Page 46 of Naughty & Nice
Jealousy…
“Get a fucking grip,” I mutter to myself as I rip open a bag of chips and pour them into two bowls. Something tells me that I’m going to be kicked off the couch now.
Their laughter continues as I grab beers and head back out with the bowls precariously balanced on my hand and arm.
Unsurprisingly, they’re cuddled up on the couch. It’s not an unusual position for them to be in, but if it’s possible, they look even closer than ever now.
Hendrix spots me the second I walk into the room, and his eyes follow me as I place everything on the coffee table in front of him.
“Good enough for you, Sir?” I mock.
“It’s great,” Noelle says, leaning forward to grab two of the beers.
She passes one to Hendrix, but he’s too busy glaring at me to notice.
“I get that you’re pissed with me, Rix. I’m sorry. I fucked up. But can you blame me? You’ve seen her; she’s hot.”
“She is sitting right here.” Noelle scoffs.
“Yeah, and you’re hot. But seriously, we’re going to be stuck here for a few days at least by the looks of it, you can’t stay pissed all that time.”
“You wanna bet?”
“But it’s Christmas,” I state. “And we’re family.”
“You were meant to be in a different country right now,” Hendrix mutters.
“Yeah, well, aren’t you lucky that I’m not? You might not have come in your pants just now if I were elsewhere.”
“Will you just shut the hell up?”
I shrug before dropping into the chair with my bottle of beer and bowl of chips.
“What are we watching?” I ask, although I already have a very good idea.
“Christmas movie,” Noelle says.
“Wonderful. I hope there’s a good car chase and gunfight.”
I feel the heat of her stare when she turns it on me, but I don’t look back. I don’t need to give Hendrix another reason to hate me right now.
“You’d be so lucky. Pretty sure it’s Hallmark,” my brother mutters.
“Even better. I fucking love Christmas,” I say before throwing a handful of chips into my mouth.
We fall into a comfortable silence as the movie begins. As predicted, it’s cheesy as fuck and possibly the most cringeworthy thing I’ve ever seen. But Noelle seems to enjoy it, and I guess that’s the main thing here.
It’s only about twenty minutes in when my cell buzzes in my pocket and I find a message from Benny, one of my teammates, in our group chat.
I lose myself messaging the guys, trying to ignore the presence of the couple in front of me.
They look cute. Too fucking cute, and I can’t help but find myself wondering what it would be like to find a girl I actually wanted to spend time with outside of the bedroom, or the back of my car, or the locker room…
It’s a bizarre concept, but it soon hits me that Noelle is the only girl I’ve ever really spent any time with. All the others… they’ve never interested me enough to give me a reason to keep them around.
I tell myself that it’s because she’s Hendrix’s best friend, that I haven’t had a choice in having her in my life. But I can’t help wondering if it’s more than that.
There’s a break in the group chat, and I risk looking up. I want to say I’m surprised that neither of them is watching the movie and they’re instead having a hot and heavy make-out session, but I’m not. They’ve both been waiting for this for years; I guess it’s only right they try and make up for lost time.