She Loves Him...Not

by Elana Johnson

  “I told you I’d get the stuff for soup, right?” he asked, backing up and drinking in the sight of her. She wore a pair of cutoffs that showed way more leg than Teagan had seen on her, ever. In addition to that, she wore a cute blouse that tied in a knot right over her belly button, the black stripes crossing the fabric and making alternating orange and white stripes.

  In short, she was absolutely beautiful, and Teagan couldn’t even remember what he’d asked her.

  She said something as she stepped past him, but the scent of lemons and roses distracted him, as did the way her hair fell over her shoulders in delicious waves. Having enough awareness to close the door took all his energy, but he got it done.

  He turned back to her just as she set her bag of groceries on the counter in his kitchen. How many times had he envisioned her here? So many.

  Teagan swallowed and followed her, putting down the rest of the things she’d brought. “So I thought I’d do a vegetable tempura,” she said, pulling out asparagus and zucchini squash. “That’ll go well with the soup, right?”

  “Absolutely,” he said.

  “I got prawns,” she said, producing them. “And I may have started getting ideas about dessert.” She looked up at him, a package of dark chocolate in one hand and a carton of cream in the other. Her blue eyes sparkled at him like sapphires, and he realized she was flirting with him.

  He grinned at her, ready to play this game with her until he could press her right against the kitchen counter and kiss her. “Whatever you have in mind for dessert is fine with me.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Teagan thought of the ice cream in his freezer. She didn’t need to know about it. “Of course.”

  “I find it hard to believe you didn’t plan something for dessert.”

  “Well, believe it.”

  Gwen rolled her eyes, an action she’d done dozens of times over the past six months. But this time, it felt playful instead of angry, and Teagan chuckled as he helped her unpack her groceries.

  Surveying the ingredients she’d brought, he started to see where she was going. “Cake or cookies?” he asked.

  “Cake, of course,” she said. “Ten-year-olds make cookies.”

  “Hey, I had these cookies on the mainland last week that were amazing.”

  Gwen folded up her reusable grocery bags and tucked them between his toaster and his refrigerator as if she lived here. Suddenly, Teagan needed to nudge down the air conditioner and close that back door. He always opened it, because he liked the scent of the sea air, the sound of the street noise below him, and the amazing island breeze that came bustling in from time to time.

  But standing with Gwen in his kitchen, her eyes on him and the thought of cooking with her, and Teagan needed a cold drink and something to get his internal temperature back to normal.

  “You’ll have to take me there,” Gwen said.

  Teagan’s mind blanked. “Where?”

  She giggled and ducked her head, and that only made his desire for her shoot through the roof. She was powerful and confident in the kitchen at The Heartwood Inn, and he really liked her in that environment.

  Buttoned up in a chef’s jacket, with her hair slicked back, her notes in front of her, and kind strength pouring from her.

  But he liked this more feminine, fun, flirty version of the woman too, and he hoped he’d get to see more of her.

  “The cookie place,” she said, stepping into his personal space. She slowly—oh, so slowly—slid her hands up his arms and tipped up onto her toes. His eyes drifted closed as if she’d kiss him, but instead she said, “All right, chef. Let’s cook.”

  Teagan could wait to kiss her. He felt like he’d earned a PhD in Waiting to Kiss Gwen Heartwood. So if she wanted to cook, he could wait a bit longer—and he’d cook.

  Chapter Seven

  Gwen tied an apron around her waist, her body’s cue to stop flirting and get to work. Flirting with Teagan was a lot of fun, though, as he seemed to lose his train of thought really easily.

  “So,” she said, exhaling as she started unboxing the unsalted butter. “Have you dated a lot since your marriage ended?”

  Teagan made a choking noise, and she turned in time to see him drop the bundle of celery in his arms. He carried at least half a dozen vegetables, and he stepped over to the island and dumped them there.

  “I suppose—no. Not much.”

