Her hand landed on my forearm and I softened. Emma’s voice was quiet. “Everybody makes mistakes cooking. And you’re an amazing goalie.” Her hand squeezed my arm once, twice. “Close your eyes. Clear your head. In and out.”
I closed my eyes and together, we breathed. I focused on the sound of her breath, the feeling of her hand on my arm.
“You got this,” she said. “The game and cooking.”
With a long exhale, I opened to find her big brown eyes softly watching me. She patted my forearm twice before stepping away from me. “Excuse me.”
She took the pan from the stove and I turned to the cutting board behind me. Metal scraped on metal as Emma tried to pry the steak from the pan. “I’ll get it later,” I grumbled.
With a plasticky swish, the steak thunked to the bottom of my trash can. “Sucks that Eric Cordero’s fucking your girlfriend though,” she said, like the cuck comment was the biggest revelation to come out what had just happened.
I finally cracked, curling forward as I laughed. I met her eyes to find her smiling at me and fuck, her eyes were pretty. “Don’t have one of those anymore, Chef. But if I did, I couldn’t even be mad if he fucked her. That guy is a legend.”
Emma cackled and warmth tingled through me. She appeared at my side with a glass container and lid in her hand. She pointed to the broccolini I’d been chopping. “Put those in here.”
“What? Why?”
“Because,” she said carefully, “you’re going to cook those some other time. For now, you’re taking me out to dinner.”
I must have looked alarmed. Was she asking me out? And why did my heart beat faster? “Okay?”
She smirked again. “It’s part of the lesson.”
“Right, of course.”
She leaned a hip against the counter and crossed her arms, gaze sweeping over me. “You get frazzled easily. We’re going to have to work on that.”
I picked up the cutting board and scraped the chopped broccolini into the container. “I don’t like being bad at things. I like control.”
She nodded, surveying my immaculately kept home. “I know.”
I dropped the cutting board into the sink. “Am I a control freak if I ask to drive?”
Emma delivered a saccharine smile. “Yes, but I’ll let you anyway.”
The ribbing had returned. I could pay her back for all her teasing. “I’ll choose what we drive.”
NINE
EMMA
FEBRUARY
“Nothing to be afraid of,Chef. Hop on.”
I was a single mother. I wanted to live to see Liam graduate. High schoolandcollege, preferably. He was closer to me than to his dad. Hell, he was considering staying home just to stay close to me. I had a mama’s boy to support.
Then again, he’d probably get a nice life insurance settlement if I died while he was still seventeen.
Morbid. Not the point. Terrible line of thinking.
A leather-gloved hand wrapped around my wrist and gave a playful squeeze. “I’ll be gentle.”
Funny how quickly our roles had reversed. Now I was the one in a mild panic.
“Why should I trust you?” My voice sounded high pitched and strained over the engine’s soft rumble.
Harlan laughed. “You saved my life, Em. I owe you one.” He flipped his visor up and looked me over. “Let’s review the rules. What did I tell you?”