“That one wasn’t dangerous. I used to hide and cover my mouth to stifle my giggles because I was sure I was so damn good at it. Or at least that’s what my brothers always told me.” I give a humorless laugh. “When I finally came out of my hiding place, I’d find them downstairs playing video games. They told me I was so good they had to give up. It took me a while to figure out they were ditching me.”
She laughs. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to laugh. That was mean.”
“We used to play king and guard, too. Have you heard of it?” She shakes her head no. “Of course not. They made it up.” She eyes me, waiting for me to explain. “My brothers would take turns being kings and order me around. Mainly I was doing their chores for them.” Kira covers her smile with her wineglass and takes a small sip. “Go ahead and laugh,” I say, and she does. It’s contagious, and I can’t help but laugh with her.
“Here’s one they had fun with.” I lean toward her. “We’d all get ten chicken nuggets, right? They were our favorite, and we’d eat out once a week. My brothers would take turns playing the chicken nugget game.”
“Oh no, do I want to hear this?” She tugs her lip between her teeth, and my gaze falls to it for a brief second.
“Hey, you opened this can of worms.”
“Oh, please tell me there weren’t worms.”
I laugh. “No worms, but what they’d do is challenge me to see who could eat ten nuggets first. I would go up against a different brother each week, and I’d always win.”
“Really?”
“Sure, because one of the others would point out that if they helped me eat five, then I only had to eat five against the brother eating ten. So every week, one of my brothers got fifteen nuggets, and I only ever got five.”
“Oh, Nate,” she says chuckling. “Your brothers were horrible.”
“Yeah, no shit.”
Jenny brings our food, and Kira and I go silent for a moment as we take our first bites. I dig into my lobster macaroni and savor the flavor.
“How’s yours?” I ask.
She dips her spoon in again, blows on the chowder, and slides the utensil into her mouth. My cock twitches as her lips part, and when she makes a sexy bedroom noise, I shift uneasily.
Down boy.
“Sooo good,” she practically moans, and for a second, I visualize her saying that to me while I have her in my bed.
Think of something else, Nate.
“There was a game called Best Bad Chef, where I had to eat things they made and vote one the worst, but the worst was when they took up boxing. Can you guess who became the punching bag?”
Her hand slides across the table and closes over mine. “Oh, no.”
“I learned how to take a punch, that’s for sure, and I learned how to give one.”
“They could have killed you.”
“That might have been the plan.”
Spoon halfway to her mouth she asks, “Where the heck were your parents?”
“Dad was rarely around, but things changed for me when my mother, who was his third wife, finally came from her room, caught on to what her stepsons were doing, and tried to put a stop to it. Tried being the key word here.” But by that time, she was sad and lonely with Dad on the road so much and spent most of her time locked away in her bedroom.
“Third wife?”
Fuck, why am I telling her all this? I’m considering my answer, not wanting to go into the details, when Jenny pops back to see how our first bites were.
“Fantastic, as usual,” I say.
“Best chowder I ever had,” Kira says, and Jenny smiles.
“I’ll be sure to let the chef know.” She spins and heads to the kitchen.
“About that third wife,” Kira says, taking us back to where we were cut off.