  Gwen nodded at him and turned to survey his cabinets. “Do you have a stand mixer? If not, it’s—”

  “Right here.” Teagan practically tripped over his own feet to get to a cupboard directly in front of her. He bent and opened it, pulling out the mixer she’d requested.

  Gwen found his nerves cute, but she really wanted him to settle down and cook. Be real with her. Just talk while they put some delicious food together. She ignored the mixer for a moment and stood next to him. “Tell me about your soup.”

  “It’s not a traditional pho,” he said. “But it starts off that way.” As he started telling her about the ingredients and why he put them in the noodle soup, he relaxed. Satisfaction pulled through Gwen, and she got back to putting together her batter too.

  He finished talking at the same time he finished chopping the onion, and it hit the hot oil in the Dutch oven on his stovetop in the next moment. The scent of hot oil and onions filled the air, and Gwen basked in the sizzling sound of it.

  “How do you feel about pets?” she asked.

  “If I didn’t work so much, I’d have one,” he said.

  “Traditional, like a dog or a cat? Or are we talking exotic?”

  “Exotic?” He laughed then, the sound full and throaty. “Are goldfish exotic?”

  “I wouldn’t think so.” She smiled as she greased a cake pan.

  “Lizards?”

  “Nope.”

  “Ferrets?”

  “I’m not even sure I know what a ferret is.”

  He chuckled again as he worked from the cutting board to the pot, adding spices and ginger, baby corn cobs, and bok choy. “Probably just a dog or a cat,” he said. “In fact, probably a cat. Then I don’t have to exercise them.”

  “Mm, wise choice,” Gwen said, getting back to her own recipe. She wasn’t entirely sure where she was, because watching Teagan cook was so interesting. So hot.

  She cleared her throat and focused. She didn’t want her cake to be a flop.

  “Let’s go back to the dating question,” Teagan said, easily now. “Do you date a lot?”

  Gwen laughed, sure he was joking. “Not even a little bit.”

  “Really? Seems like you’ve been out with a few men lately.”

  Gwen paused again, this time cutting a look at him out of the corner of her eye. “Were you watching me?”

  “Wasn’t that obvious?” he asked, grinning at her as he stepped over to the sink for water.

  She supposed it was. “I…haven’t had much luck with men.” She nodded. That summed things up nicely.

  “What do you want?” he asked.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “What do you want your life to be?”

  “I thought we were talking about dating.”

  “We were. I just moved us to this. Dating is part of your life, right?”

  Gwen nodded, because yes, it was. “I want…I want my life to be about more than the inn.” As soon as the words left her mouth, Gwen wished she could pull them back in. There were too many feelings inside those words. Too many revelations. Too many answers she didn’t know.

  “That’s interesting,” Teagan said.

  “What about you?” she asked. “What do you want your life to be?”

  “My life is what I want it to be,” he said.

  “Really?” she asked. “You have everything you want, right now.”

  He shrugged, stirring everything together. He put the lid on his Dutch oven and adjusted the flame underneath it before turning toward her. “I mean, I’m here with you, cooking in my house. So yeah, right here, right now
, I have everything I want.”

  Gwen felt like she’d been backed into a corner. Her answer had opened so many doors she wished she’d kept closed. “If we’re doing right here, right now, in this moment, anyone could say that.”

  “True,” he said, leaning against the counter and folding his arms. The action made his biceps bigger, and Gwen turned away from the handsome sight of him in that white T-shirt.

  “What more do you want besides the inn?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” Gwen said, swallowing. She poured her cake batter into the pans and turned to put them in the oven. Teagan’s eyes on the side of her face felt so heavy, but she refused to look at him.

  “Come on, Gwenny,” he said, almost teasing.

  She faced him, her pulse bumping a little harder than it had been a moment ago. “You have to tell me something real if you want me to share something real with you.”

  “I did,” he said. “I told you things about my past I haven’t told very many people.”

  “How many people?” she asked, feeling some of the challenge spark back to life inside her.

  “My sister,” he said. “My mother.”

  “No father?”

  “My father passed away when I was very young,” he said. “Five or six.”

