Authors: Mariah Stewart
“The one on the right.”
She slipped out of his arms and walked across the wood floor to the bathroom. The door squeaked slightly when she opened it, and again when she closed it behind her. She turned on the light and looked in the mirror.
Her face was flushed and her lips puffy, her eyes bright. She looked alive, and the thought made her smile. She splashed water on her face to see if the glow would wash off. It didn’t. When she went back to the bedroom a few minutes later, she was still smiling. She tripped over Jesse’s shirt on her way toward the bed, so she picked it up and tossed it at him.
“What are you doing now?” he asked sleepily.
“Gathering up my clothes so I can get dressed.” She found her skirt, inside out, and righted it. “I like company when I cook,” she added pointedly.
“Got it.” He sat up and pulled the shirt over his head. She tossed him his shorts and he laughed.
“I’ll meet you in the kitchen,” she told him.
“Five minutes,” he promised.
It had been less than five, but not by much, before he slid up to her at the sink and wrapped his arms around her from behind. He kissed the tip of her ear, then went to the fridge.
“Do you like wine with your company while you cook?” he asked.
“I do.”
“White or red?”
“White.”
He took two glasses from the cupboard and filled them. He handed one to her and said, “To us. To new beginnings.” He touched the rim of his glass to hers and winked.
“Jesse,” she said, “there is something about you—”
“I’m irresistible, right?”
Brooke laughed. “In your own way, yes, you are.”
“Good. Now, what can I do to help you?”
“You can find one of those yellow ware bowls for me.”
“This one?” He held up the large bowl he’d used for Halloween candy.
“That’ll do.” She went through the grocery bags she’d brought with her, lining up celery, carrots, an onion, a plastic bag of bread crumbs, chives, a red pepper, a bottle of Worcestershire sauce, and an egg on the kitchen table.
“This is a neat table,” she said.
“It’s made from old reclaimed barn boards,” he told her. “A guy in Pennsylvania makes them. I bought it when I was passing through on my way here in January.”
“Maybe you can tell me how to find him. I think I’d like something like this for my new house.” She opened the fridge and took out a package of crabmeat wrapped in brown paper.
“When do you think you’ll be moving?”
“Not as soon as I’d like. My brother got an estimate for the basic, most necessary renovations from
Cam O’Connor—do you know him? Cameron? Tall blond guy?”
“I may have met him.”
“Anyway, he’s our local contractor. He gave Clay an estimate that was higher than I’d anticipated. But I figure with school being over, I’ll have more time, so I can do some of the work myself. At least the interior painting.”
“I can help with that,” he told her. “I’m good at that.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I know. But since I plan on spending a lot of time there, I figure I should carry my weight.”
“You mean this wasn’t a one-night stand?” She’d thought to make a joke of it, but it didn’t come out that way.
“Not on your life.” He leaned back in the chair at the kitchen table and made no move to touch her, but she
felt
touched, as if he’d run his hands down her arms. “You sleep with me, you have to keep me. You
own
me.”
She laughed. “Knife?”
“Seriously?”
She laughed again. “I need to chop this stuff.” She pointed to some of the vegetables.
“I’ll chop. You do the rest.”
He brought a knife and a cutting board to the table and picked up the red pepper. “How small?”
“Small,” she told him. “Really small.”
“Okay. So we need to talk about my grandfather’s birthday party,” he began as he was slicing up the pepper.
“How are the plans going?”
“Pretty good. Yesterday Violet made up some invitations and Liz printed them off in the office. They actually looked really good. She said that was the only way they’d get done in time. Then she emailed them to everyone whose email address she had, printed them out for those whose email addresses she didn’t have. Didn’t you get yours?”
“I haven’t looked at email in a week. I’ll check when I get home. Are you definitely having it at Lola’s?”
“Yes. I called yesterday and spoke with Jimmy. He said they’d take care of everything, that they know what dishes he likes and they’ll set up a buffet. All I have to do is give him a final count the day before.”
“Are you doing the decorating yourself?” she asked.
“What decorating?” Jesse frowned.
“You know, in the room. At Lola’s. For the party.”
He had that deer-in-the-headlights look again.
“Like what?”
