Page 10

I spot a box of spaghetti hiding at the back and pop up onto my tiptoes to reach it.

Just as I get my fingers on it, I look to Aubry to see if I’m right.

He isn’t paying a lick of attention to the knife flying near his hand.

Nope, all of his focus is on me, my tits spilling toward the top of my dress, my legs stretched at their limits.

My first instinct is to suck myself in and apologize. My next instinct is to talk. A lot. “Now I’m regretting the white. Should have gone with the blue, or maybe red.”

Aubry snaps his head like I shattered a spell. “Sorry?” He stares at the cutting board filled with diced tomatoes and zucchini, then upends it all into a pot.

“My dress.” I pat my hands to the top, knowing I’m about to drench it in pasta sauce, but it draws Aubry’s eyes like a moth to a bonfire.

“If I’m not dropping tacos, curry, or popcorn down my front, it’s because I’m not eating.

Any trip to the Olive Garden is guaranteed to end in me covered in sauce, probably more than the pasta. ”

He’s staring at me. Because I can’t stop talking.

Aubry drops the knife, and I gulp.

“I see three options. Either I loan you one of my shirts.”

One of his shirts…? Like right off of his back to drape around me. A little giggle starts in my throat at the idea of him sitting there half naked watching me eat.

A coy smile teases Aubry’s lips. “I cover you with my hands.”

“Ah ha…” I grimace laugh in a giddy panic.

His only response is an eyebrow raise before he turns to his pot. With little care for measuring, he squirts a mess of red banana sauce into it and grabs a spoon. Damn it, did I mess up my chance again?

“What’s the third option?”

“Hmm?”

“You said there were three options? What was the last?”

“Oh.” He gently stirs his sauce, barely paying me any mind. Seconds that turn into eons tick by. I can feel the rise and fall of Pangea before he glances over his shoulder. “You’re not wearing your dress at all.” My brain fights to process his words into a coherent thought.

So we’ll be doing laundry?

Oh, wait. Duh, Sadie.

As he stares at me like I’m already naked, I swear his dark eyes take on a purple sheen. It’s enchanting and terrifying at the same time.

Is this my cue to tear off my clothes? Tear off his clothes?

I flex my hands, picturing myself awkwardly reaching behind to pull down my dress’ zipper while he watches with confused disgust. Then I remember it’s a sun dress with a tie on the front and there is no zipper.

So if I just shimmy out of it, then I’ll get my head stuck at the waist as he stares at me.

How do they make undressing look so hot in the movies? Probably velcro.

As my brain’s processing how I can get naked without looking like a ferret trying to wiggle out of a sweater, my mouth talks.

A lot. “I make curries. Not great ones. My mom’s the specialist. But I picked up a few tricks from her.

One time I tried to do a ramen curry. Big mistake. Never doing that one again.”

He answers with a little chuckle.

Damn it. I flex my nose to keep from crying, the least attractive thing on a date. “I’m sorry,” I whisper.

“For what?”

“My talking. I don’t try to do it. I just, when I get nervous, or don’t know what to do, my mouth starts going. Half the time I don’t realize it’s been flapping until I look up and everyone’s staring at me. And I did it again. Sorry.”

Aubry rests the spoon on the pot and turns to me. I only catch a hint of his dark brown eyes before I panic.

“You probably hate it, being the stoic type. I’ll try to shut up. Right now. No more talking… Damn it.”

Wiping his hands off on a kitchen towel, he says, “You’re right.”

I wince.

“I don’t talk much. I haven’t had a conversation with someone other than Astin in…a long time.”

“Really?” I can’t believe he doesn’t have random people stop him on the street just to tell him how hot he is.

“Part of my job was being big, intimidating, and quiet.” He sounds as if he wants to be anything but that, his gaze drifting miles away.

I want to ask him if he misses being a bouncer. If it was a lot of work. If he ever got to meet anyone famous and throw them out.

So I pinch my fingers and fight to shut up.

Aubry’s gaze focus back onto me. “I find your rabid talking refreshing.”

“You do?”

“It’s relaxing in a way.”

He lifts his hand and my heart skips a beat. Slowly, like dancing through molasses, his fingers drift across time and space to land on my space. On me. On my cheek!

“Whenever I have no idea what to say, you’re already filling the empty air.”

Oh my god! He’s running his fingertips over my cheekbone. He’s gonna kiss me! This is it! I slip my eyes closed and ready my lips. All I know is his warm touch cradling me, ready at a moment’s notice to go ‘This is mine’ and pull me to him.

Hiss! Splort!

The touch falls off, and I look around. Aubry’s already moving the pan that’s boiling over. He races to adjust the knob and wipes off the overspill with his towel. It’s a lot easier to take dinner spoiling the mood instead of me.

Well, since he likes me talking, I start to do it.

A lot. I tell him how my parents live in Sacramento, that I have a brother who was a rotten brat growing up, but who’s okay now.

That I moved to Loomis on a whim with some friends who quickly got other jobs and moved out in a year.

How I love photography, but can’t stand weddings, so my options were severely limited.

“…and then I stumbled onto food styling. It’s fascinating. Like one part art, one part chemistry, and a little magic while praying everything doesn’t melt under the lights before I get the shot.”

“And you don’t find taking a hundred pictures of the same fruit bowl boring?”

“No.” I’m damn near vibrating with excitement, wanting to tell him every trick I’ve learned. “I love it. Every peach is unique, the colors, the roundness, the scent...”

“Um-hmm,” Aubry chuckles.

My face flushes, but I keep going full steam ahead. “Taking something we see every day, like a pot noodle, usually viewed under harsh grocery store or kitchen lighting and turning it beautiful is…well, it’s wonderful. Amazing.”

He’s completely stopped to stare at me. “You find food beautiful?”

Oh, that was probably something crazy. I nervously tug on my hair, trying to reel back in what I said, but it’s also the truth. There can be beauty in the shine off of an apple, in the glow of an orange peel, and even in the glint of a spoon in a bowl of a ten dollar cereal.

“Yeah,” I admit, bracing for the ridicule.

A serene smile rises across his face. “I think so too.”

Really? I have to bite down to keep from telling him everything about my last shoot with hard boiled eggs. Still trying to be the pleasing date, I slide closer and peer down at the pot. “So, what are you making?”

Aubry shuts off both burners. He spools the noodles onto two plates, then drenches them in sauce. Lifting the plates into the air, he says, “Jollibee spaghetti.”

“Jolly what now?”

“Jollibee.” He chuckles. “It’s a fast food joint in the Philippines. My grandfather used to take me if I managed to swing B’s on my report card.”

Ah, that would explain his tan and unfairly handsome but also boyish face.

“Shall we eat?” he asks as if I’m not ready to devour dinner whole.

I glance over my shoulder to find the sun nearly setting. The last rays stream across the immaculate back yard, catching on the eternal river. He looks with me and smiles. “Sounds perfect.”