He released her. Her legs wobbled, but she kept her balance.
And because she was a Blue, she set her sights on the entrance to the rink, and she did her dang best to win.
* * *
The dark clouds gathering overhead gave Tony pause when Pepper pulled into her driveway. After a thoroughly enjoyable round of hot chocolate, they’d stopped at the grocery store for a few last essentials before the storm hit.
Like a normal couple.
He wasn’t a fan of the weather bearing down so ominously now, casting a literal cloud over the most enjoyable morning he’d had in over a year.
Not a bad sign, he told himself. Just normal winter weather.
But the chill felt heavier when he pulled himself out of the car and opened Gran’s door. Her grip was firm, and like her granddaughter, her hands were cold.
Unlike her granddaughter, though, as soon as she stepped out of the car, she sneezed a massive sneeze that could’ve come from someone twice her size and should’ve propelled her onto her ass.
“Okay there, Gran?”
“Just a sneeze, young man. Not like my nose is going to fall off.”
“She always sneezes like that,” Pepper said. She tilted her head toward the house, an invitation for him to follow. “Family lore suggests Grandpa was half-deaf in his right ear after twenty-something years of having Gran sneezing on his right.”
“He had selective hearing,” Gran said. “Couldn’t hear a single one of the kids asking for anything, but he could hear his paper land on the doorstep every morning. God rest his soul. Tony, you coming in? Pepper makes the best chocolate chip cookies in the world, and she shouldn’t be left alone right now.”
Pepper froze with her key in the lock, some caught-with-a-hand-in-the-cookie-jar guilt making her eyes wide. “I shouldn’t?”
“Not if you have a handsome, virile man willing to sit with you on a day when you were too sick to go into work, dear.”
“You know what I love about you, Gran?” Tony said.
“My dashing good looks and sparkling personality?”
“That, and your remarkable gift for subtlety.”
Pepper laughed. “Don’t encourage her.” She pushed the door open. “You two coming?”
As if there were anywhere else he wanted to be.
* * *
“I’m taking my hearing aid out, so if you and Tony want to do something with the goat, I won’t hear a thing,” Gran said in her bedroom after a delicious lunch of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. She sat on the quilted bedspread and winked, though her voice was deeper and leaning more toward the nasal side than usual. “And I’ll be napping for a good hour at least.”
“Tony probably needs to go check on things at Pepperoni Tony’s, Gran.” Pepper squinted at the dark clouds rolling in before she closed the blinds. “And I need to make sure the girls close the shop early. Weather reports are getting worse.”
Which meant there was no reason for her to leave home either, provided her employees had closed up already.
An entire afternoon all to herself. It had been so long since Pepper had taken a weekday off, she wasn’t entirely certain what she was supposed to do.
“Can’t make babies if he leaves,” Gran said.
For a few hours, she’d almost forgotten about babies. “Maybe I don’t want kids.”
“Margie might not want kids, but you—you’ve always wanted kids. Don’t try that baloney with me. I’m still your grandmother, and I still know a thing or two about you.”
Did she?
Pepper leaned over and kissed Gran’s forehead. She was unusually warm. Coupled with the sneezing and the froggy voice, she might’ve been coming down with something. “You feeling okay, Gran?”
“I always nap in the afternoon. Perk of being old.”
As if Gran would admit to anything holding her back. She was a tough old lady, and she didn’t like to let anything slow her down.
Except afternoon naptime, apparently. Which she didn’t indulge in every day, and which Pepper knew because she was usually at Bliss Bridal every day now.
“If you need anything, I’ll be downstairs.”
“Go on. Shoo. Have fun with Tony.” Gran flopped onto her back, closed her eyes, and let out a fake snore.
Pepper suppressed her smile, but only until she’d closed Gran’s door.
Downstairs, she caught Tony checking his phone in the kitchen. He pushed off the counter and shoved it in his pocket. His dark hair was growing out already after his haircut before the non-wedding last weekend, curling at the ends, and she had a flash of two little boys with his dark hair and green eyes running through the kitchen, flinging meatballs at one another.
Her throat clogged. Dammit. “Thank you. I had fun this morning.”
“My pleasure. You still free for dinner?”
“The weather—and Gran. She’s—”
A sneeze from upstairs rattled the window over the sink.
“That,” Pepper finished.
“Hmm. That.” He angled closer to her and settled his hands on her hips. “Is that sonic sneeze genetic?”
“Margie has it, and Cinna fakes it, but the rest of us are much more dignified and subtle about sneezing.”
His laughter rumbled low and warm, and it was so easy to let her head drop to his shoulder.
His hugs were the best of everything—warm and comforting like hugs were supposed to be, but spiced with his unique, tantalizing scent and the hard planes of his body.
If he got married when they were done with this fake dating—which oddly no longer felt fake at all—she’d be talking to Basil about what it would take to go to nun school.
Forget Bliss. Forget the boutique. Forget a career.
She was done watching men she cared about marry other women and have babies.
His hands were innocently rubbing up and down her back and inspiring not-so-innocent thoughts and feelings that she refused to act on today.