  Regret stained Gwen’s heart immediately. “I’m so sorry.”

  “I don’t remember him,” Teagan said. “I mean, sometimes I feel like I knew him, but then….” He paused, looking somewhere inside his mind. “Then the moment passes.”

  “And where are your mom and sister?”

  “Whistlestop Shores,” he said, turning to open the fridge so she couldn’t see his face. She couldn’t tell from the tone of his voice how he felt about that.

  “Are you from there?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said. “Born and raised.” He straightened, the carton of cream in his hand. “Want me to help with this?”

  “No, sir,” she said, taking the cream and putting it back in the fridge. This dance with him in the kitchen was fun, and easy, and she was glad she didn’t have to avoid him the way she’d been doing.

  “So your family must be wealthy,” she said.

  “My mother came from money,” he said evasively, and Gwen started thinking through any famous Hatch’s she knew. But she’d never been one to run in high society circles, though her family had plenty of money too.

  “Will you take me to Whistlestop Shores?” she asked, moving some of her dishes into the kitchen sink. He joined her there, and it was very nice to work side-by-side with him.

  “Sure,” he said. “It’s a great place.”

  “I’ve been a few times,” she said. “But not for a while.”

  “I’ll give you the locals tour.” He grinned at her and turned on the hot water.

  Gwen swirled her hands in the water as he added soap, and he put his in too. He took her hand and squeezed, and she stilled, letting the perfectness of the moment wash over her.

  “I haven’t forgotten that you didn’t tell me what you wanted outside of the inn,” he said, his voice much quieter now.

  A flash of irritation moved through her. “I shouldn’t have said that. I have a good life.”

  “Of course you do,” he said gently. This softer side of him was nice, but Gwen also didn’t know what to do with it. “But it’s okay to want more too.”

  Gwen did want more. She wanted some days off. She wanted a partner in her life that wasn’t her sister. She loved Celeste, but she and Brad would get engaged and then married, and Gwen would still have the family house on the beach and the kitchen at the inn.

  She wanted a family, but she absolutely wasn’t telling Teagan that. At least not right now, on this, essentially their second date.

  “Maybe you’ll tell me one day,” he said.

  “Sure,” she said, her way of saying Not today.

  Thankfully, Teagan left it at that, and Gwen appreciated that gesture. “So the grand opening of the VIP pool is on Tuesday,” she said. “Do you want to go with me?”

  “Sure,” Teagan said, absolutely no hesitation in his voice. Warmth and happiness moved through Gwen, and she enjoyed the rest of her afternoon with the most handsome—and most talented—chef on the island.

  “I have cake,” Gwen said as she entered her parents’ house.

  “Cake?” Her dad sat up from where he’d been reclining in the couch. “I want cake.” He put the leg rest down and stood up.

  Gwen accepted a quick side-hug from her dad and handed the cake to him with a smile. “It’s a black and white cake, Pops.”

  “Looks amazing.” He grinned at her and took the cake she’d made at Teagan’s into the kitchen, where her grandmother waited with a knife.

  “I’ll put coffee on,” her mom said, and the bustling and hustling in the kitchen warmed Gwen’s heart. She was exhausted, and she still needed to get back over to the restaurant for their dinner service. She wasn’t working the kitchen that night, but Bea had a family affair starting at eight, and Gwen would take over the floor then.

  “How’s the kitchen?” her dad asked, and Gwen sighed.

  “Dad, did you ever just want a day off? Or a week?”

  He looked up, concern instantly in his dark blue eyes. Her mother had all the light blonde, blue-eyed genes, and every one of Gwen’s sisters had a shade of blue eyes and a shade of blonde hair.

  Gwen’s was quite light in all areas, and she’d always wished she had hair that didn’t wisp away like cornsilk and eyes that didn’t look like someone made a mistake by not putting in enough dye.

  “You look tired, dear,” her mom said, and Gwen sighed again.

  “Thanks, Mom.”