“Well, like flowers. And balloons,” she suggested.
“He’s going to be eighty-five. Do you think he’ll want balloons?”
“Everyone wants balloons. Wouldn’t you?”
He appeared to think it over. “I think I would.” He nodded. “Yes, I would like balloons. Remember that if you ever give me a party. Helium balloons. Lots of them.”
“That’s exactly what I had in mind.”
“Where do I get those?”
“Party store in the shopping center near the gas station,” she told him as she broke an egg into the bowl and beat it with a fork. “I got the ones for Logan’s birthday party there.” She paused. “I wonder if Steffie
would have time to make an ice-cream flavor just for him.”
“Do you think she would?” Jesse grinned. “That would be so cool.”
“We can ask. I don’t know if she’ll have time, but as my mom says, if you don’t ask, the answer is always no.” Brooke measured out what looked to be the right amount of mayonnaise and plopped it into the bowl. She followed it with mustard, hot sauce, and Worcestershire and mixed it all with a spoon before folding in the crabmeat. “How are you doing there with your chopping?”
“It’s moving along.” He glanced into the bowl. “I suppose your part of this operation is finished.”
She folded her arms and nodded.
“Show-off,” he muttered.
Brooke sat and waited for him to finish chopping the pepper into small pieces. “You can dump it right in here.” She pointed to the bowl.
He tossed in the red pepper and started on the onion.
“I think I’m going to get a dog,” she told him. “Logan is dying for one, but I didn’t want to inconvenience Clay by getting one while we’re still living with him.”
“Doesn’t Clay like dogs?”
“He loves dogs. But it’s one thing to love your own dog, and something else entirely when someone moves into your house and then one day brings a dog home.”
“Grant always has dogs at the shelter,” he said. “I heard he has some really nice ones. I was thinking about getting a dog there myself.”
“What kind?”
“Probably a pit bull. I heard him say he had a lot of rescued pit-bull puppies. They’re not all mean and vicious, you know.”
“I do know. One of my neighbors in Kentucky had a pit bull. She was all white and she was so soft, such a sweet thing. I wouldn’t mind having one like her.”
Jesse finished chopping the onion and he dumped that into the mix.
“Anything else?” he asked.
“The thyme needs to be chopped really small.”
“I got it covered.” He washed the thyme and cut it into tiny pieces. “Good enough?” he asked.
When she nodded, he scattered it into the bowl.
“That’s everything?”
“Except for some lemon rind.” She took a zester from the bag and ran a lemon over it until all the rind had been removed and the lemon was white.
“You brought your own tools?”
She nodded. “I didn’t think you’d have one of these.”
“You thought right.”
She washed her hands, then gave the bowl one more mix with the spoon. “You wouldn’t happen to have a cookie sheet, would you? If not, a plate will do.”
“There’s a flat thing in here that my sister made cookies on when she was here a few months ago.” He knelt down and found it in a cabinet.
Jesse watched her spoon up the mix, then roll it into balls that she placed on the cookie sheet and flattened with the palm of her hand.
“That looks like fun.” He stepped next to her. “Can I make a few?”
“Go wash your hands.” She slanted a look in his direction. “You forget I know where those hands have been.”
“Should have thought about that before you had me chop up all that other stuff.”
She made a face, and he laughed.
They made eight crab cakes then set them in the refrigerator to rest while potatoes and asparagus roasted. They drank wine by the fire, then cooked the crab cakes in a skillet and ate at the kitchen table.
“So I suppose there will be cupcakes for dessert?” he asked after he cleared away the dishes and rinsed them.
“Are you getting tired of cupcakes?” Brooke frowned. Maybe she should have brought something else. “Are you over my cupcakes?”
“I will never get tired of your cupcakes,” he said solemnly. “I’ll never be over them.”
“I meant the kind I bake.”
“Them, too. If you baked it, I’ll love it.”
“You’re very accommodating,” she observed.
“Well, I do need you to stick around to bake for my grandfather’s birthday.”
“You’re going to have to give me a head count when you have one. I have orders for a dinner party that same weekend and a list of customers who want cupcakes for Thanksgiving.”
“Then you’ll be rolling right into the Christmas season. I’ll bet you get a lot of orders for December.”
