Harvard Hottie Read Free Page B

if I slipped in there and popped some corn real quickly.
    Except just my luck: half of the couple was Luke Thayer.
    I cursed to myself. I should have known when I saw all that damned blond hair. He looked up when I entered the room, as did the girl he was kissing. I didn’t know who she was but she was really beautiful, and I was pretty sure it was a different girl than the last one I’d see him with. But really, who the hell knew?
    “Twelve Fingers!” Luke exclaimed, his face lighting up when he identified me.
    I didn’t even look at him. I marched right to the microwave and shoved the bag inside. Unfortunately, I had no idea how long it was supposed to go in for or how to work the controls on this stupid microwave.
    Luke noticed me struggling. He climbed over the back of the couch and landed practically right at my feet. “Get away from me, Thayer House,” I snapped.
    But Luke didn’t budge. “Can’t even work the microwave?” He clucked his tongue. “This is kind of a disgrace. How’d you get in here anyway?  Maybe they needed to fill their New Jersey quota.”
    “Well, they definitely filled up their arrogant rich asshole quota,” I replied. Stupid microwave. If Luke wasn’t staring at me, I would have been done with the popcorn ten minutes ago.
    “What did you get on the SATs?” Luke asked me.
    “I got a 1600,” I replied honestly, lifting my chin to him. A perfect score. Beat that, Thayer House.
    “Oh yeah?  Me too.” He grinned at me, then pressed a button on the microwave, which whirred into action. “I guess working microwaves wasn’t on the test.”
    I stared into the microwave, willing the popcorn to pop faster. “What are you doing here, anyway?” he said. “Don’t you live in Weld?”
    I narrowed my eyes at him. How did he know that? “Yeah, so?”
    “So you can’t use our microwave,” Luke said. “That’s illegal. The popcorn is rightfully ours if you pop it here.”
    “My keycard works here, so that means I am allowed,” I argued.
    “ Nuh-uh,” Luke said. He turned to his date, who was studying her nails. “Hey Lindsay, we’ve got some popcorn here. Ellie here is donating it to us.”
    Lindsay lifted her vivid blue eyes. God, she was really beautiful. “I don’t want it. I’m on a diet,” she said. Even though she probably weighed about as much as that bag of popcorn.
    “Lindsay doesn’t want the popcorn,” Luke reported back to me, like I wasn’t standing right there. “She’s on a diet, apparently. So I guess I’ll let you keep your popcorn.”
    I gave him a dirty look. “Wow. How gracious of you, your majesty.”
    He leaned in close to me and I could smell his aftershave. It occurred to me that I’d never been so close to a man who wore aftershave before. He smelled… nice, actually. “But you have to give me a handful,” he said.
    I shook my head, clearing it of the intoxicating aroma of aftershave. “No way.”
    “You’re not leaving this room if you don’t give me some popcorn,” he informed me.
    “Watch me.”
    The microwave dinged and we both jumped. I reached for the door, and Luke grabbed my wrist. His grip was strong, his hand warm, and he might have hurt me if I was trying to resist, but for some reason I wasn’t trying. I hated the fact that at that moment, I would have given him popcorn or pretty much anything else he wanted from me.
    “Luke?” Lindsay’s voice interrupted our little face-off. “What are you doing over there?”
    She didn’t sound angry, only terribly bored. I wasn’t a threat to her, obviously. It was pretty clear someone who looked like me wasn’t stealing Luke away from someone who looked like her.
    Luke dropped my wrist. “You got off easy this time, Twelve Fingers,” he said to me. His brown eyes met mine. “But trust me, sooner or later, I’m going to get that popcorn.”
    Not if I had anything to do with it.

Chapter Three
     
    Let me tell you about Primal Scream:
    This is a semiannual Harvard