by Tia Souders
He should’ve stayed away from her. He knew this, and yet here he was, at a Kimball party, competing against her for a prize he had no right to claim.
A kiss was off-limits.
Yet he’d do just about anything to win.
He had to give himself credit. He had even half convinced himself that he was capable of staying away.
Prior to arriving at the Kimball’s, he told himself he’d spend the day hanging with Dean and watching Jinny from a distance. No problem. It might be a little like self-torture, but he was a big man. He could handle it.
Then he showed up and saw her with her tight little workout clothes on, looking so young and adorable with her snippy comments and her blazing eyes. The bet had just slipped out of his mouth.
He knew how much her job meant to her. The last thing he wanted to do was jeopardize it. And his own situation was precarious enough as it was.
Then there was Dean. He would kill Emmett if he saw the way his gaze tracked Jinny’s every move. The way he watched her hips sway as she gloated after a win or how he fantasized pressing his mouth over those heart-shaped lips.
It didn’t matter how wrong he knew it all was. The moment he saw Jinny in the Kimball’s kitchen, all his reasons for keeping her at a distance faded away.
Maybe it didn’t matter though. He had done a fine job of making her hate him. Maybe he’d pushed her so far away that she’d never let him in.
He stepped up to the table with the plates. He had to admit, as goofy as this whole Kimball Olympics thing was, it was the most fun he’d had in a while. He was almost sorry for it to end. Mostly because he loved watching Jinny’s face light up when she won.
Jinny took her place next to him. The air between them snapped with tension.
The makeshift scoreboard—a giant dry-erase board—read Dean 2, Emmett 3, Jinny 3, and their Uncle Sal had shocked them all with a round eight win. It didn’t matter though, Sal had been effectively eliminated. Even if he won the final event, he had no chance of winning now.
It was down to Dean, Emmett, and Jinny. If Dean won, he would cause a three-way tie and force them into overtime.
Emmett noted the way Jinny glanced down at the flour-filled plate in front of her, then peeked at him out of the corner of her eye. He could practically feel her nerves.
His stomach tied in knots as he watched her.
With sun-pinkened cheeks and tendrils of hair that had escaped her ponytail, she looked effortlessly beautiful. Natural. Real. Like the proverbial girl next door everyone wanted, but no one was good enough to touch, least of all him.
He turned his attention back to his plate as the event was explained. Technique for this one was obvious. Buried somewhere in the plate of flour was a lifesaver. All they had to do was retrieve it with their mouth—no hands.
He readied himself, knowing the best way would be to hold his breath, dive in deep, and use his face to mash the excess flour off the plate, then grip the lifesaver with his front teeth. The key was being uninhibited, unafraid to get flour in your eyes, up your nose, and in your mouth.
Callie sidled up next to Jinny. He tried not to listen, but couldn’t help himself. It’s like his brain was a radio that only tuned in to Jinny’s frequency. Everything else was static.
Callie was giving her a pep talk. “You got this,” she said. “One more, and this is all yours. But we’re not putting the trophy on the shelf in our apartment.”
“We totally are,” Jinny whispered, focused.
Emmett hid his smile, amused that Callie chose to help Jinny instead of Dean. When he met her eye, Callie shrugged.
“What? Us girls have to stick together.”
Emmett nodded, but as Callie stepped away and Mrs. Kimball raised her hand, he noticed Jinny swallowing. Her hands shook slightly as she gripped them behind her back and bit her lip.
Winning this ridiculous competition meant something to her. Something bigger than Emmett knew. And, whatever it was, he suddenly didn’t want to take that away from her.
He stared at her furrowed brow, the crease between her eyes, as he contemplated what to do. Maybe he didn’t care about winning this competition, but he cared about the bet they’d made. He was used to getting what he wanted. Winning meant he got a kiss. And he wanted to kiss her more than he wanted to breathe.
When the whistle blew, he dived face-first into the flour. His execution was perfect as he pushed half of it off right out the gate and found the lifesaver with his lips. Just as he opened his mouth to nip it with his teeth, he heard Jinny beside him, coughing. He lifted his face just enough to see her—face caked in flour, like a ghost with two blinking eyes—hacking flour from her lungs.
