Page 30 of Own the Eights
Save the Whales glanced over at him. “Do you think that guy’s all right?”
“He’s fine.” She turned to Jordan. “Sir, you should check out the herbal teas on aisle five. They’re great for cough suppression.”
Red-faced, Jordan blinked back tears of laughter and moved down the row toward a rack of bananas.
“You really want to make sure you’ve got a firm cucumber,” she continued, because, despite the whole phallic symbolism of this convo, once the cucumber door opens, there’s no going back.
“My cucumber’s not firm?” Save the Whales asked as the hacking laughter of Jordan Marks again tore through the produce department.
“No, you need it to be a little firmer.”
Save the Whales stared at the vegetable. “Thanks for the tip.”
“And speaking of tips…” she continued.
A round of thuds erupted behind her. Jordan, in a hissy fit of laughter, had bumped into a display of onions.
She ignored him and pressed on. “You’ll want to make sure it’s firm all the way to the ends or tips.”
Save the Whales stared at the bin of cucumbers. “All this time I’ve been eating cucumbers, I never knew to check for firmness.”
“They’re also actually a fruit because they come from a flower and contain seeds, but I’ve probably gone way overboard with the cucumber lecture,” she said with an embarrassed smile.
Save the Whales chose a new, firm cucumber, added it to his basket, then shifted from foot to foot. “Do you live around here?”
Georgie’s trifecta perked up.
“Not too far from here,” she answeredas cool as a cucumberand snuck a glance at Jordan.
“I’m new to the city. Could I get your number, and maybe we could hang out and make cucumber salad?”
Triumph surged through her veins. If this were a superhero movie, she’d levitate a few feet above the ground, blast Jordan with her laser beam eyes, and give the nice whale activist her number. Unfortunately, she’d never come into contact with a radioactive spider, nor did she hail from a distant superpower planet, so she’d have to settle for the latter.
But it was still a win for her Own the Eights philosophy.
She expected to hear another bout of cough-laughter, but when she glanced over her shoulder, this time, she’d found Jordan stock still, clutching a potato with a vengeance completely undeserving of the root vegetable. She threw him a sweet screw-you smile and exchanged numbers with…
“Steve,” she said, glancing at her phone’s screen where he’d entered his information.
“Georgie,” he said, staring at his. “Is that short for Georgia?”
“No, Georgiana.”
Steve smiled. “That’s a lovely name for a lovely—”
The cough was gone, but the guttural sound of Jordan clearing his throat echoed off the organic beets and stopped Steve from finishing his sentence.
She took a step back and smiled at her Save the Whales conquest. “I should finish my shopping. But I hope I’ll see you around, Steve.”
“Yeah, me too. Nice to meet you, Georgie,” Steve replied with a kind smile, apropos of one who cares deeply for the ocean, then weaved his way toward the checkout.
She blew out a relieved breath when she felt Jordan come up behind her, and she had the bizarre desire to lean back into his brick wall of a torso. Gah! Why did that have to be her first thought? She’d done it! She’d proved her method was just as good as his, but she couldn’t remember one thing about Save the Whales Steve other than his shirt.
With Jordan, she remembered everything. His clean scent. How his green eyes darkened when he gazed at her. The four freckles on his left forearm that looked like the handle of the big dipper. She tensed as her lady parts begged to climb back onto his lap and rock her body against his hard—”
“Cucumber,” Jordan said, and she gasped, shaking all thoughts of doing anything with his cucumber out of her head.
This lapse in judgment was just the superficial cavewoman who dwelled in the primitive brainstem of every woman, trying to claw her way past the rational Own the Eights intelligent, conscientious side of her and procreate with this, or any other, member of the male species. But she was an eights gal and that meant that Jordan and his Perfect Ten Mindset was nothing she wanted in her life.
