Chapter Twenty-Eight

"Now, who's ready for a match of beach volleyball?" The noble lady asked, almost exclaiming.

"I am!" Michel sounded enthused about the idea. "I was born ready for some beach volleyball!"

"Let's go in front of the house, then!" Madeline replied. "The losers will set the net as punishment, of course."

Both Evan and Michel groaned heavily in great discontent, and the girls laughed at them.

Evan had never in his life set a volleyball net. Doing this was certainly going to be a real pain of a task to accomplish.

"Don't worry guys, I'll help you even though I won." André tried to reassure them.

André was indeed tall. If Evan and Michel planted both poles well into the sand, André wouldn't have any trouble at all with tying the net on their edges. The only real struggle, then, would be disentangling the net firstly.

"Andie, you are seriously irremediable." Madeline told him, and André flashed a fleeting smile to thank her, clearly being sarcastic.

The six of them headed to the front of the beach house.

Evan could see it better now, the items on top of the end tables were not food or drinks, they were decorative fruit and empty vases and pitchers. The lounging chairs were made of dark wooden boards, and there seemed to be a cluttered room behind the balcony.

The house had a nice front porch with a white polished wooden pergola that boasted wild climbing tropical ivy and tiny exotic flowers bloomed on top of it, between each square that the pergola featured.

There was a classic bench with the surfing board backrest next to the entrance, and down the latticed foundation's stairs, a picnic bench with an outdoor grill, and some outdoor playing structures, like a medium-sized sandbox and a double swing.

The volleyball's net and its poles were found in a case next to the picnic table, as well as the ball and its air pump.

"You boys set the net, we're gonna inflate the ball." Madeline said as she opened the case and took the saggy ball and the pump.

"Okay. Evan, Michel, please take the poles and dig them firmly into the sand, I'll quickly disentangle the net and tie it to the poles afterward." André said, always with a solemn and polite voice.

Evan and Michel heeded him. They took one pole each. They were made of steel and polished with white paint. They were also retractable, they measured only a meter with a naked eye, but they were probably going to measure two meters and a half or so when they retracted them; since both Michel and André were tall, that height would be more than ideal.

Evan took the pole a couple of meters away from the picnic table and planted it with all his might. Michel walked past him and stood at around five meters from him and did the same. Then, they proceeded to retract the poles and fixed them at the height of two meters and a half.

André came right after that with a disentangled net in his hands and tied the extremes of it tightly around the two poles. After that, the net was already set.

"Okay, ladies, the net is set already!" André shouted to Madeline, Belle, and Adelyn from his place near the net.

"Fantastic!" Madeline yelled back, giving them a thumbs-up before trotting toward the net with a perfectly inflated ball in her hands. "The ball is ready."

The other two girls walked up to the net after her, at a slower pace.

"Alright, ready to get beaten at your own game, Maddie?" Michel tried to provoke her, always in an amicable way.

"Me? Getting beaten? No, no, Your Highness, you're the one who'll bite the sand here." She replied, smiling mischievously.

"We'll see who wins this game. But no more bizarre prizes, Maddie, otherwise the Martís will never want to see us again." André warned her.

"Well, then, this will be a war between you and me, darling. Winner makes dinner." She declared, her smile warping.

André opened his gray eyes widely.

"Geez, we're not having almond mousse again for dinner! That's supposed to be a dessert! Not proper food! Ugh…" The crown prince groaned in frustration. "Guys, please do me a favor and play better than you ever did, I'm not having some weird-looking, overly sugary cream for dinner tonight."

"That's the spirit, brother!" Michel cheered on André, high-fiving him.

"Alright guys, choose your setter, we'll do the rotations after earning three points." Madeline informed.

The boys started talking among themselves, trying to decide what the best idea would be.

"Okay, Evan, you'll be the setter first, I'll go as the middle blocker and André will be the spiker, they'll do the service first, and the three of them seem to be good at this." Michel explained with a low voice.

Apparently, Michel was about to plot a strategic scheme for the victory to be theirs.

"So, when they do the service, they'll aim for the middle, most probably where Evan will be standing. If I'm quick enough, I'll manage to carry the service, otherwise, André will have to do it. Evan is taller than the three of them anyway, so he'll most probably be able to score a point if he does the service correctly."

He continued communicating his master plan in a low voice.

"After we rotate, I'll be the setter and we're gonna get those three points for sure, my services are fierce, there's no way they'll be able to carry them. At the last service, same as the first one but reversed, we don't know which one of them will be setting."

He now set his eyes on the short redhead that knew little to nothing about volleyball.

"Evan, you won't need to worry at all about anything. We will both be able to carry their services and those other three points will be ours!" Michel said, enthused. He clearly knew what he was talking about.

The three boys nodded simultaneously and positioned themselves by their side of the net. The girls were already set, Belle was doing the first service.

"Go, Belle!" Madeline yelled loudly.

Gabrielle did quite a poor service, the ball hit the net and plopped down to the sand. She whined, disappointed.

