by Cate Ashwood
Alec closed his eyes, and it took more time than it should have for him to open them again. I wasn’t sure if it was the alcohol or the exhaustion from work. Maybe a little of both, and suddenly I felt like a prick.
“You okay?”
“Just tired.” He sounded like it.
“Do you want to call it an early night?”
Alec glanced at the scoreboard. There were only a few frames left, but he looked as though all the energy had drained from his body.
“I should stay for a bit. I didn’t think I had that much to drink, but it hit me hard.”
I could feel my cheeks pinking. “My fault. I’m okay to drive, though. I didn’t actually have much.”
He looked at me sideways. “You were keeping up with me.”
“I was pouring my beer into yours when you weren’t looking.”
For a moment, I thought he was going to be pissed. But the stern expression melted into one of amusement. “You’re a fucking cheater, and for that, you forfeit. Your ass is in the kitchen for a week, and you have to drive me home.”
I deserved that. “I’ll even pull over if you have to puke.”
“What a fucking gentleman.”
Chapter Six
Alec
I left Liberty feeling better than I had all week. LaborForce had come through for me, finding a couple of skilled laborers who were available to start working the following morning. They were brothers who’d been with another company the next town over on a temporary contract, and since their contract had ended, they were looking for work. According to the administrator, they wanted permanent, so if I liked them, there was a good chance they’d want to be hired on for good.
I could have kissed the woman for finding me two guys with valid tickets who were available pretty much immediately. I was still short one worker, and who knew if the new guys would be any good, but I needed bodies in the shop and they were going to have to do.
I’d managed to pick up the slack over the last three days. We weren’t too far behind schedule, and I managed to leave work on time for once. It was a small miracle.
Even more miraculous was that when I got home, Chase would be there with dinner ready for me. I had no idea what we were having, but the fact that I’d welded through lunch meant I was ravenous. He could be serving BBQ-sauce-covered shoe leather and I’d eat it.
Okay, maybe not. But I wasn’t going to be picky. I was just happy I wasn’t going to be the one in the kitchen. Or cleaning up after.
Things were looking up.
When I arrived home, I saw Chase’s car in front of my building again. Fantastic. I was starving.
I walked in, expecting to smell something… anything… but there was nothing.
“You home?” I called as bent down to untie my work boots.
“In here,” he replied.
I toed off my boots, then followed the sound of his voice to the kitchen where he was searching through the cupboards.
“What are you looking for?”
“Pancake mix,” he replied.
“Pancake mix?”
He stopped rifling through the pantry to turn to look at me. “It’s all I know how to make.”
“Seriously?”
“Jesus Christ, Alec. You’ve known me forever. Have you ever seen me cook?”
I thought about it, searching my memory. There had to be something. Somewhere. But I came up empty.
“How did I not realize you didn’t cook?”
“I have no idea. You’re the one who came up with the consequences of the bowling bet. You should’ve put some more thought into it.”
I shrugged. “I guess we’re having pancakes.”
“Fantastic. Where’s your mix?”
“I don’t have a mix. But I should have all the stuff to make them.”
He stared at me, his mouth parted in disbelief. I suppressed my laughter.
“It’s not that much different. Instead of measuring out the mix, you measure out everything. Here,” I offered, pulling my phone out of my pocket. “I’ll find you a recipe.”
I typed “no fail pancakes” into Google and waited the half second for whatever magic algorithm it used to populate some results for me. I chose the link at the top, quickly glanced over it to make sure I did have everything stocked, then handed it to Chase.
He was still looking at me like I’d lost my mind.
“I’ll stay and supervise if it makes you more comfortable,” I offered. I knew I sounded like a jackass, and he shared my opinion judging from his expression.
“Go shower. You smell like sweaty ass.”
I lifted one arm and sniffed. “I think I smell like daisies.”
“You’re psychotic.”
“Nuh uh.” I grabbed him, pulling him into me.
“Ugh! Gross.” He tried to squirm away, but I held him tight.
“Don’t fight it, Chase. I know how much you enjoy a nice sweaty ass.”
He managed to get his hands wedged between us, and he pushed against my chest until I let go. Nearly stumbling back against the counter, he managed to catch himself.
“I’m not washing my hands before I make yours.”
I laughed all the way to my bedroom.
Washed and dried, I dressed in a pair of well-worn sweats and made my way out to the living room. Collapsing down on the sofa, I propped my feet up on the coffee table and reached for the remote. It had been such a shitty start to the week, but now sitting with my feet up and what promised to be some very questionable pancakes in progress, I felt content.
I lay my head back and closed my eyes, letting my body relax into the softness of my couch. The sound of the TV faded away, becoming nothing more than background noise. The tension I’d been carrying around all week loosened, and I was on the precipice of sleep when I heard Chase swearing in the kitchen.
My eyes snapped open, and I forced myself to stand. When I walked into the kitchen, I saw Chase standing there looking frazzled. He had flour in his hair as well as a white dusty handprint on his thigh. I peered into the pan to see what could have once been sort of a pancake but now looked like a mangled mess.
“Would it count as cooking if I ordered pizza?”
I stared at him. “No. And we already had pizza this week.”
