IT would be a mistake to look directly at her when she spoke. Her words, he knew, could not affect him; her face and body could.
Sinclair turned and gazed out the window as she closed the door. It was a warm day, and outside he could see many of the students lazing in the sun. A few played touch football, but most just lay on blankets, couples cuddling close to one another; opened textbooks sprawled near them, ignored, giving the illusion at least that they had actually planned to study.
A flash of golden highlights drew his vision toward a head of blond hair. He turned and recognized the pretty sophomore heartthrob from his two p.m. class. Half a dozen boys surrounded her, all battling for her attention, all hoping to draw her brightest smile. A stereo from one of the rooms blasted Buddy Holly’s final single across the commons. Once again, he looked at the attractive blonde who was not one-tenth as striking as the brunette standing behind him.
“Well?” he asked.
From across the room, the stunning beauty nodded and then realized he was still not facing her. “Yes.”
He sighed heavily. Below his window, a few of the boys moved away from the blonde with dejected faces, as though they had been eliminated from a competition, which, he guessed, they had been.
“You’re sure?”
“Of course, I’m sure.”
Sinclair nodded, though he could not say why he did so. “What are you going to do?”
She stared at him in disbelief. “Correct me if I’m wrong,” she began with blatant annoyance, “but I think you might be involved in this, too.”
Again he nodded for no reason. On the commons, another boy had been thrown from the ring, leaving only two to battle for the blonde’s potential favors. He turned his attention to the touch football game and watched a pass float slowly through the humid air. A bare-chested boy extended his hands.
The ball spiraled toward him, bounced off his fingertips, and landed on the ground.
Sinclair concentrated on the game, feeling the boy’s disappointment, trying his best to ignore the power she wielded over his mind. His eyes inadvertently shifted back to the blonde. A winner had been chosen. With down-turned eyes, the runner-up stood and sulked off.
“Will you please turn around and face me?”
A smile played on his lips, but he was not foolish enough to turn around, to expose himself to her devastating weapons, to allow her to cast her sensual spell over him. He looked down at the young man who had captured the blonde. Even from his window on the second floor, he could see the hunger in the boy’s wide eyes as he moved in to claim his hard-sought prey. The boy kissed her. His hands began to wander.
To the victor go the spoils.