"Evan, your turn now." Madeline informed, doing an impeccable service to throw the ball at Evan's side of the net.

Evan caught it slightly frightened.

After a couple of seconds, he took a deep breath and did the service. Too far out this time, the ball landed some meters away from the girl's side. Adelyn had to go after it.

It was Belle's turn again. She did another bad service, this time, worse than the last one, as she didn't even manage to hit the ball. It fell right in front of her very feet. She whined again, feeling mortified.

"Belle, don't feel bad! You're gonna score the next one, I promise." Madeline tried to cheer her up a bit.

Evan's turn to do the service again. He took another deep breath and aimed for the middle, a bit at the left, where Belle was standing. He threw the ball up in the air and hit it with all of his might, trying to score.

The ball hit the ground effectively in the spot he was aiming for. Madeline didn't manage to carry it, and Adelyn aimed to carry it too early. Belle simply dodged the ball, fearing getting hurt.

He had scored. Michel and André shouted, cheering on him. Evan's citrine eyes shone brightly as he sketched a wide grin across his freckled face.

The girls' expressions looked slightly morose. It was Belle's turn to do the service again, and, hopefully, the last one.

Belle took the ball in her hands and tried to mimic Evan's moves. She aimed for the spot in the middle, where Evan was standing. Then, she tossed the ball into the air and hit it as fiercely as possible.

The ball managed to go past the net, but Michel quickly jumped and carried the service flawlessly. The ball brushed past Madeline's fingers and surpassed Adelyn's attempt to carry it by a few centimeters, landing a bit over the edge of the valid area, but still into it, scoring another point for the boys' team.

"Well done, Michel!" André yelled.

"Ugh, I'm so bad at this…" Belle said, sounding discouraged.

"You did it very well for being your first time." Said Madeline, giving her a pat on her shoulder to try cheering her up again.

They rotated their positions. Now, Evan was the spiker, André was the middle blocker, and Michel was the setter. On the girls' end, Madeline was the setter, Belle became the spiker and Adelyn the blocker.

The service was on Michel, who didn't even need to put effort on it. His service was high and harsh, making it impossible for the three girls not to fear getting hurt by the ball. He scored their fourth point just flawlessly without any difficulty.

"Ha! What's this, Maddie? Are tables turning? You still have time to surrender…" Michel teased.

"Not yet, Beaumont. Wait for my services, and you'll regret having said that." Madeline replied, she sounded quite intimidating now.

It was Madeline's first service. She aimed for the middle spot and calculated how much strength she'd need to reach the backmost area of it. She then threw the ball into the air and hit it with the necessary strength.

André jumped a slight bit and blocked the ball effortlessly, sending it back to the girls' side. Luckily, Adelyn managed to block it back nimbly and carried the ball, suspending it high into the air. Madeline saw the chance and jumped as high as she could, hitting the ball fiercely and making it land on the spot next to André. She had scored a point.

"Nicely done, Ade!" She cheered on the native Avevian girl.

Michel looked at Madeline with competitive disdain, ready to do the following service and not willing to fail to score.

He repeated the same technique, aiming at someplace in the middle, tossing the ball as high as he could, and hitting it with great power.

Adelyn was brave enough to jump and carry the service twice, once suspending the ball midair, and the other hitting it mightily and aiming for the spot right in the middle, thus landing another point.

"Woo-hoo! You rock, Ade!" Madeline cheered on her with enthusiasm.

Michel let out another groan, getting even more determined now to score another point again.

He aimed for a strategic point: he'd throw the ball near Madeline's spot because he knew either Madeline or Adelyn was going to block this service, he fixed his gaze on André, trying to use brotherly telepathy or something of the sort to warn him to block the carry back and try to aim for a spot on the front sides to score a point.

Once he was sure it could work, he tried to do the best he could. He threw the ball up in the air, just high enough to make sure some of those two would carry the service. He hit the ball vigorously and, what he expected to happen, just happened.

Adelyn blocked the service, and Madeline hit the ball. However, André not only blocked it back but also hit the ball ruthlessly that it brushed the net harshly, and landed on the leftmost side of the girls' field. André scored yet another point for them.

"Just give up already! You're not making almond mousse tonight, honey!" He yelled at Madeline, this time sounding already maddened by his fiancée's overly annoying stubbornness.

"In your dreams! We still have another set! And Adelyn will be the setter now. She's our best player, so get ready to get smacked!" Madeline replied, just as upset as her soon-to-be husband sounded.

It was Adelyn's turn to do the service, Evan feared for his life already, she could be a quite formidable opponent, at least at volleyball…

Adelyn took a deep breath, aiming for the backmost area of the middle of the boys' field, then she got into action. She threw the ball really high into the air and, with admirable dexterity, she jumped just as high to hit the ball with all of her might. She could even jump higher than André or Michel could!

But unluckily enough, she not only missed the point, but also aimed for the wrong area accidentally, and hit Evan on his forehead very hard.