Chapter Sixteen

 

Upside #16: Cooking for one is easy. It’s when you have to make pasta for two people that you realize you have the cooking skills to feed a small army…and have leftovers.

 

“You didn’t stir it, did you?”

Jake looked at the now-burned pasta stuck to the bottom and sides of the pan. “I stirred it. Once.”

“How long ago did you stir it?”

He made an awkward face, bearing his perfectly straight teeth in such a way that he looked like the grimacing emoji.

I patted his arm and took the pan away from him. “It’s a good thing you’re pretty.” I put the pan in the sink and mentally patted myself on the back for deciding that he needed a test run.

Good thing pasta was cheap.

I got a clean pan from the rack hanging inside the cupboard and passed it to him. “Fill it up with water and boil it. Do you think you can manage that without ruining something?”

“How can the clumsiest person in the world cook as smoothly as you can?” he grumbled, filling the pan.

“I’ve had a lot of practice.”

“As opposed to the limited amount of practice at being a human being.”

I poked my tongue out at him behind his back. “At least I can cook pasta, arguably the easiest thing in the world to do.”

“I’m culinary-challenged, just like you’re life-challenged.”

“But I’ll never starve.” I handed him the salt. “Put a little of that into the water. It helps to stop the pasta sticking.”

“You couldn’t have told me that a minute ago?” Jake tipped the salt container and—

“I said a little bit, Jake! Why don’t you just run to the coast and get me a pan full of seawater?”

He stopped, tipped the container upright, and looked at the foggy mess that would make the Gulf of Mexico cry with saltiness. “Well, shit.”

“Move out of the way.” I nudged—shoved—him out of my way, grabbed the pan and emptied it, then rinsed it out before going through filling it for the third time. I put the salt in my hand before adding two pinches and washing my palm off.

“Oh, well if you’d told me to do that…”

“You’d have still done it wrong.” I rolled my eyes. “Do you think you can dice the chicken, or should I do it just in case?”

He stared at the knife on the board. “Honestly, everything in me says you aren’t to be trusted with that knife.”

Emotionless, I said, “Why? Because you’re within stabbing distance?”

“I was going to say because you’d cut yourself, but now you’re definitely right.” He picked up the knife, then knocked on my head. “Hello? Satan? Are you in there?”

Despite myself, I laughed, batting his hand away. “Shut up. Dice it, but not too big, and not too small.”

“Has anyone ever told you you’re an excellent teacher? Your ability to give instructions is out of this world.”

“There are other knives in this kitchen I can stab you with, Jake.”

He peered back at me over his shoulder. “You look pretty today.”

“I’m wearing yoga pants, a shirt with a sauce stain on it, and I think my socks have a hole in. Try again, Romeo.” I paused. “In fact, don’t. You’re not supposed to even be here, let alone compliment me.”

“A boss can’t be nice to his employee?” He put on a look of faux-shock.

I pulled the mushrooms from the fridge and hit him with a hard look. “Not when the only reason the boss is in the employee’s house is because he crossed a line.”

He inclined his head in acknowledgment and cut the chicken breast in half. “And then, you let me over the line.”

“We aren’t talking about this anymore. Shut up and cut the chicken.”

“Should you be talking to your boss like that?”

I slammed the mushroom packet on the side. “When you’re in my kitchen, there’s only one boss, and I’m it. Is that clear?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Call me ma’am again, and I will slice you like a tomato.”

He fought a laugh just long enough for me to narrow my eyes and convey with my gaze that I was deadly serious. He quickly stopped laughing and went straight back to cutting the chicken and throwing the diced cubes into the pot.

I turned away, biting my lip to hide my smile, and reached for the pasta. Luckily for me, I’d bought two packets on impulse.

Clearly, my spidey-senses had shown up today.

I put the pasta in the now-boiling pan and threw a splash of oil in with the chicken. Miraculously, Jake managed to make it through cutting it all up without screwing it all up or cutting himself.

