to hit it.
It took four tries.
“Yeah, that worked,” he snarked as I took the paper away from him.
“Oh, shut up.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN – IVY
“You’re thirty dollars deep. It’s ridiculous. You can buy like five bears for that in any normal store.”
“I know, but I want this one.”
“It’s just a stuffed bear.”
“It’s a cute stuffed bear.”
“I think you’ve lost your mind.”
“I think you’ve lost yours.”
“I have. That’s why I’m still standing here waiting for you to attempt to win this thirty-dollar bear,” I said, leaning against the next machine.
Kai ran out of turns and put more coins in the slot. I shook my head. I had no idea why he was so desperate for this bear, but I was getting tired.
Although it was funny to see him lose so miserably after he’d totally kicked my ass at golf.
I sighed. “I’m tired and hungry. That took a lot out of me. Can we go if you don’t win this time?”
He looked between me and the bear he was desperately trying to win. “I suppose.”
That was better than ‘no,’ I guess.
I watched as he tried two more times to no avail. Gritting his teeth, he maneuvered the grabber for his one final try. I didn’t know why he was trying so hard—it was just a bear, just a stupid freaking bear from a grabber that probably cost the owners of this place fifty cents in some mass purchase from China.
Look, just because I’d spent all my allowance here when I was a kid didn’t mean I couldn’t be a hypocrite now, okay?
The grabber claws closed around the bear and lifted it up.
I raised my eyebrows. This had happened like fifteen times already, and not a single one had made it into the tub.
So shock jolted through me when this bear not only made it to the edge of the machine, but into the chute that meant Kai had won it.
“Ha!” He punched the air and bent down.
He stuck his arm through the flap and retrieved the cream bear with a red tartan ribbon tied around its neck in a bow. I had to admit that it looked softer outside of the glass than in, and it was kind of cute in a lopsided-eyes kind of way.
He held it out to me. “Here.”
“You spent thirty-five dollars on this bear for me?” I raised my eyebrows.
His lips pulled to one side. “No. I just spent thirty-five dollars and ten minutes of my life trying to win this bear for the baby.”
My lips parted, and I reached out to take the bear from him. It was ugly as hell with its lopsided eyes and its loosely stitched nose, and its bow looked like something out of Scotland in the seventeen hundreds, but oh, my God.
I didn’t know if I’d ever loved a bear more than this one.
“Are you going to cry?”
I swallowed. “Maybe. Can I?”
He choked back a laugh and wrapped me in his arms, squishing the bear between us. I hugged it tightly as Kai did the same to me, and thankfully, I didn’t actually cry.
Phew.
Thank God for small mercies.
I pulled back and shrugged off any lingering emotional moments. “I’m just hungry.”
“Of course you are,” Kai said, wrapping his arm around me. “What do you want to eat? Chinese?”
I shook my head.
“Thai food?”
“Ugh, no. I don’t like Thai on a normal day.”
“A burger?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Two pints of ice-cream?”
I paused. “That’s not really dinner, is it?”
“Why don’t we get pizza on the way back? The pizza place is just up the street from the grocery store. I’ll run in and get you ice-cream if you can wait for the pizza.”
“God, talk dirty to me.”
“Hot, gooey, cheesy pizza.” He leaned in, his lips brushing against my hair. “With a cheesy stuffed crust and crispy pepperoni, followed by all the ice-cream you eat without any judgement from anyone.”
“Yep, now I’m turned on.”
Kai snorted and unlocked his truck. “Get in, you lunatic.”
“Hey, you started the dirty talk. It’s not my fault if pizza and ice-cream is sexy right now.”
Yep. I was definitely not going to fit into my skinny jeans in a few months. Sigh.
I got into the truck, once again with him opening and closing the door for me. He followed suit and we pulled out of the golf complex’s parking lot. The traffic was light for a Sunday, so it didn’t take us long to get across town to Hot Stone Pizzeria.
Armed with the order, I went inside to order while he went to the grocery store