“You going into Bliss Bridal this afternoon?” he asked.
“Nope. They’re closing early. You?”
“Thought about it, but you didn’t have any dresses in my size last time.”
“Smart-ass. It’s like fake-dating my sisters.”
His arms tightened around her. “Yeah, but I’ve got something your sisters don’t have.”
“If you’re talking about your penis—”
“Actually, I was talking about all-you-can-eat pizza. And I’ll throw down with any one of them in a chili cook-off too.”
The back door banged open. Pepper didn’t let go of Tony, but she did glance over at her baby sister and the two dogs tromping inside. George lunged for them, but Cinna hadn’t unclipped his leash yet.
“You two are so disgusting.” She stomped her boots on the mat and let Sadie off her leash first. “Can’t you save the PDA until after coffee?”
“It’s two in the afternoon,” Pepper said.
“Which is my morning. And we’re out of cold pizza. Hint, hint.”
Another sneeze shook the house. All three of them looked toward the ceiling.
“Not a Gran-cold,” Cinna whispered.
“Don’t say it out loud,” Pepper hissed. “She probably just got some dust caught in her nose when we were skating.”
Tony disentangled himself, and cool air swirled through her shirt where his body heat had been. “I need to run over to the shop,” he said. “Make sure it’s closed up tight.”
Cinna let George off his leash, and he leaped for Tony’s leg.
“Whoops,” she said. “Looks like George doesn’t want you to go.”
George wasn’t the only one.
Which was silly. This wasn’t a for-real relationship.
No matter how real it had felt today.
Pepper rescued him from the dog and held the toy poodle tight.
“CJ’s closing Suckers too,” Cinna said. “But if there’s a Gran cold in the house, I’m begging to sleep there instead.”
> And if there was as much snow on the way as the weatherman was predicting, Pepper wouldn’t be having dinner with Tony tonight. He’d be locked up with Lucky. She’d be here with Gran and George and Sadie.
Which was probably for the best.
Because if he cooked for her again, and if they were alone in his house, there would be far fewer reasons not to kiss him. Persuade him to make love to her again.
Or talk to him. Get to know him better.
Learn his secrets.
Forget again that this wasn’t real. Lose herself in a fake relationship so she didn’t have to deal with the realities of her life.
“Be safe out there,” she told him.
He pressed a kiss to her cheek. “I’ll call you.”
She’d be waiting.
15
The snow started just after four. Pepper, Cinna, and Gran—who was trying to hack up a lung—kept drifting to the windows to watch the large white flakes swirl in the unnaturally dim afternoon light. Pepper had texted Tony to ask if he was hunkered down yet.
He hadn’t replied. Probably taking care of final storm preparations. He’d posted on Pepperoni Tony’s Facebook page that they were closed tonight due to the snowy forecast, but his truck wasn’t next door.
She hoped he wasn’t planning on riding out the storm down at his pizza place.
A not-so-small part of her was relieved he wasn’t home though. She’d barely begun to process that she couldn’t have children. She didn’t need to get wrapped up in a man right now. Especially a man she wasn’t dating for real.
She tried for a while to read the latest Mae Daniels book, but the story—a secret baby romance—had hurt her heart. So she’d tried for a while to read Phoebe Moon and the Missing Sunshine, but reading a book for middle schoolers had also made her heart hurt. So instead, she tossed her e-reader aside and went into the kitchen to bake.
She was pulling the first batch of chocolate chip cookies from the oven when someone knocked on the door.
George yipped and charged the door.
“Back, you little spawn of Satan,” Cinna said. “Gran, this dog needs obedience training. If you don’t sign him up, I’m going to.”
“Hush and get that door,” Gran said. “I’m waiting on a package.”
Not today, she wasn’t. Sadie pulled herself out of her doggy bed in the corner of the dining room and hopped her little doggy-hop behind George, close enough to see what all the excitement was, far enough away not to draw the other dog’s attention.
“You really need to put him in his place,” Pepper said to her pet while she slid the next tray of cookie dough into the oven.
Sadie nodded, but she still hung back. The door clicked in the other room, and her tail went wild.
“Hey, pizza man,” Cinna said. “Please tell me you’re not here with a package for Gran. Because ew.”
Pepper leaned out of the kitchen. “Hey.”
Thick snowflakes dusted Tony’s dark hair. He had at least a half-dozen plastic grocery bags in hand, a streak of marinara sauce on his dark jeans, and a warm smile on his lips. He kicked his shoes off beside the door. Her useless feminine parts stirred to life.
“I brought dinner,” he said.
Yep.
She was a goner.
She stood gaping a second too long. “Cinna, help the man with the groceries. Gran, if you can’t cough in your elbow, cough in a tissue.” She hustled into the room and took two bags from him, but he shooed her away when she tried to take more, sidestepping her on his way to the kitchen.
“You didn’t have to—”
Her objection died on her tongue when he cast a silent, yes, I did at her.
“Thank you,” she amended.
He deposited the groceries on her kitchen table. “Been too long since I had anyone to cook for.”
Her heart squeezed, but before she could reply, he added, “Beautiful cookies. You remembered chocolate chip is my favorite.”