Their eyes locked and she dived back down, wheezing as she did. She’d rather aspirate than lose.
Emmett clenched the lifesaver between his teeth and paused, biting down so hard he cracked it.
Crap.
He knew what he had to do.
He dropped the candy back to his plate and continued to root in the thick white dust. When a whistle blew, the winner was declared.
When he stood back up, the sight of Jinny raising her arms in victory tugged at his heart.
She beamed, completely giddy with excitement. She didn’t even bother to wipe the flour from her face as she did a cartwheel of victory, landed in a half split, and pointed at him. “Beat you!”
Moving to Dean, she poked him in the chest, gloating. “And you. And you, and you.” She hooted, pointing into the Kimball crowd.
Finally making a full circle with her rounds, she reached for the towels Callie was holding out at the same time Emmett did. Their hands met for a brief moment, long enough for electricity to spike his veins, adding to the twisting of his stomach.
He wiped his face with the damp towel. When he finished, he glanced back up to a half-clean version of Jinny.
Her snide grin was unmistakable as she fluttered her fingers in a wave. “Bye, Felicia.”
Dean sidled up next to him as he watched her go back into the house. “You were a fierce opponent, Hall.” Dean clapped him on the back. “I blame you for the next year of gloating I have to endure, but especially for the next twenty-four hours.”
Emmett shrugged, toying with the towel in his hands.
“Wait…” Dean narrowed his eyes in the silence. “You didn’t throw it, did you?”
Emmett’s head snapped up. “What?”
“No one loves winning more than you. And you won the apple bobbing. It’s similar…”
“I’m pretty sure no one is more competitive than Jinny.”
“If you threw it just so she could win, I’d have to question your motives.” Dean shook a finger at him.
Emmett ran a hand through his hair and took a step back. His heart raced as he protested. “Like I would let her win. That would be stupid. Why would I do that?”
Dean stared at him a moment, brows drawn low, before he broke into a smile and whipped him with his towel. “Nah, I’m just messing with you, man.” He doubled over in laughter. “You should’ve seen your face.”
Emmett exhaled in relief. “I kind of value my life.”
“Come on, I know you better than that. Like you’d go after my baby sister.” He clapped him on the back. “You know she’s off-limits.”
∞∞∞
He knew the terms of the bet. He knew Jinny expected for him to leave, to run away with his tail tucked between his legs. She had graciously reminded him so an hour ago. But Mrs. Kimball had insisted he stay and eat, ignoring his protests that he had somewhere else to be.
Hey, he’d tried. A little.
He watched while Jinny, the victor, sashayed around the buffet, with her medal around her neck, as she got first dibs on the food, taking half of her mother’s famous brownies out of spite. The plate sat in front of her, piled high with the fudgy dessert.
Emmett sat at the table across from hers, finishing the massive plate of food Mrs. Kimball had placed in front of him, while Jinny
stared daggers at him. It didn’t take long for Mrs. Kimball to notice he didn’t have any dessert.
She pointed at his plate and perked up. “Oh, you must have something sweet. Hold on a minute. You know, I’m famous for my brownies.”
Mrs. Kimball made a beeline straight for Jinny’s hoard. As she tried to steal one from the top, Jinny covered them with her arms, shielding them like Gollum from The Lord of The Rings with his precious.
After a moment of dancing around her, Mrs. Kimball swatted her arms away and went in for the kill as Jinny jerked to deflect her shots. Stealing a brownie from a hole in her defenses, Mrs. Kimball smiled.
“Traitor!” Jinny yelled.
“Here ya go, dear,” Mrs. Kimball said, handing it to him.
She sat down, oblivious to the staring contest he and her daughter were embroiled in.
Emmett arched a brow as he brought the brownie to his mouth and took a bite, moaning with pleasure and closing his eyes. But maybe he pushed it too far. Because when he opened them again, Jinny was gone.
Chapter twelve
Jinny
She skulked off, carrying her mountain of brownies, her hand hurting from the sheer weight of the plate.
