The Flirting Games (The Flirting Series - Young Adult)

by Stella Wilkinson

  He growled from deep in his chest as he pinned her back against the wall.

  “You wretch. You’ve been leading me a merry dance for weeks. You are the most annoying, disrespectful, irritating little minx, but lord help me I love every maddening inch of you!”

  “You love me?” She was shocked.

  “Yes I do! And I’ll pummel to bits any other man you touch, is that clear Miss Parkhurst?”

  Her eyes filled with happiness. She would have plenty of time later to enjoy testing that statement as well as his patience levels, but first she had to kiss him a whole lot more.

  Telling him she loved him back could wait a little while too, she giggled to herself. And as her arms snaked back around his neck, Ellie and Nate locked together in a kiss that said more than any words.

  Epilogue

  It was the first day of the Christmas Holidays and the front drive was full of cars as parents arrived to pick up their children.

  Flora stepped out of the front door and then quickly darted behind a pillar as she noticed Gabriel standing over to her left talking on his phone. She crept round the pillar to get a bit closer and overhear what he was saying.

  “But Vanessa, we only had three days together as it was.” He spoke crossly. “I’m flying out to you in Paris and it was supposed to be just the two of us for New Year’s Eve. In the most romantic city in the world and now you want us to go to a party with your friends?” He paused for a few moments, listening. “Yes, actually, I do mind. So in fact I’m coming all the way there for just one proper night together?” He paused again. “No, I do not want you to pay for my flights!” He sounded outraged.

  He started to pace away from the door and, though Flora longed to hear more, she knew he would see her if she tried to follow. Instead she hugged herself with the thought that it sounded as though Gabriel and Vanessa were having problems. She hoped it didn’t make her a bad person, but how was she ever going to get Gabriel unless he broke up with his girlfriend?

  Flora looked around for Ellie. She would love her feedback on what she had heard. Ellie had been trying to help her get noticed by Gabriel, but so far there hadn’t been much opportunity. She finally spotted Ellie in the courtyard and rolled her eyes. Nate Naverly was wrapped around her friend as usual and they were totally oblivious to the rest of the world. It seemed to Flora like Ellie and Nate had spent most of the last month kissing non-stop. She decided to leave them to set the world on fire by themselves; after all, Nate was supposed to be leaving at three and her own mother wasn’t due to collect her until five.

  Her mom and Travis were catching a taxi from the airport to get her and then they were going straight back there and getting a plane to Bordeaux, where they were all going to stay in a massive chateau with some friends of Travis for Christmas. She couldn’t wait to see her mom again and tell her all about Compass Court.

  Though she was already looking forward to coming back after the Christmas break and starting her campaign to become the next girlfriend of the hottest guy in the whole school.

  ***

  Jack Parkhurst parked his car at the front of the school and pulled his suitcase off the back seat. It felt weird to be coming back to Compass Court to stay for two weeks over the Christmas holidays.

  Rose and Toby’s parents were working undercover somewhere in Brazil and so his cousins had been going to come to their house over the holidays, but his own dad was also apparently unable to leave work except on Christmas Day. As a Captain in the Army he was preparing some soldiers who were reporting to The Middle East just after New Year and now it seemed that he was going over there with them for their first month.

  Jack’s mother had of course said she didn’t mind having all five children to stay over the holidays on her own and that she would lay on Christmas, but it was Jack who put his foot down. He knew that she wouldn’t want to be apart from his dad for his last two weeks in this country.

  Compass Court allowed pupils to stay over the holidays. It was generally for the pupils who had come to the school from other countries and couldn’t always go back and forth, but people stayed for a variety of reasons. Usually other family members had to put up in the large hotel in Oakworth Village down the road, but the school had made an exception for Jack as an ex-pupil.

  Though his mother had never said anything, Jack knew she was scared and worried about his father going back to The Middle East, so he had informed her that he had discussed it with the others and they were all happy to stay at school over the holidays and that he would be staying there too, but that he expected both her and their father to join them at the school for Christmas Dinner.