“Picky, picky,” Chase muttered under his breath, but loud enough I knew I was supposed to hear it.
“What’s wrong with the pancakes?”
He looked at me like I was stupid.
“Besides aesthetics,” I added.
“The consistency isn’t right. With the mix, you add water and you’re good to go. This is all sorts of fucked-up.”
I looked into the bowl. It did look a little thick. “I’m sure it’ll be delicious.”
Chase scooped the tattered remains of whatever it was in the pan into the garbage and started fresh. He dipped the measuring cup into the batter, then poured it into the pan. I heard it sizzle, and it smelled pretty good. It didn’t much matter to me what they looked like. I was ready to drink the batter from the bowl.
After a minute or two, Chase flipped it, and I took a peek to see the even golden color.
“Looks good.”
Chase smiled, obviously encouraged. “Yeah, not too bad.”
He repeated the process with the next and then the next until he’d used all the batter and the plate in the oven was piled high. I pushed off the counter where I’d been leaning and retrieved the maple syrup from the fridge.
Chase carried the rest into the dining room and sat the warm plate down on a trivet on the table. It took me about three seconds to fill my plate. Chase followed suit, stacking three on top of one another before drowning the entire mountain in syrup.
I dug in, cutting the first one open and watching the batter ooze from the middle.
“Oh goddamn fucking fuck,” Chase swore from across the table. “I told you I couldn’t cook.”
“They’re fine,” I assured him, turning my plate in an attempt to hid
e from him exactly how raw they were. It was futile. His were just as bad, and I was surprised at how upset he was about it.
“The edges are cooked, and pretty fucking delicious.” The last words were muffled as I shoveled a forkful of mostly cooked pancake into my mouth to prove my point. Chase didn’t look convinced. “Seriously, they’re good. Thank you for cooking.”
“You don’t mean that.”
I sort of did.
“How long am I solely responsible for cooking for us?”
“A week.”
“And how long does it take before the human body starves to death?”
I chuckled. “We’ll go grocery shopping tomorrow. I’ll teach you how to make some stuff.”
“I’ve never been a good cook. Helpless and hopeless in the kitchen.”
“It’s not hard. You just need someone to show you the basics, I think. It’ll be fun.”
I don’t think he believed me.
Chapter Seven
Chase
We’d already been standing in the supermarket for what felt like hours. I knew only a few minutes had passed since we’d wandered into the produce section, but seriously, how long does it take to pick out a melon? Is it roundish? Are there rotted bits? If the answers to those questions are yes and then no, then you put it in the fucking basket and move on.
Not that I bought melon, or fruit in general, for that matter.
“What are you looking for?” I asked as Alec lifted yet another cantaloupe in the air to inspect.
“To see if it’s ripe,” he replied as though it was obvious. I supposed it was.
He placed it into the cart and moved on, picking through apples. I hung back and watched him curiously. I should have been taking notes on how to be an adult like a pro. Somehow, Alec had turned into a fully functioning grown-up when I wasn’t looking.
It wasn’t like I hadn’t noticed he’d left childhood behind long ago. The broad chest and deep voice were clues enough, but he seemed to have his shit together better than I did. I hadn’t realized until we were living under the same roof. How was it that he was so fucking responsible, and I was seemingly still stuck back in middle school?
I’d graduated college and gotten a good job, worked my way up to where I had a team of people working under me, but my home life was a disaster. For the first time, I entertained the possibility Reid had been right. Maybe I wasn’t mature enough to handle being married. All my friends seemed to have their lives sorted much better than I did.
The more I thought about it, the more humiliated I felt. My trips to the market usually took less than ten minutes. I hit the frozen section, then the cereal aisle, and if I remembered, I grabbed a carton of milk. There was a reason the delivery drivers from the takeout places in a five-mile radius all knew me by name.
The only item on my list when we’d arrived was Cinnamon Toast Crunch. I was addicted to the stuff, and the closest thing Alec had to sugar cereal in his pantry was a box of Multigrain Cheerios. Now I felt like I should be picking something out with flax or a high fiber content.
I stood there as Alec checked labels, carefully reading the lists of ingredients on anything packaged before adding it to the cart. We definitely had very different shopping strategies, and the conscientiousness I’d always admired about him was suddenly grating on my nerves. My back hurt from standing in one place on the spotted linoleum floors, and I wanted to go home and put my feet up, maybe veg out for a few hours before bed.
When he wasn’t looking, I grabbed the box of sugary cereal and added it to the cart behind the package of spinach and the tub of greek yogurt and hoped I would be able to sneak it through the checkout just as easily.
“Are we done?” I asked, knowing full well I sounded like the kid one aisle over who had asked almost the same question in almost the same tone only a few minutes earlier.
Alec checked his list, ignoring my whine. “Nearly. A few more things, and then we can check out.”
I couldn’t believe he’d actually made a list. Okay, so yeah, I could. Alec was organized, practically to a fault. He’d always been that way. I’d been the kid walking into class with my homework half-finished on a crumpled piece of paper—if I’d been able to find it in the whirlpool of chaos that was my locker—but Alec had always kept a planner. What teenage boy keeps a fucking planner?