She set it down on the kitchen counter with a loud thunk and crammed a brownie in her mouth while she stared out the window at Emmett, muttering to herself about take-backs, traitors, and lack of respect. Whoever said blood is thicker than water clearly didn’t know Emmett Hall. Or her mother.
“Traitors, all of them,” she seethed as she waved a brownie in front of the window.
Maybe she could get a new family for Christmas. Yup. That was going straight to the top of her wish list. She wondered if Amazon Prime delivered new family members. If so, that two-day shipping wouldn’t be fast enough.
Dean and Callie took a seat across from Emmett.
She huffed in annoyance as she watched. Looks like she’d be adding new BFF to the list, too.
Chomp, chomp, chomp. Her teeth gnashed at the massive brownie in her mouth, imagining it was Emmett’s skull her jaw was crushing. If the Kimball Olympics had a brownie eating competition, she would’ve demolished it.
She watched with wide eyes as her father approached Emmett next, two beers in hand, and offered him one.
NO. Don’t you take it.
Condensation dripped from the bottle in the afternoon heat. If it weren’t for the chocolate in her mouth, Jinny’d be drooling at the sight of the cold beverage. She had yet to have one. She’d been too consumed with hydrating for the competition. Consumed with winning—which she’d done. Yet, here she was, hiding out in the kitchen because Emmett didn’t know how to honor a bet.
Her eyes zoned in on the icy brew. Don’t even…
Her father laughed at something Emmett said, and before she knew it, Emmett smiled and accepted the bottle.
Jinny grunted and crammed another brownie in her mouth. Of course he took it. Sore loser. The Kimball Olympics was probably the first time in his life he ever lost anything. Especially to a woman. His giant-sized ego must be torn to shreds.
The thought made her smile. Several crumbs fell from her lips.
Maybe she should cut him some slack. The shock to his system must’ve given him temporary dementia. Clearly, he didn’t know how bets worked. If you won, you got what you wanted. If you lost, you didn’t. Honoring your side of the bargain wasn’t optional. At least not if you were a real man.
Plowing another hunk of dessert into her mouth, she glanced down to the half-empty plate and grumbled to herself, cheeks full.
Why was he still here? And was this her plan—to eat a bazillion empty calories as revenge?
Someone tapped her shoulder, and she froze in her closet, stress-eating. In slow motion, she lifted her gaze back to the window. Emmett’s seat at the picnic table was empty, and he was nowhere in sight.
She glanced up at the ceiling, expecting confetti and balloons to fall from the sky and rain down on her. Anytime now “Girl on Fire” by Alicia Keys would start playing.
Emmett had honored the bet. Victory was hers.
But instead of glee filling her blackened heart, her stomach twisted.
Must be the brownies. A bad batch. Emmett probably poisoned them when her back was turned.
There was another tap on her shoulder, followed by the clearing of someone’s throat, jolting her from her thoughts.
She had forgotten about the person behind her, and she instantly knew who it was. She could smell him, even if she couldn’t see him.
His cologne hit her like a freight train. The glorious scent of cedarwood, earth, and spice, with a hint of sweat. She took a deep breath, pinching her eyes closed and breathing it in. Then she glanced behind her as she stifled a gag. How nauseating.
She was fully aware of her cheeks stuffed to the helm with brownie—practically bursting. The chocolate had turned to paste in her mouth. She couldn’t swallow if she tried.
With as much dignity as she could muster, she spit the glop of food into the garbage disposal, washing it down with tap water.
“Finished with your dessert?” he asked.
Jinny turned around and smiled. Please, don’t let there be chocolate in her teeth.
“Of course. I just didn’t want you to have any. But seeing as how the woman I used to call my mother stole one from me anyway…” She trailed off, turning her gaze away.
He didn’t deserve her undivided attention. He got enough of it throughout the week.
Emmett moved in, stepping close and forcing her to back up until the edge of the counter pressed into her lower back. She had nowhere else to go.
