Page 72 of Whiskey Chase
I cleared my throat, trying to soften the chicken with my saliva. “I like you, too,” I said through my mouthful. No amount of chewing was going to make this chicken softer. I was either going to have to swallow it whole and choke on it or spit it out.
“Well, since we like each other. I don’t think that you should just up and leave without at least talking to me about it first, and if you think I’d be okay with you having sex with someone else, you aresorely mistaken.” Her voice rose.
“Are you breaking up with me?” I demanded, moving the chicken to the side of my mouth.
“What? No!” She looked horrified. “I’m doing the opposite.”
“You’re asking me to be your boyfriend?”
Scarlett looked uncomfortable. She shrugged one shoulder. “I’m not really asking. It’s more like telling than asking.”
I sucked in a breath to laugh and lodged the chicken between my tonsils. My laugh became a coughing fit.
She jumped up and slapped me on the back. I managed to spit the chicken out into my napkin. “Excuse me,” I gasped.
“Are you okay?”
“Just went down the wrong pipe,” I said, gulping down my wine.
Scarlett sat back down and forked up a mushy lump of asparagus. I didn’t care how much I liked her. I wasn’t touching that green slime.
“So, what do you think?” she asked, her pretty gray eyes pulling me in.
I thought the chicken was a biohazard.
“I thought you didn’t want to talk about relationships,” I said. “The first time we had sex, I tried to bring it up, and you shut me down.”
Scarlett took a deep breath. “I just never expected to get so attached to you. And now if you were to just pack up and go home, I’d be… upset.” Her eyes narrowed, and she pointed her drippy glob of asparagus at me. “And I’d be real upset if I caught you showing off that cock to anyone else.”
“Scarlett, I’m not going anywhere for the time being, and I certainly wouldn’t leave without at least talking to you first. And I don’t know where you’re getting the idea that I’d want to be with anyone else when I have you. There’s no one out there like you. I’d be the biggest idiot in the world to keep looking when I have you in my bed.”
She beamed at me, and I felt the tension in my shoulders relax. “Really?”
“Really.”
She grinned and wiggled in her seat. I watched in horror as she shoveled the asparagus into her pretty mouth. Her face froze, and then her eyes widened as the realization hit her. She clamped a hand over her mouth.
I shoved her napkin at her. “Spit it out before you vomit,” I ordered.
“Gah!” She grabbed the napkin and pressed it to her mouth. “Ohmygod. Ohmygod. Ohmygod.”
I held out her wine glass. “Drink.”
She drained the glass like she had the beer the first night I met her.
Scarlett put the glass down with a clunk. “That was the worst thing I’ve ever put in my mouth.”
“You didn’t try the chicken yet,” I pointed out.
“Man!” she wailed, throwing the napkin of masticated disaster on the table. “I just wanted tonight to be perfect!”
I reached across the table and held her hand. “Baby, it is.”
“No. It’s not! The food is horrible, and I got all nervous and basically forced you to be my boyfriend, and I’m really hungry and all we’ve got is half a potato each!”
I used my grip on her hand to pull her out of her chair and over into my lap.
She sat stiffly against me, and I hid my smile. Her stubborn streak was a mile-wide like my gran would say.
