, the edges of her lips curling into a smile. “Eager to see her, are we?”
“Quite,” I whispered into her ear, but removed my arm from her a second later when we walked through the glass doors and entered the building.
Rebecca tossed her thick hair, blond as mine, over her shoulder and wrapped her arm around Tyler, but glanced my way. “She’s got biology first period. Let’s see if she’s already there.”
Tyler chuckled at his girlfriend’s high hopes when he knew as well as I did that Lauren and I dating for real was never going to happen. We shared a quick look over Rebecca’s head as she led the way to some biology classroom, but neither of us dared to pull her out of her mission.
Lauren was a bombshell, all right, and two years ago, I might have considered a relationship with someone like her for sure. I’d actually had a girlfriend before I started hooking up with random girls. But a lot has happened since, and for me to be exclusive again meant there had to be a girl who wouldn’t flirt around—or worse, dump me for my best friend. I still gritted my teeth at the memory of Amanda Roseman telling me on the phone that Michael had replaced me as her boyfriend during spring break in tenth grade. I doubted there was a girl in this town who could make me fall in love again. However, if there was, I challenged fate to send her my way right this minute.
As we rounded the corner, the only girl I saw was Lauren. Apparently, fate had a screwed up sense of humor, and I silently laughed to myself, shaking my head.
We joined Lauren and the two guys she was talking to, Allen Stone and Wesley something. I wasn’t really friends with Wes, but he seemed cool enough to hang out with sometimes. His elephant-like ears were the one thing I always noticed about him first. Right now, he was leaning with one shoulder against the line of lockers in front of Lauren, who had her back to me, and said something that made her laugh. He straightened the moment I stepped up to them, giving my presence away to her.
Pearly white teeth appeared in a lazy smile as she turned around. “Hey there, handsome.”
“Hello, beautiful.” I might have placed a kiss on her mouth, too, but she’d used a shiny red lipstick this morning, which I couldn’t stand. I’d kissed her with glossed lips before—and other girls too, in fact—but it always filled my mouth with a plastic taste I couldn’t get rid of for hours afterward. Lauren knew that. It was the reason she never wore makeup when we met to study.
“What brings you to my biology class?” she mocked with a lifted chin and a real spark of interest in her dark eyes. “Did you miss me?”
Confidently, I placed one hand against the locker next to her head. “How about you wipe off your lips, and I’ll show you just how much?”
“I thought I made myself clear yesterday.” Lauren held my gaze with a taunting smirk. “That’s not going to happen until you learn to conjugate future perfect tense.”
That was my cue. Leaning in a little closer, I purred into her ear, “
Al final del día...yo habré quitado tus bragas.
”
Lauren sucked in a soft breath at my pledge that I would have pulled her panties down by the end of the day. “With my teeth...” I added in a dangerously low tone, enjoying the light blush my promise put on her usually pale cheeks. Catching her off guard was something that happened like twice a year and always made me feel a little more sure of myself around her.
“Ah, I see you actually took a look at your textbook for once.”
“I’m up for some case studies later. What do you think?”
She gave me a cocky look. “I’ll be home alone until four thirty.”
Unfortunately, that collided with my plans for the afternoon. “I’ve got basketball practice right after school today,” I told her, dropping the bedroom voice and speaking normal again. “But you can come to my place after five.”
“Hey.” A soft voice behind me made me turn my head before I got an answer from Lauren. Next to my right shoulder stood a girl for whom no name was in my memory. Her honey-colored hair was in a modest ponytail, and she shoved her glasses farther up her pert nose as she looked me directly in the eyes. “Expecto Patronum” stood in a Harry Potter font on her left boob, with the white outline of a bunny flashing out of a magic wand standing out against the pink of the shirt. A calculator also stuck out of her right breast pocket. She had to be one of those kids who dressed up for comic cons and calculated the three-hundredth digit of pi or something for fun. A poster child for the nerd club.