He reached for her arms. “Jinny, listen—”
“Hey.” Dean’s voice cut him off, and Emmett’s hands dropped to his sides so fast Jinny thought she’d imagined it.
She glanced toward her brother. His frown said it all. She hadn’t imagined it, and Emmett had been too close for his comfort.
“Are you ready?” Dean asked, looking at her.
Jinny’s eyes lit up. The trophy. “Of course.”
“Let’s go, then,” he said.
Once they made their way outside, they stood in front of their closest friends and family as Dean gave up the trophy. He handed it over to her, denouncing his title as the Kimball Ninja Warrior.
Jinny took it, eyes brimming with tears as she hugged the golden statue to her chest. She and Dean had created the trophy when they were ten, and it had aged well over the years. It looked like some deranged form of the Academy Awards statue, with a bald Barbie duct-taped to one of Dean’s old basketball trophies from middle school. Superglued to the sides were two giant wings and a cluster of silk flowers, all spray painted a gaudy metallic gold. It was the most hideous, yet beautiful sight she had ever seen.
“I’d like to thank my brother for being a fierce competitor,” Jinny said, “who in the end submitted defeat. Better luck next year, buddy.” She flashed him a pitying look. “And for Emmett Hall for being second best. Hopefully, this taught you that there are winners and losers in life, and I, Jinny Kimball, will never be the loser.”
Her family chuckled good-naturedly as she raised the trophy in the air then kissed it. Once the crowd parted—a little too quickly, in her opinion—she took her trophy back into the house. She’d place it in her old bedroom until it was time to leave. She didn’t trust Dean not to swipe it and run.
Setting it down on her old desk, she turned and jumped at the shadowy figure looming in the doorway. “Gah!” She placed a hand over her racing heart. “Why are you always sneaking up on me?”
Emmett stood in the threshold of her room, looking like a giant in the small space. He shoved his hands in the pockets of his black gym shorts, allowing his gaze to drift over her belongings.
“So…this is Jinny Kimball’s lair.”
Jinny snorted. “My lair?”
“You know, you can learn a lot about a person from their teenage bedroom.”
“Is that so?” She
crossed her arms over her chest, trying to quell the fluttering in her stomach.
Emmett stepped over to a shelf and lifted a framed photo of Jinny and Callie from junior high.
“Please, make yourself at home.”
He set the photo back and moved closer to her bed, pausing as he smiled at the posters on her wall. “Brad Pitt? Really?” he asked, arching a brow. “Let me guess, A River Runs Through It? Legends of the Fall? Or was it The Curious Case of Benjamin Button that got you all googly-eyed?
Jinny scoffed. “Fight Club.”
Emmett laughed like she’d told a hilarious joke. She didn’t see what was so funny.
He turned around, and she wondered what it looked like through his eyes. The creamy walls with posters of movie stars and bands. The old jewelry box on her dresser. The faded photos stuck to nearly every surface. Mainly ones of her and Callie growing up through various phases of life. Her frilly pink bedspread and old CD collection.
“I didn’t know you played ball,” Emmett said, picking up one of the trophies off her desk.
“There are a lot of things you don’t know about me.”
Jinny grinned when his eyes latched onto hers and he said nothing. That shut him up.
“Anyway, what are you doing up here?” she asked, picking at the peeling paint on the edge of her footboard.
She didn’t like him in her space. There was only one of him, yet the room filled with his presence. It was like he was everywhere.
“I just came to say goodbye.”
Her gaze lifted to his. “You’re leaving?” she asked. “Er…I mean, good. You’re leaving.”
Emmett cocked his head, then took a step forward. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you didn’t want me to leave.”
“That’s ridiculous.” She toed the nap of the throw rug under her feet.
“Is it?” Emmett stalked forward, closing the distance between them.
“I named my stakes, didn’t I?”
“You did,” Emmett confirmed, but his words contradicted the knowing grin on his face. “But, I wonder…”
He paused in front of her and widened his eyes. “You tried to throw the contest. That whole coughing thing with the flour was all an act. Maybe you wanted me to win? You secretly wanted me to beat you so that you’d have an excuse to kiss me.”