“It’s a requirement, with these gorgeous kernels.”
“Mmm.”His gaze drops to the popcorn jar, but it kind of equates to him looking at my chest, which only further delights the sixteen-year-old inside me.“On a scale of one to ten, I’d give them a ten.”
I’ll pretend he’s saying that about my boobs, at least for a few delusional seconds.“Everyone knows about Mrs.Harlow’s kernels,” I say as I oil the pot and set the heat.
“Legendary kernels,” Griffin goes on, not missing a beat.“Voluptuous, even.”
I dump half of the mason jar into the pot, then smile over at him.“Plentiful.”
“Kernels for days,” he returns.
“An eternal, never ending, kernel train that enters our mouths and winds through our—”
“What are you guystalking about?”Piper interrupts me before I can say the wordintestines, which is probably a good thing.She looks highly amused, her gaze flicking back and forth between me and Griffin with suspicion, like she caught us kissing or something.
“The popcorn!”I say, gesturing to the pot.“What else would it be?”
“Still doesn’t fully make sense, but okay.”Piper grins as she heads past me to the fridge, pulling it open and removing a hard cider.I focus on the popcorn, feeling like that sixteen-year-old again.Before I can verify that Griffin is feeling it too, Kru has called him over for input on a lively debate that’s cropped up between him and Branson regarding fly fishing.I tune out, because I’m trying to relive the oddly sexy conversation with Griffin about honey and corn kernels.
But my reverie doesn’t last long.Once the popcorn is ready, it’s go time.I move over to the couch, where positions have rearranged after the fly-fishing debate.I’m right between Piper and an empty space for Griffin.Thank you, B-movie gods.I pass around the bowl of popcorn, trying to play it absolutely cool while I wait for Griffin to finish adjusting the speaker connection and sit next to me.Not like I think I’ll end up curled in his lap or anything, but having his manly heat next to me doesn’t sound like an awful way to spend an evening.Even if it doesn’t end with him touching my gorgeous kernels.The ones on my body, that is.
“Let’s get ready forNightbeast” Griffin finally says, lowering the lighting.We alloohandaah,and then the movie starts and Griff fills the space next to me.
We’re not touching.It’s a big couch, so it’s not like we need to sit elbow to elbow.
But as the movie starts, all I can focus on is measuring the space between us.Figuring out if it’s one inch or three inches.I swear I can feel the air buzzing, and it takes an epic bout of bad acting to pull me out of my Griff stupor.
The bowl of popcorn is passed around.Once it hits my lap, I reach for a handful at the same time Griffin does.Our knuckles brush, and my thighs clench.Dear god,I am too attracted to this man.I glance guiltily at him, but he’s looking at the TV screen.Of course he is.Because he’s not one more popcorn kernel away from orgasming, like some of us on this couch.
I stuff my wild attraction to this man deep down inside me and force myself to comprehend the movie.There is a bug-eyed alien with a ray gun and a sheriff desperately trying to get it to stop its killing spree.Not only that, there’s a supremely awkward sex scene that makes us all cackle with laughter.It’s an outrageous hour before the movie ends and we are watching each other in shock.
“I can’t believe we just watched that whole thing,” Piper blurts.
“I can feel the alien in my brain, I think,” Kru laments.
“What do we think?”Griffin looks over, the glow of the television showing me that his eyes are on me.Heat spreads through me again as I think about the knuckle brush and the kernels and the fact that I would ride this man for hours if there was an alien coming to kill us with a ray gun.
“In a nutshell?Cheesy and bad.”I reach for a few flecks of leftover popcorn in the bowl.
“I think I’m getting a headache from the bad acting,” Branson’s date, Kylie, says.
“So it sounds like it did exactly what it was supposed to,” Griffin says as he stands from the couch.Soon the lights are back on and we’re still processing what hilarity and badness we just ingested.Griffin cracks a beer and offers me one.I take it gratefully, burrowing into the couch a bit more.Piper sends me another one of those suspicious looks as she and Kru get up from the couch.
“I think we’re gonna call it a night,” she says with a yawn.“We have an early morning tomorrow.”
“Thanks for sharing your time with theNightbeast,” Griffin says, giving his sister and Kru easy hugs.
“He was kind of a day beast half the time, now that I think about it,” Kru says before they head to the door.There’s a bit more discussion about the poorly crafted eighties alien, and then it’s just us.
Two couples.
If Griffin and I were dating, which we’re not.
“You down for another B-movie?”Branson pinches Kylie’s waist, but she groans.
“I’ll get a migraine if I watch anything else made in the eighties,” she whines.“Let’s go to karaoke night.”
Branson’s brows lift as his gaze slides to Griffin.“What do you think?”