  His mother was such a gentle person that she had been quite overwhelmed by Jack taking charge and had given in after only a small fight. Jack was sure that he and Alex, Ellie, Rose and Toby would have a great time wherever they were.

  He stopped to watch the ebb and flow of parents; it was a scene that never really changed. There was young Jasper Clements, looking embarrassed as his mother openly cried and hugged him. Next along was Brenner climbing in to the mud-spattered ancient Vauxhall Corsa, looking moody and embarrassed for a different reason. His father was chatting up some of the mothers and wearing a dirty torn jacket held together with black masking tape. You would never guess to look at him that he was actually Lord Wentworth and owned half of Gloucestershire.

  Then his eyes stopped to rest on the shiny blonde hair of Sophie Jones. She seemed lit up by the sunshine, wearing a short dress that showed far too much leg as usual and her large blue eyes were looking straight at him. He found his feet starting in her direction.

  Sophie looked skittish, like she might bolt off at any moment. Jack walked over slowly; half of him wanted her to disappear in the other direction, save him from having to make this effort. He felt awkward. It wasn’t a feeling he was used to. He told himself that he needed to apologize again. That he needed to get back on friendly terms with her because she was a close friend of Rose. He was also painfully aware that he really should have called her after what happened between them. He wasn’t the type to shy away from something that needed doing, but in truth he had no idea how to handle Sophie.

  He found her to be a bundle of contradiction. She was loud and confident in a group, yet quiet and sensitive on her own with him. She came across as cynical and experienced in the ways of the world, but he had learned first hand that she was as innocent and naïve as a baby bird learning to fly. She merrily jumped without looking first, then seemed terrified by the drop.

  “Hi.” He stopped in front of her.

  “Hello, Jack. How nice to see you.” She sounded over polite and strained, yet her eyes were full of hope. He felt his stomach dip. She still had feelings for him. How did he tell her to move on? Did he even really want her to? He told himself that he a selfish pig because deep down he wanted her to wait for him. To stay just as she was for a few years until maybe one day… No, he wanted her to stop thinking about him and have a great time. But perhaps she could do it in a longer skirt so that other guys would stop looking at her legs!

  “Sophie…” He had no idea what to say. “I think I should apologize again.”

  Her eyes flashed with a hint of anger, but she didn’t say anything. He ran his hand through his hair.

  “I shouldn’t have taken advantage of you.”

  “You didn’t. I mean I wanted you to.” She didn’t voice the thought that she still wanted him to.

  She had sensed him before she had even seen him. It was like a radar inside her when he was near. She had known he would be here today, but despite lying awake half the night coming up with clever things to say, now that he was here she could barely stop herself from throwing her arms around him and begging him to hold her once again.

  “Are you seeing anyone?” Jack mentally slapped himself. Why on earth had he asked that?

  She shook her head. “Are you?”

  “Umm, yeah, two or three girls at Uni. Nothing serious, you know. I don�
�t want a steady girlfriend.” There, he’d said it. So why did he feel like it was the wrong thing?

  “Do you still have my number?” Sophie couldn’t believe she had so little pride as to ask, but she had wondered every day for six long months.

  “Yes.”

  “Then call me some time. Or text me. I’ve got to go. Goodbye, Jack.” She forced herself away and over to her parents’ car that had just pulled up. She didn’t look back. She leaned in the car window to kiss her mother and then climbed into the back seat.

  They were about a mile down the road when her phone beeped.