The same teenage boy who grew into a man who kept a grocery list.
I shifted my weight from side to side while he checked out a box of what looked like rice but had some fancy name on the front of the package. What the hell did I know about rice, other than the chicken fried rice from the Shanghai Gardens was #140 on the menu and tasted like chicken-flavored heaven?
Nada.
Alec tossed the box into the cart and shot me a look I couldn’t quite interpret. If I had to guess, I’d say it was somewhere between amusement and irritation. I didn’t think I’d complained that much.
Maybe this was why I was such a shitty cook. I couldn’t be bothered getting the ingredients for anything. Alec looked as though he thoroughly enjoyed grocery shopping. It was absolutely baffling.
What was more baffling was I didn’t know this about him. We’d been friends forever, and I counted us as being closer than close, but there were parts of his life that were completely foreign to me.
I knew about his business and what he was like when he was at Webster’s with the group. We caught the occasional movie together, and every once in a while I’d suffer through whatever sports game he wanted to watch at his house for the sake of getting to eat pizza and drink beer with him, but the little things—the tiny domestic details—I guess I’d never really put much thought into them.
We checked out and headed back to Alec’s house. The groceries he’d bought barely fit in the trunk of my car, but somehow we squeezed them in. As I helped to unload the last bag, I spotted my Cinnamon Toast Crunch.
I should have bought the bigger box, but I didn’t want to step back into the seventh circle of hell that was the supermarket. I’d have to make a secret trip if I ran out, but then again it wasn’t like I could eat it in the bathtub like I did at home. It was my little after-work routine and one of the ways I relaxed, but maybe best saved for when I lived on my own again.
When I walked into the kitchen, Alec was unpacking the groceries.
“We should have hit a drive-through on the way home,” I said, overwhelmed by the assortment of ingredients spread out on his counter.
“Don’t be an idiot. That doesn’t count as cooking, and you lost the bet. You’re cooking for the next six days.”
I gaped at him. “You still want me to cook after the pancake fiasco?”
“I’ll help you,” he assured me.
“What am I making?” I was already plotting on how to subvert the responsibility and have him take over without realizing it.
“Risotto.”
I resisted the urge to whine. “Seriously? Isn’t that insanely hard to make?”
I didn’t think I’d ever eaten risotto in my life. Wasn’t it rice? The one and only time I’d ever tried to make rice, I’d had to throw the pot away, I’d burned everything so badly.
“It’ll be all right,” Alec assured me. I was doubtful. But he’d bought all the shit for it, and chances were he was going to be doing most of the work anyway. I’d just be his backup.
I liked being Alec’s backup. That’s how I’d always felt, like his perpetual wingman. Even when we were kids, I’d prided myself on having his back, although I was the one who needed rescuing more often than not.
“Come here.” Alec beckoned me forward, and I stepped up flush with the counter next to him. “We need to chop the onions first.”
He grabbed a cutting board for me and a knife from the block next to the stove. I grasped the handle and waited for further instruction. Maybe it was a bit ridiculous, but I’d never chopped an onion before in my life. I really was an aging frat boy… except there were most definitely frat boys out there who knew how
to chop an onion.
Several beats passed and I’m pretty sure my ineptitude became overly clear to Alec because he launched into very detailed step-by-step instructions. I tried to follow along as best I could, but the onion was barely peeled and it was already looking mangled as fuck.
Alec took the knife from me, and the onion, then cut it in half. “I’ll do this half so you can see, and then you can do the other, okay?”
I nodded, feeling increasingly stupid as Alec ran his knife in easy strokes first in one direction, then in another, and finally slicing the onion so it tumbled to the cutting board in tiny cubes. He made it look easy, but I’d had issues even getting the skin off.
“Now you try.” Alec passed everything back over to me. I tried to mimic his motions, but the knife was huge—much bigger than the single one I owned—and it kept slipping on the onion’s surface.
“This is useless. I am not meant to be in the kitchen. I need a 1950s housewife to do all the cooking for me,” I complained, my eyes stinging already from the onion.
“You’re doing well. You just need a little practice. And you need a better grip on your knife.” Alec crowded in close to me and my breath caught. I’d been closer to him than this a hundred times before, but this felt different.
Unbidden, my heart sped and my skin tingled, that telltale prickling of attraction dancing across the back of my neck.
I took a deep breath, inhaling as quietly as possible and letting it out silently. I didn’t want him to know he was affecting me the way he was, and more than anything, I wanted distance. In his kitchen, the perfect image of intimate domesticity, Alec being this close was doing weird things to my head.
His warm hand closed around mine, slipping my fingers up higher on the handle until my thumb and index finger were resting against the sides of the blade. I tried desperately to concentrate on what he was telling me, but I’d never been much good at multitasking, and the lion’s share of my attention span was zeroed in on the feeling of his palm wrapped around mine, the crook of his arm cradling my own, and the flat of his stomach against my back.
“Okay, I think I’ve got it,” I said with as much conviction as I could marshal. Alec stepped away and I wanted to rejoice out loud over the much-needed space between us until I made the first slice and promptly cut my finger open.