“Now what?” he asked.

“Now, you clean the board, so nobody gets food poisoning.” I slid it off the counter and over to the sink. He followed me, watching as I ran the water until it was hot and rinsed the board off with some soap. “You do the knife and yourself, and I’ll dry this.”

“Yes, boss.”

Cocky bastard.

I dried the board, then grabbed a new knife and sliced the onion in two, making sure to cut off the end. “Are you done?” I asked Jake.

“Yep.” He came back over, wiping his hands on a towel. “What’s next?”

“Slice the onion. I’ll do the first half. Watch this.” I peeled the layers of skin off the onion, checked the top layer of it, then set it down on the board. “Dice it like this,” I said, making the first cut into the onion.

“How?” He moved closer.

“Pay attention.”

He came even closer. He was all in my personal space, consuming every last bit of the air around me and filling it with his presence. My left arm brushed against his body every time I sliced, and I swallowed hard as the warmth from him seemed to radiate onto me.

“Ah. I see.” He leaned right against the side of the counter. “Seems simple enough.”

I turned the onion and diced the other way. My eyes were barely stinging, so either this onion was weak, or the general sensation of being around Jacob Creed was way more overwhelming than onion.

Probably not the best compliment I’d ever paid anyone.

I’d keep that gem to myself.

“Then you just…scoop it up…” I said, doing just that. “And throw it in the pot with the chicken.” I blinked and stepped back, clasping my hands together. My eyes flitted from meeting his gaze to the onion until I said, “You do the other half.”

“I’ll try.” He picked up the other half of the onion, and with an almost endearing uncertainty, peeled off the first two layers of skin. “That enough?”

I peered over. “One more. The last one can be tricky. You have to get your nail under it a little.”

He did as I said, frowning as he peeled off the last, pesky layer. “Now?”

“Now cut.” It was almost cute I was teaching a basically thirty-year-old man how to slice an onion…and watching him do it wrong.

God help me.

“No, no. You don’t slice across first. You slice into the onion.” I used my finger to show him the proper direction. “You have to hold the layers together, but not cut all the way into it.”

“Uhh…”

“Oh, Jesus Christ.” I took the knife, and beckoning him to stay still, did two cuts to show him. “There. See? The onion is still together, but it’ll dice easier when you cut across it.”

“Like this?” He covered my hand with his and forced it into the onion correctly.

“Yes,” I managed to get out.

“Uh-huh.” He did it again, this time moving his body so he was almost completely behind me, his solid chest pressing against my back.

My ass was pretty much tucked against his groin, and I swallowed hard, willing my body not to react the way I knew it so easily could.

“Is this right?” he asked, slicing into it perfectly.

“Perfect,” I eked out.

Tingles ran up and down my arm.

“Now…the other way.” My throat was dry.

His arm muscles flexed against me when he twisted the onion and moved to cut it. My hand was still on the knife, trapped beneath his, and every time he exhaled, his breath fluttered my hair.

He sliced it perfectly.

It hit me.

He’d played me, and I’d fallen for it. I’d played right into his hands, getting in this position and so easily allowing him to basically wrap his body around mine.

“Is that done?” he said in a low voice, his mouth right by my ear.

I nodded. My heart thundered in my chest, skipping a beat when he used my hands to scoop up the onion and drop it into the pot.

Never. Never had I ever thought that cutting an onion could be sexy.

“Now what?” he asked, lips still in the same spot, except this time, they almost brushed against my earlobe.

“Mushrooms,” I whispered. “And the ring needs turning on.”

He leaned over the stove and turned on the ring that had the pot on it before reaching for the mushrooms and opening the packet. “How many?”

“Five. Maybe six.”

“How do you cut them?”

I swallowed. “Slices.”

“Show me.”

I should have said no. I should have told him that if he didn’t know how to slice mushrooms at his age, then he had no chance of being able to cook anything successfully.