  I like your new hairstyle

  That was all it said. But she could hardly restrain herself from bursting into tears of happiness. It was Jack’s way of giving her his phone number. She re-read it a hundred times on the long journey home. Now if only she could think up the perfect witty reply…

  Keep reading for a sneak preview of Book Two in the Flirting Series: More Flirting Games

  Book Two of The Flirting Games Series will be out soon, if you would like to be kept informed whenever new books are released by this author then please sign up to the mailing list here: http://eepurl.com/wEMmD

  More Flirting Games

  Book Two in The Flirting Series

  Rose Falcon is staying at Boarding School over the Christmas holidays whilst her parents are working abroad. The only problem: Leo Flanagan is also staying. There’s some bad history between her family and his, and her parents told her to keep her distance from him. The trouble is that after he kisses her she can’t stay away. The attraction between them seems to be spiraling out of control. Can they keep their relationship a secret? Can they even make it work with so many obstacles? And what is the deal between Leo and the beautiful Diana? Rose battles with both her conscience and her desire.

  Also more of your favorite characters from Book One.

  Sneak Preview of More Flirting Games

  Boys, boys, boys! That’s all Sophie and Grace seemed to talk about this year. Maybe throw in a little gossip, clothes, magazines and make-up. But otherwise it was boys. Boys they might like and the boy band they definitely liked, boys they knew and boys they wanted to know. School came a very poor second.

  Rose Falcon was really enjoying being back at school this year. The summer had been great but her parents were always working and she had missed the girls. She and her younger brother Toby had spent three weeks of the holidays with her cousins, Jack, Alex and Ellie, but she had been on the phone almost every day to Sophie or Grace or both.

  She supposed that officially Alex was her best friend. Even though they were cousins, they had been born only days apart and had been close their whole lives, but at 16 she had found that she and Alex had started to drift apart slightly. They were both in the same year at Compass Court Boarding School and both in the same Schoolhouse, West Tower, but this year she just seemed to be hanging out a lot more with Sophie and Grace and seeing less of Alex.

  At a certain age you just needed good girlfriends, and Alex certainly didn’t want to talk about boys.

  Rose, Sophie and Grace had shared a dormitory at Compass Court since they all started over five years ago and though the three of them were very different they had bonded instantly.

  The fourth girl in their room, Diana, had never really been their friend.

  Diana didn’t seem to have or want female friends. She was thin and had perfect porcelain white skin, with an oval face, dark eyes and naturally red lips. There were a few girls in the year below who hung on her every word and tried to copy her waist length long dark hair, but she seemed hardly to notice them. Rose thought Diana was very beautiful but very cold.

  The only person Diana was close to was Leo Flanagan. Both Diana and Leo were originally Irish, though both their families now lived in England, only about half a mile away from each other by all accounts. Rose thought that Diana and Leo might be related, but as neither of them spoke much to her or her friends she didn’t really know.

  “Who are you looking at?” Sophie nudged Rose out of her reverie.

  “No one.” Rose shook her head. “What were we talking about?”

  “I was just saying what a dry term it’s been for boyfriends. It’s Christmas already and we’re all still single.” Said Grace

  It was the 20 of December on the last day of their first term in Year Six. It was dark now by five o’clock and the Common Rooms were the coziest place to be in the evenings. The three of them were sitting in the West Tower Common Room enjoying the fact that as it was the end of term and they didn’t have to do any studying. They had a low coffee table at one end of the room with a sofa and a leather armchair that they always tried to get to before anyone else. It was comfortable and intimate. There were no other seats close by so no one could overhear their conversations. Across the room in an alcove under a tall lamp, Leo and Diana had a little table for two and looked like they were actually doing homework.

  “And I was wondering what’s going on with you and Ben Castle this year?” Grace continued as she swiveled sideways on the sofa to rest her feet against the radiator on the wall.

  Rose shrugged. “You know how it is with me and Ben, he asks me out, eventually we kiss and then it just seems to fizzle out.”

  “So are you going out or not?” Grace furrowed her brow in confusion.

  “Beats me. I would say probably not seeing as we haven’t spoken in over a month. We had that snog at Halloween and we spent most of the evening talking. But we’ve hardly had time to speak since. He’s always got sporting commitments and I’ve been working on my English coursework most nights. It all just seems a bit of an effort to find the time and I’m not going to chase after him.”

