Chapter 6

“Scrambled eggs, huh? I see you’ve really advanced your cooking skills since junior high, when you used to make…oh yeah, scrambled eggs.”

Luke didn’t bother to look up from the firehouse stove as he cracked another egg into the bowl and tossed the shell in the trash. “I’ll have you know I’m adding cheese and mushrooms. I’ve upped my game.”

His sister came up beside him, going up on her toes even as she pulled his face down to kiss him on the cheek. “And mushrooms, you say? It’s a wonder the Food Network hasn’t swooped in here and put you behind a camera.”

She dropped back on her heels, snapping her fingers. “Oh, that’s right. You’re going to be a different kind of reality star.”

Luke pulled a whisk from the old coffee can that had been repurposed to hold kitchen utensils. “Is there anyone in town who doesn’t know about it?”

Tawny snorted and snagged a sliced mushroom off the cutting board. “What do you think?”

He sighed.

His sister, younger by three years, studied him as she nibbled the mushroom. “Want to talk about it?”

“Yeah, absolutely. But first, do you think you could put on some Céline Dion? Someone who can best express what I’m feeling in a nice ballad?”

“Don’t tempt me. I have an Adele album in my car.”

He glanced over. “Tell me you didn’t tell Mom about this.”

“I didn’t tell Mom,” she said, the inflection making it clear that their mother knew anyway.

Luke groaned. Jane Elliott had moved to Northern California a year earlier. After twelve years as a widow, she’d met “the second love of her life” in Las Vegas. She’d gone down with a couple of friends to celebrate their sixtieth birthdays and come home with a wedding ring on her finger.

She’d moved to be with her new husband a month later, since he had a daughter from a previous marriage still in high school. Luke was happy for her, but any hopes that the distance would keep her from meddling…no luck thus far.

“Oh, come on,” Tawny said with a grin. “Exactly how long do you think Vicky lasted before calling Mom and telling her that city folk were sniffing around for you?”

“City folk?”

Tawny shrugged. “Heard the girl wore Louboutins and the guy’s shirt was purple with pink cuffs.”

“Lou-bu-what?”

“Fancy shoes,” Tawny explained.

Hot shoes, Luke amended silently.

Just about everything on Jordan Carpenter was hotter than sin, but those ridiculously impractical shoes had resulted in some very dirty thoughts the past few nights.

Luke shoved the memory aside and set a pan on the stove, flicking on the burner.

The guys at the firehouse all rotated kitchen duty, and breakfast was Luke’s least favorite. Yeah, sure, eggs were simple, but they weren’t like lasagna or sub sandwiches, which could be made ahead of time and left in the fridge. No decent breakfast food was make-ahead. Unless you counted quiche, and Luke absolutely did not.

“Rumor has it she’s also gorgeous,” Tawny said. “Very big city.”

“Who?”

She threw a mushroom at him, which he caught and popped in his mouth. “Be useful. Grate some cheese.”

Tawny narrowed hazel eyes that matched his own. Actually, everything about Tawny matched him, except smaller, more feminine. Same greenish eyes, same light brown hair—or dark blond, depending on whom you asked—same straight nose, stubborn chin.

His sister was one of his best friends, as was her husband, Bill, but if she kept talking about Jordan Carpenter and the damn TV show, the status would be short-lived.

“If I grate this cheese, will you tell me what the heck you said to the TV girl that made her sign a monthlong lease on the Buckley house?” Tawny asked. “Did you goad her? What am I even saying—of course you goaded her.”

Luke froze in the process of pouring eggs into the hot pan and turned to face her. “She rented a fucking house?”

“Yup. Signed the lease yesterday afternoon, and you know what that means.”

“That I need to join the witness-protection program?” he muttered, irritably dumping the eggs in the pan and tossing the metal bowl and whisk in the sink with a clatter.

“It means that not only is she here to stay for a while but she’s met Stacey.”

“Stace won’t talk,” he said, giving the eggs a swipe with the spatula.

“But—”

“Tawny,” he said, before pointing his spatula at her. “Grate faster; the eggs are nearly done.”

“Seriously? You need more?” She used the back of her hand to push back her sandy-blond bangs, as her other hand pointed the grater at the mound of cheese. “That’s, like, half the block.”

He made a rolling more motion with his finger.

“Maybe I should start running five miles a day if it’ll help me eat like this,” she muttered.

“Six. I run six miles a day.”

“I hate you. Everyone does. Just thought you should know.”

He merely grinned at her, and a minute later he flicked off the burner, stirred in the cheese and mushrooms, and pulled out the plate of toast and bacon he’d cooked earlier and left to warm in the oven.

“Do I even want to know how many loaves of bread are on that plate?” she asked, taking a triangle from the top of the stack and nibbling the corner.

“Doesn’t Bill feed you?” he asked.

“No, I feed him. Although don’t tell him you guys eat like this here, or I’ll never get him to continue choking down the turkey bacon I’ve been pushing lately.”

Luke set the food on the table, along with a stack of plates and a roll of paper towels to serve as napkins, before pushing open the kitchen door and ringing the bell that served as the Food’s up notice.

“You have less than a minute to tell me what you’re after before the wolves descend.”

“Hey, I come by at least once a week on Bill’s day off to say hi!” his sister said, punching his arm.

“Sure, but you never agree to grate the cheese,” he said, picking up a piece of bacon—not the turkey kind—and devouring it in two bites as he pulled a carton of OJ out of the fridge. “What’s up?”

“I think you should do it. The show,” Tawny announced.

Luke couldn’t withhold the wince. His own sister wanted him to sell out? “Jesus, Tawny.”

“Just hear me out,” she said in a rush. “It’s not for the spectacle of it, although for the record, how cool would it be?”

He gave her a warning look, and she held up an appeasing hand, her eyes darting to the door as the sound of hungry male voices came closer. “I think it’d be good for you. You haven’t been the same since Eva—”

“No,” he interrupted, voice curt, even for him. His sister knew full well that while he was pretty easygoing talking about his first two failed weddings, the third was off-limits.

“Will you at least talk to the New York girl?”

“Have you even met her? She’s a complete pain in the ass. She’d step on anyone and anything to get what she wants.”

The door shoved open, Charlie first, as he generally was. Luke’s friend made a beeline for Tawny, scooping her up and hugging her as though he hadn’t seen her in months and wasn’t likely to run into her at the grocery store or the gas station or Tucker’s any day of the week.

“Why’s he so grumpy?” Charlie asked, grabbing a plate and jerking his chin toward Luke.

“I’m not grumpy.”

“You look grumpy,” said Hank, one of the older firefighters, setting a handful of bacon between two pieces of toast and taking an enormous bite.

“Well, shit, I am now,” Luke mumbled into his coffee.

“Heard the hot New Yorker is staying awhile,” Ryan said, strolling in and giving Tawny a kiss on the cheek.

“She won’t last through the end of the week,” Luke said, picking up a plate and spooning a pile of the eggs onto it.

“How do you figure?” Charlie asked, dropping into his chair and picking up a fork.

Because I’ll lose my mind if she doesn’t leave by then, that’s how I fucking figure.