But, I didn’t. The pressure of his body against mine was too sweet. The way his breath tickled my hair and skin was too warm—it felt too good, all the time.

The way his fingers curled around mine on the knife handle sent too many shivers through me.

Yet, I couldn’t change it. I couldn’t say no and push him away and make it stop.

So, I sliced the mushroom, and when I grabbed the second, he took hold of the knife.

My chest was tight. My lungs wanted more air, but I had to fight it. There was no way I was going to make it even more obvious to him that I was going crazy inside. That he was sending my body into a tailspin of lust and desire that reverberated through every vein, mixing with a shot of adrenaline into a heady mix that defied logic.

He only released me to stir the chicken and pasta, something I’d forgotten about.

How could I remember how not to burn things when I was burning up myself?

How could I cook that, when the only thing that was cooking was my own damn insanity?

He’d got what he wanted, and right now, he was winning the battle, but my God—he would not win the war.

He could think he would, but I wasn’t going to kiss him.

Not tonight.

Not ever again.

I didn’t care how much I wanted to. I didn’t care how hard my heart beat around him or how many times I had to clench my legs together because the ache in my clit was unbearably uncomfortable.

I didn’t care.

Not one bit.

He turned his face into my hair. “Is that everything?”

I nodded, my eyes darting from the pasta pan to the pot with the chicken. “It all just needs stirring now. Until the sauce.”

“Do you make the sauce?”

I turned my head back to look at him. Which was a mistake, because there was barely any space between us. One wrong move and my lips would be on his.

“No,” I said slowly and softly. “You burned pasta. One thing at a time, Gordon Ramsey.”

His lips twitched. Those gray eyes of his sparkled with silent laughter, and I turned around fully, gripping the overhanging edge of the countertop and standing on my tiptoes.

“You knew how to cut that onion, didn’t you?” I asked quietly.

He nodded, his mouth now firmly in a smirking curve.

“And the mushrooms.” I didn’t bother asking this time.

“I said I can’t cook, not that I can’t cut.” He lifted his hand to the side of my face and, after a brief hesitation, ran his fingers through my hair, leaving it to fan out as he reached the ends. “I thought you were supposed to be the strong one out of us.”

“I’m the stupid one,” I corrected him. “I genuinely thought you were that useless in the kitchen.”

His laugh was quiet but deep, a genuine one that make goosebumps pop up on my arms. He rested his hands on the countertop next to me, his thumbs brushing across my little fingers, and he leaned forward just enough that I could feel his breath ghosting across my lips.

“Clumsy and easy to fool,” he murmured. “How have you made it this far in adulthood?”

“I’m smart and scrappy,” I breathed. “I could probably survive an apocalypse.”

“After you’d fallen over a tree root or stubbed your toe on a rock.” He lifted one hand to the side of my face. Slowly, he slid it around the side of my neck until his fingertips tickled the base of my scalp.

Shivers shot down my spine.

“At least I’d be able to eat.” My voice was no more than a whisper, because his mouth was right there, barely an inch away, and my eyes were fluttering shut.

I could feel his lips.

There. Teasing mine. Seeing how far he could go before I’d stick to my guns and not kiss him.

He didn’t have to go far.

“Shit!” I pushed him away and yanked the pot off the stove ring. “Goddamn it!”

The chicken was burned. We hadn’t stirred it because he’d distracted me from what I was supposed to be doing.

Like not burn the goddamn chicken.

“Fuck it.” I ran my hand through my hair. “It’s screwed.”

“Maybe we could…Oh, never mind.” Jake wrinkled his nose and stepped back from it. “I thought you said you could cook.”

“I don’t usually have a hot guy distracting the hell out of me!” I dumped the pasta into the strainer in the sink and let the pan fall into the other side with a slam. “Well, this wasn’t a mess at all.”

Jake leaned against the table, grinning, with his thumbs hooked through his belt loops. “Shall I order a take-out?”

I sighed and looked at him. “You’re gonna have to. I don’t have any more pasta.”