  “I think you should just dump him once and for all” said Sophie. “You two have been on-again off-again since the first year, you’ve never done more than kiss and neither of you is getting the chance to date anyone else.”

  “That’s true.” Rose thought back to her first year. It was Alex who had befriended Ben, they were in the same biology class and had introduced him to her.

  Ben was considered very attractive, though not traditionally handsome. He stood at over six feet, his large frame was reassuringly solid but his gentle personality made you feel you would be safe with him He had brown hair with a tendency to curl, big brown eyes and a friendly wide smile. There was something very appealing about his open countenance. So it was all the more confusing that he blew hot and cold with their relationship.

  “The thing is” Rose continued, “there isn’t really anyone else I want to date anyway.”

  “No. The talent has totally dropped off now that Jack’s gone.” Sophie pouted. Rose laughed, as Sophie’s crush on Jack had been extreme and unrequited for several years.

  “But I don’t want to date Jack.” Rose joked “That would be gross as he’s my cousin.”

  Sophie kicked Rose’s foot off the table to show how little she thought of the joke.

  “Sorry Soph.” Her face softened at her friend’s down-turned mouth. “One day Jack will notice how lovely you are.”

  Sophie glanced at Grace. They both knew that Jack had already noticed Sophie, but had decided not to tell Rose as she would only rail at Jack about it. Grace saw the look and nodded imperceptibly to show she still knew not to say anything.

  Sophie and Jack had gotten together at the end of year dance for the Upper School at the beginning of the summer. More than gotten together. The trouble was that they had both gone home the next day and although Sophie had given Jack her phone number, he had never called. She was too embarrassed to tell Rose. Rose had spent some of the summer holidays with Jack’s family and she would have forced him to call Sophie. After discussing it with Grace, Sophie had decided this would be worse than Jack just not calling. Unfortunately Jack had now left Compass Court for University and Sophie was despairing of when she might get another chance to speak to him without looking obvious.

  “Anyway,” said Rose “Didn’
t you have a bit of a thing going this term with Danny Barnett in Year 5?”

  “Barely.” Sophie snorted. “At first I thought he was so cute, with his boy band looks and that fab hair.”

  “His hair is only like that because he puts so much gel in it.” Grace said.

  “Totally. Anyway, cute or not, he turned out to be really vain and immature. It lasted what? Only two or three weeks before he got on my nerves. I think he thought because I was in Year six I would be easy or something. I’m not going to date anyone younger than me again.” Sophie stated.

  “We were in Year 5 only a few months ago.” Grace reminded her with humor.

  “Yes but we’re girls, we mature a lot faster. Danny was not decent boyfriend material. He actually seemed to think I would be impressed if he could guess my bra size correctly.” She rolled her eyes and then rounded on Grace. “Lets not forget about you. What’s your tally been this term? Even worse than us, the only action you’ve seen is that you spent the North Tower Christmas Party in a corner with Jerry! What were you thinking? He’s hardly brain of the year.”

  “I wasn’t interested in his brain” Grace smirked. “I just like my men big.”

  “I’ll bet you do. And just how big is Jerry?” Sophie waggled her eyebrows suggestively.

  “Not like that!” Grace laughed and threw a cushion at her. “You know what I mean. I like a bit of muscle on a man. I can’t stand skinny bony boys.”

  “Maybe you should date Ben then instead of me.” Rose joked.

  “Yes because that’s what friends do to each other.” Grace said sarcastically.

  “Tell me again what your doing this Christmas?” Sophie asked Rose.

  “Well, as you know it doesn’t look like my parents will be able to leave South America until early next year,” Rose chewed her lip “and Uncle John is training troops right up until Christmas day. So Jack’s organized it that we all stay at school during the holidays and his parents are coming just for Christmas lunch.” By ‘all’ Rose meant herself, her brother Toby, and her three cousins, Jack, Alex and Ellie.