Neanderthal by Avery Flynn

Chapter Thirteen

Griff

Griff was many things—stubborn, surly, and stuck in his ways—but he was not the type of guy to kiss someone in any kind of relationship, let alone someone who was engaged. He wasn’t that type of asshole, but at the moment, he sure as hell wished he was.

Kinsey was so close. Literally, all he’d have to do was dip his head down and—

Yeah, shut the fuck up, brain, because it’s not happening.

Shoving his fingers through his hair, he grumbled who the fuck knows what as he took a step back and then another and another until he was in the living room. As if they’d all been waiting for him, the Becketts—and soon-to-be-Beckett Fiona—turned as one and looked at him. He sucked in a breath, prepping for whatever the hell was about to happen next, and ripped off the Band-Aid.

“Kinsey responded to my ad,” he said, already bracing for the onslaught that was sure to follow. “She’s my date.”

There was three seconds of shocked silence, and then the living room erupted with almost everyone talking at once.

“She’s engaged,” Bristol said, her eyes wide.

Morgan followed up a heartbeat later with, “You know her!”

“You set the whole thing up, you devious ass.” Dixon chuckled. “I gotta admire it.”

Before he could even open his mouth, Kinsey squeezed past him through the doorway and walked right into the eye of the hurricane.

“One, it was my idea,” she said, her chin tilted upward just enough to let everyone know what to expect if they doubted her. “Two, there’s nothing in the rules as I understand them that requires the date to be a stranger; please correct me if I’m wrong. Three, I am pre-engaged, and there’s nothing in the rules about that, either. In the future, I’d suggest you take a more thorough consideration of what is and is not acceptable prior to the start of your bet’s time frame.”

It was like the gym all over again. Everyone just stood there with their jaws scraping the floor because Kinsey had wrapped the whole thing up with a few choice words in less time than it had taken for most everyone else to process the news.

“She’s not wrong,” Griff said, unable to stop himself from grinning at the unique situation of being the one Beckett not at a loss for words.

Fine. It wasn’t nice to rub his cousin’s face in it, but she had them both by the short hairs, and he was here for it.

“There are the rules and then there is the spirit of the rules,” Dixon grumbled.

“Like Kinsey said,” Griff added with a shrug, enjoying the moment way more than he probably had a right to. “You should have thought of that beforehand.”

Fiona turned to her fiancé, her hands on her hips. “And are you really going to be poking your nose in it, Dixon Beckett, when you’ve already lost the bet?”

For a guy who’d always compared falling in love to losing out on life, it was obvious that Dixon had never been so glad as when he’d lost the bet and it showed in his face when he looked down at Fiona. “And thank God I did.”

“Good recovery.” She pushed herself up on her tiptoes and gave Dixon a quick kiss. “Really, if anyone has the right to be annoyed, though, it’s Nash.”

But Nash was just standing there in the corner, not saying a word while watching the rest of the room with a shit-eating grin on his face.

It only took a matter of seconds for Griff to realize Nash was up to something and whatever it was, Nash wasn’t the least bit pissed off about the guarantee that he was about to lose the bet for Grandma Betty’s last present. The only way that was possible was if something else was at play. For the entirety of their lives, the Beckett cousins had competed against one another. No matter if it was being king of the island at their grandma’s house, racing her attack goose, or even getting the first choice of desserts, half of the joy of winning was beating out the other two. It wasn’t that they didn’t like one another, it was just the way they were.

But Nash didn’t seem to give a rat’s ass that there was no way Griff could lose now—which meant only one thing. Nash was up to something, and Griff and Dixon were just pawns. The question was, what was really going on?

The only other person in the room who was quiet was Morgan. Instead of hollering with the rest of the crowd, she simply topped off her glass of wine as she watched everyone else in the room freak out. Gut swirling, Griff watched as his sister’s gaze slid over to Nash, and she raised her glass. Nash returned the toast.

Those two were without a doubt up to something, and the only thing he was certain of at this moment was that it was definitely going to fuck up his life.