“I thought cannoli was your favorite.”
He flashed a pirate grin that made her belly clench, and while she tried to hide the flush in her cheeks by busying herself with preparing the next pan of cookies, he went to work pulling groceries out of the bags.
* * *
Tony had never met a kitchen he couldn’t work in, and Pepper’s was nearly perfect.
Wasn’t her counter space doing the trick—she had about as much room as he did. And while her kitchen itself was more modern than his, her stockpot wasn’t as nice as his, nor was her rolling pin. But she had a stand mixer, sharp knives, and a big kitchen table he could work at.
She also had an easy way of keeping him company while he worked, telling stories about her family and some of the more outrageous brides she’d worked with, both here in Bliss and back when she worked for a big bridal chain in St. Louis. By the time he added the diced onion, carrots, and celery to the chicken in the stockpot and set it to boil, he was more relaxed than he’d been in at least a year.
Probably two.
A swirling sheet of snowflakes danced in the backyard. Gran and Cinna were curled up in the living room, watching pro wrestling with George. Pepper’s dog snored softly at her feet beneath the table. And Tony was doing what he loved—cooking for people he cared about, in a home that felt like a home.
Wondering at his chances of getting his favorite woman naked again.
“Flour?” he asked Pepper.
“Big mushroom.”
She smiled when he glanced back at her, catching her reaching for another cookie. “On the counter. The mushroom crock.”
He’d noticed the four crocks of various sizes, each with orange mushroom cap lids and little doors and windows painted on the stems, but he hadn’t given much thought to anything being in them. He peeked in each.
Tea bags in the smallest, playing cards in the next biggest, then sugar, then flour.
“Stylish,” he said.
“Gran had them in her kitchen for years before she downsized and went into a senior living facility. I had to arm wrestle Ginger for them, and that was back when she was picking up toddlers all day long and had guns of steel. So you know I had to want them badly.”
There went that stirring in his pants again.
He couldn’t decide if Pepper was good or bad for him. Probably both. “Video evidence?” he asked.
“You wish. What’s the flour for?”
“Noodles.”
“You’re making us homemade noodles?”
“No, I’m making Gran homemade noodles. You’re going to have to suffer through salmon, bacon-wrapped asparagus, and a Tony special treat.” He dumped two cups of flour in the mixer and topped it with a healthy dose of salt. Pepper was watching him with an intensity that made him squirm.
“You really love to cook,” she said softly.
A foreign heat crept up his neck. Because her statement struck him as a question. Do you love to cook for me?
She hadn’t asked that, of course. Probably wouldn’t have occurred to her to ask if he was doing this for himself or for her.
“Just compensating for what I’m not good at,” he said with a rueful shrug.
“I’m struggling to imagine anything you’re not good at.”
He kept his head ducked down while he cracked the two eggs into the mixer and turned it on. The noise made talking impossible, and he needed to pay attention to the dough to make sure he added the right amount of milk.
When he shut the mixer off a minute later, Pepper was eyeing the chocolate chip cookies again. “Gonna ruin your appetite,” he murmured.
“No chocolate chip cookies for you,” she replied.
“That’s not the way to a man’s heart,” Cinna called.
Gran coughed.
Worry lines creased Pepper’s forehead. She reached for her phone. “I know it’s probably just a normal cold,” she said quietly, “but she’s eighty-seven. And her brain is stronger than her body.”
His mom had been too. Especially the
last few weeks. “She’s too feisty to let this get her down for long.”
“Let’s hope.” She typed something on her phone, then plunked it on the table. “Screw it. I want another cookie.”
He wanted to lean over the table and kiss her. Pull her hair out of that ponytail, take his time, and learn what she liked. Everywhere she was ticklish. Her secret, sensitive places that would make her breath hitch and her heart pound.
His own heart thumped harder.
He didn’t even want to kiss her to prove to himself that he wasn’t broken anymore. He just wanted her to know she wasn’t alone.
But she thought he was here because she was doing him a favor in pretending to date him so he could avoid blind dates from his sisters.
Not because he couldn’t resist her.
Tonight, as soon as Gran was settled, as long as Cinna took a hint and left them alone, he’d ask her if they could date for real.
* * *
“You should marry this one, Pepper,” Gran said over her chicken noodle soup two hours later.
“I find men are more likely to want to be involved with women whose grandmothers don’t bring up marriage while they’re sniffling into their soup,” Pepper replied.
Not that she honestly disagreed with the basics of Gran’s sentiment. She had salmon, bacon-wrapped asparagus, and Brazilian cheese rolls waiting for her once Gran was in bed, and this soup was utterly divine.
But she had too many complications in her life to work through to even consider marriage.
And her primary motivation for wanting it was gone.
Besides, Tony had heard Gran’s suggestion, and he’d shoveled another spoonful of soup into his own mouth before turning back to the rest of his cooking.
“Tony, how long have you been divorced?” Cinna asked.
“Cinna,” Pepper hissed.
“Little over a year,” Tony replied.
“Plenty of time to move on,” Gran announced. “So? Will you marry Pepper?”
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