I stepped inside and placed the order, then took a seat to wait. It wasn’t that busy, which hopefully meant I wouldn’t be hanging around here for too long.
Which, in turn, meant I wouldn’t have to sit here and think about kissing Imogen anymore.
For at least five minutes, anyway.
Maybe.
Fuck.
This was not how I’d planned my evening. First Dolly’s little feast—and I still had to figure out exactly how she’d gotten into that chocolate—and now all I could think about was grabbing Immy and kissing her.
And the pizza.
Jesus, I needed to pick something to obsess over and get on with it.
My order was thankfully called before I could wrap myself up in any more knots. I took it from the young girl and checked everything, then thanked her and headed back out to Immy’s car.
“Oh, God, that smells like heaven,” she groaned when I got in. “Belt up, let’s go, I’m starving.”
Laughing, I clipped my seatbelt into place and held tightly onto the pizza boxes as she tore out of the parking lot onto the main road.
“All right, we can’t actually eat the pizza if we die on the way there,” I pointed out.
“Well, at least I won’t be hungry anymore,” she grumbled, hitting the blinker stick.
“You’d rather be dead than hungry?”
“You haven’t seen me hungry, Mason. The only reason I’m not turning green and ripping my shirt off is because you’re in the car.”
“I’ll take a raincheck on the turning green, but if you’d like to remove your shirt, there’ll be no complaints from me.”
She shot me a look that could kill. “My shirt will be staying firmly on unless there’s a baby animal in need of rescue.”
“You’ve already rescued one baby animal today, Imogen.”
“I know. That’s exactly why my shirt is staying on.” Another look lingered for a moment until she pulled away from the junction and took the turn that would lead us back home.
We didn’t say another word for the rest of the ride. I didn’t think me suggesting I could help her take the shirt off just in case we found a hurt squirrel or something would move this conversation along.
It would probably get my pizza shoved in my face, and I was hungry.
Immy pulled into her driveway, and I grabbed the pizza order and the bag from the liquor store. The curtains covering her living room window twitched, and she raised her hand and stuck her middle finger up in the direction of it.
Jen.
Biting back a chuckle, I headed for my front door. And stopped—my keys were in my pocket.
Shit.
“What’s wrong?”
“My keys are in my pocket,” I replied. “And my hands are full.”
Her nostrils flared. “Which pocket?”
“Front right.”
She stepped forward and stuck her hand in my pocket, fishing for the keys. One of her fingers brushed precariously close to my groin, and I gritted my teeth. The last thing I needed was my cock to wake up.
She pulled the keys out of my pocket with a yank and stuck the house key in the lock. With a turn of the key, she unlocked the door. “There,” she said, turning around. “Are you happy now?”
“I was going to suggest you took the food so I could get the keys, but being partially felt up by you has definitely made this day better.”
A noise that was somewhere between a squeak of frustration and a growl escaped through her pursed lips, and she whipped me with my own keys.
“Ow!”
“You deserved that!” She stormed into the house ahead of me and tossed the keys on the small unit near the door.
I grinned. Her own impatience had gotten her into this situation, and I knew she wasn’t mad at me.
She was mad at herself.
She’d jumped the gun, after all.
I took the pizza and alcohol into the living room where Immy was wrestling with the TV remote. Deciding to leave her, I detoured back to the kitchen where I grabbed her a wine glass and the corkscrew.
“Really? Friends? Haven’t you grown out of that obsession?” I asked, handing her the empty glass.
She snapped her head around so fast I was surprised it was still attached to her neck. “Grow out of Friends? Nobody grows out of Friends, Mason. You grow with it. I relate to Joey far more now than I ever did.”
“Are you secretly a starving actress?”
“No. I don’t share food.” She reached over and grabbed the garlic bread balls from the pile of boxes and put them on her lap.
“You’ve never shared food.”
“Why would I share my food? It’s mine.”
“It’s polite.”
“No. If we spent more time teaching kids that it’s okay not to share every single thing that belongs to them, maybe people would stop expecting something for nothing.” She shoved a garlic bread ball in her mouth with a grin.
“You’re philosophical tonight.”
“What can I say? Saving a puppy’s life and being hungry brings out my inner prophet.”
“And your ability to also speak while you eat.”
She shrugged, reaching for the bottle of wine. “When I’m this hungry, manners go out the window.”
“Should we teach kids that, too?”
“No. They already waste food by throwing it on the floor. Don’t let them waste anything else. Goddamn it!” She tapped the top of the wine bottle.
I took it from her wordlessly and inserted the screw into the cork. Five seconds later, I had the cork out and was pouring her a glass.
She sniffed. “Thank you.”
“It’s just a cork.”
“I buy screw caps normally. Corks make it more difficult to get into wine than it needs to be.”
“Then why did you buy a cork this time?”
A smile tugged at her lips. “I bought a more expensive wine. It was your money.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN – MASON
Pizza Might Be The Answer, Though
I tried to glare at her, but I failed. Instead, I laughed and grabbed my pizza box, ignoring the twinge of familiarity that brought back.
Even though she wasn’t old enough to drink in college, that didn’t mean she never did. In my senior year, she’d sometimes give me money to get her a bottle of wine at the store, and she would always tell me the same brand—six dollars a bottle, and nice and cheap for the starving college student.
It paired well with ramen.
One time, the store was out of her favorite wine, and I had to buy her a more expensive bottle, so naturally, I’d paid for it. Ever since that day, she’d always asked me to get her the cheap wine when it was her money, but always mentioned the more expensive bottle when it was mine.
I glanced at the bottle.
It was the same brand I used to buy her in college—with my money.
I hid a smile and kicked off my shoes to sit back on the sofa. Immy was already sitting in the corner with her legs crossed and the pizza box balancing on her lap. The little pot of ranch was in the corner of that box, and the garlic bread balls were on the middle cushion between us.
I’d steal one when she wasn’t looking.
I cracked open a beer and took a long drink, then ate. I’d never understood Friends despite the number of hours I’d been forced to watch it by Immy. It had just never been my kind of show, but now, I found myself snorting along when she laughed.