“I already have a lot lined up. Plus the big wedding on December tenth.” She was grateful for a few minutes to just sit and watch him. She liked the way he moved, liked the way his hair fell across his forehead
when he leaned over to stack the dishes in the dishwasher. “And since I’m one of the attendants as well as one of the bakers—both brides want spectacular cakes and spectacular cupcakes—I will be a busy girl that weekend.”
“I guess the paparazzi will be following you all over town, since you’ll be with Dallas.”
“They’ll be following Dallas all over town. Or not, maybe. She’s not publicizing this, so unless someone she invites spills it to the press, she just might get away with a wedding without photographers swinging from the chandeliers.” She couldn’t stop watching him. It was as if she’d been hypnotized a few days ago and hadn’t come out of the trance yet. “Want to go with me to the wedding?”
“As your date?” He paused, a plate in hand, and turned. “Did you just ask me out?”
“I asked you if you wanted to go to the wedding with me, so yeah, I guess that counts as a date. So yeah, I asked you out.”
“And this dinner …” He gestured to the crab cakes left on the plate. “This was your idea.”
“I suppose it was. So what?”
“So if I go to the wedding with you, it would be our second date,” he said thoughtfully.
Brooke couldn’t tell if he was talking to himself or trying to confuse her by stating the obvious.
“Does that mean something to you?” she asked.
“Depends. On whether or not you agree that the wedding would be our second date.”
Brooke shrugged. “Okay. It’s our second date.”
“And both times you asked me, right?”
She narrowed her eyes. “Do you have a bet going with someone?”
Jesse laughed. “No.”
“Then are you going to tell me what this is all about?”
“Someday.”
“Are you sure you and Clay don’t have some thing going on here?”
“I swear, no. No bets. Besides, Clay is too hung up on his own love life to worry about mine.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean Lucy Sinclair came into Cuppachino the other day and he embarrassed us both by drooling all over himself. It was sad, Brooke, to watch a grown man reduced to—”
“Are you sure? Lucy?” Her eyes widened at the thought.
Jesse nodded. “I sat right across the table from him, gave him CPR after she left.”
“Well, the wedding should be interesting, since she’s the wedding planner and he’s going to be in the wedding.” She grinned. “Should be fun.”
“Wouldn’t miss it.”
Brooke’s cell phone rang, and she reached into her pocket to check the caller ID. “My mother,” she told him. “Hi, Mom …”
“Are you at home?”
“No, actually, I’m at Jesse’s. We just had dinner. Why?”
“Because Clay called and asked if I’d pick up Logan from Tiffany’s birthday party and drop him and Cody off at Berry’s house. Clay and Wade are still at some brewery over in Rehoboth talking to the brewer. Dallas
is out and Berry isn’t driving at night these days. My car has a flat, and I’m waiting for—”
“What time does he have to be picked up?”
“Ten minutes ago.”
“I’m on my way.”
“I’m sorry that I had to disturb you.”
“That’s nice of you, but not to worry. I’ll leave right now. Thanks, Mom.”
She disconnected the call and tossed the phone into her bag. She explained the situation to Jesse.
“I’ll go with you,” he said. “We can drop off the boys at Dallas’s, then come back here.” He pulled her to him. “You could sleep over since Logan’s not going to be home.” He kissed the side of her face. “What do you say?”
She pretended to mull it over. “Your car or mine?”
Jesse took his time approaching the house that occupied a full block at the very end of Old St. Mary’s Church Road. While not the oldest house in St. Dennis, it was certainly one of the largest and grandest. It was said that the original owner had been a tobacco planter, and had styled the house after a mansion owned by a cousin of his somewhere in one of the Carolinas before the Civil War. Jesse’s great-grandfather had bought it for his wife over one hundred years ago, and the house had remained in the family ever since. Jesse had only been inside three times, and hadn’t seen much more than the front entry hall—which he’d thought was cavernous—and his grandfather’s study.
It was hard not to be impressed, Jesse conceded as he rang the doorbell. The house and grounds had been beautifully maintained over the years, and the residence was even now quite the showplace. Why, he wondered, would one person want to live alone in a house that big?