  “Gwenny,” her dad said, actually abandoning the cake and coming back toward her. He took her by both shoulders, his big hands so comforting and kind. “If you need a break, you take one. Always.”

  “But the kitchen—”

  “The kitchen will be there when you get back,” he said, peering down at her. “I mean it. The only way, and I mean the only way, I survived running that place was taking time when I needed it.”

  “And he never took enough,” her mom said.

  Gwen looked away, her emotions so close to the surface now. She loved her parents, and she was glad her dad hadn’t blown her question away like it was nothing. “Okay,” she said, her voice a bit shaky. “Then I need some time off.”

  “Then make the arrangements and take it.” Her dad kept his gaze on her as he dropped his hands. “And listen, if you don’t want the job you have, but you want to stay at the inn, talk to O. She’ll find a good fit for you.”

  “And if you don’t want to work at the inn at all, that’s okay too,” her mom said. “Right, Henry?”

  “Of course,” her dad said. “We’ve always said you girls could choose what you wanted to be. And you can be anything.”

  “Look at Alissa,” Grams said from the kitchen. “She’s got that shop now, and we ate her fish for lunch today.”

  Gwen smiled at her family, her eyes tearing up now. “Okay.” She stepped into a full hug now, hoping to take a moment to calm herself so she didn’t cry. “I think I’m okay in the kitchens for now.”

  Her mom smiled and patted her head like she was a little dog, and then turned back to the kitchen. “Let’s have a piece of this cake.”

  “Why did you make the cake, dear?” Grams asked, almost dropping the plates as she got them out of the cupboard.

  “Mom,” her mother said. “Go sit down. I’ve got this.”

  Grams didn’t seem to notice the exasperation in her daughter-in-law’s voice, and she merrily went to sit at the dining room table.

  “Well,” Gwen said. “I sort of have a new boyfriend, and we made the cake this afternoon together.”

  “A new boyfriend?” her mom exclaimed in a voice twice as loud as before.

  “Oh, boy,” her dad said, smiling as he turned to help with the cake.

  “He’s sort of an old boyfriend
too,” Gwen said, her smile fading. “I’m not really sure how things will go.” But she was already kissing him, as if the last six months without Teagan had never happened.

  “An old boyfriend too,” Grams said. “Must be Teagan.”

  Her mother dropped the knife she was using to cut the cake. A horrible clattering sound filled the kitchen, along with her voice saying, “Teagan? Really?” just before her dad said, “Don’t bleed all over the cake, Gladys.”

  Chapter Eight

  Teagan couldn’t believe how happy he was. He woke up without a pit of dread in his stomach, though it was four a.m. He arrived at the inn without tension in his shoulders. He worked with a smile way down in his soul, especially when Gwen came in, caught his eye, and smiled.

  A rush of humiliation filled him each time that happened, but as one morning faded into another, that feeling started to lessen.

  So he’d made a mistake. It wasn’t his first one, by any means. “Now all you need to do is figure out how to not make another one,” he muttered to himself. “Especially with Gwen.”

  “What?” Gordon asked, and Teagan startled in his meal prep for breakfast, which would begin in fifteen minutes.

  “Nothing,” Teagan said, heat rising to his face. Of course he knew he wasn’t alone. He just forgot sometimes, as a chef sometimes really got deep into his own mind. “How’s Kennedy?” Gordon had recently gotten married, and his wife was finishing up her beauty classes on the mainland.

  “Doing real good,” Gordon said in his Southern drawl. “She’ll be done at the end of October, and she’s starting to set up her shop.”

  “It’ll be in your place at home, right?” Teagan asked. Gordon was really his only friend in the kitchen. Before Gordon had gotten married, he and Teagan had hung out a few times.

  “That’s right,” he said with a smile. “How do you remember so many details about everyone you talk to?”

  “Do I?” Teagan laughed and finished dicing the ham. He had a literal vat of it as their special today was the ham and cheese omelet, and he expected a lot of orders. Even kids liked ham and cheese in their eggs, and it was Tuesday, so kids ate free all day long.