Chapter Fifteen
Bethany
This wasn’t how I planned our weekend to go, but I push my disappointment aside and vow to enjoy my visit. Nick and I are together—and that’s what counts—although I suspect we’re going to have a full-time chaperone.
It’s an ordeal just to get Mrs. DeLuca’s suitcases into Nick’s tiny condo. The five-piece matching hard-sided set looks flashy and expensive. But I’m sure Francine didn’t select the designer brand for its durability. His mom and I each grab a case and roll it inside. Nick wrangles the rest of them then works for several minutes to find storage locations. He stuffs a couple into his closet, one under the bed, and the rest he stacks in the corner. By the time he’s done organizing his mother’s luggage, he looks a bit disheveled, but that just adds to his allure.
“Okay, now I cook,” he says, a flirty smile playing around his lips.
“I’m going to freshen up,” his mom declares. She flits off into the bedroom and I hear a loud click! The door latch catches, giving Nick and I our first moment of privacy since we arrived.
Our eyes lock and we exchange relieved grins. He picks me up, spins me around, then kisses me as if he’s on the clock. Come to think of it, we are on the clock. I kiss him back with equal fervor while keeping an eye on his mom’s closed bedroom door.
When he nuzzles my neck and sprinkles kisses across my cheeks, I whisper. “Won’t she know what we’ve been doing if there’s no food when she comes back out?”
The kisses stop, he leans his forehead against mine and groans, fortunately the disgruntled sound is muffled against my neck. “Sorry about this, Bethany,” he mumbles.
I plant another quick kiss on his lips, then say, “No worries. As long as I’m with you, I’m happy.” My stomach takes this as an opportunity to express how hungry I am. Loudly. I blush.
Nick chuckles. “Come with me into the kitchen. You can help.” He grabs my hand and tugs me along, we pass the leather sofa and loveseat, skirt the dining table, and enter his domain.
“Wow!” I breathe in wonder at his well-equipped kitchen. I wouldn’t expect anything less since he’s a professional chef, but I’m impressed at all the high-end appliances packed into this small space. It took a magician to get them all to fit and not feel cramped.
He strides to the Wolf 5-burner stove—very much like the ones we used in class—pulls a pan from the rack hanging above his head and plunks the pan on a burner. I want to cheer when he grabs a package of bacon from the fridge and adds eight thick slices to the pan.
I love bacon!
He looks back over his shoulder at me. “We’re having BLT’s. Can you slice a couple of those tomatoes?” I follow the jut of his chin and notice the fresh vegetables sitting in a basket on the countertop.
“Sure.” Hopefully my knife skills are up to snuff for Chef DeLuca. “Knife?” I ask while grabbing a tomato and heading over to the sink to wash it.
He points to a drawer. “Over there. The cutting board is in the bottom of the drawer.”
As soon as I get set up on the counter, the aroma of cooking meat fills the air. Glancing at the sexy, rumpled chef with his back to me, I simply can’t resist the man. I approach him and slide my arms around his waist. He turns and kisses me until my toes curl. Wowza!
“I love the sight of a hottie chef cooking bacon,” I whisper.
Arching an eyebrow, he says, “How many hottie chefs do you know?”
I giggle. “One.”
“I’ll cook bacon for you every day if I’m going to get this reaction.” He winks, then leans in and resumes the kiss. Who knows how long we kiss, one minute or five. A herd of buffalo could stampede through the room, and we wouldn’t notice.
Nick pauses from our kiss to sniff the air. My nose wrinkles when I detect the odor of burnt food.
In a flash, my boyfriend turns back to the sizzling pan and yanks it from the burner. He gives the pan a crabby look, then deposits the contents into the trash can at the end of the counter.
“Why did you throw it out? I love burnt bacon.”
Grunting a reply, he plunks the pan back on the burner, grabs the package of bacon from the fridge and adds more thick slices back to the pan. He looks back over his shoulder at me wearing a grumpy expression.
“I’m not feeding you burnt bacon. Miss Hunt, please return to your tomatoes, before I burn this pan as well.” He points towards the discarded cutting board and knife. “No more distractions.”
Giggling, I obediently resume slicing tomatoes while glancing over at my sexy chef boyfriend cooking bacon to crispy perfection. He watches the pan like a hawk.
“Did you burn something?” Francine asks from the doorway, making me jump.
Nick tosses a crabby look my way that suggests he clearly blames me for what happened. I plaster on an innocent smile, not rising to the bait.
“Yes, I burned the bacon,” Nick clips.
His mom’s skeptical expression and the way she glances at me says she knows I had a hand in the mishap. Oops!
By the time I finish slicing the tomatoes, Nick has the sandwiches plated. When did he have time to toast the bread?
With a flourish, he sets three plates on the table, along with lettuce and a plethora of condiment jars, all have hand-printed labels indicating that Nick made them himself. My mouth waters. I bring the tomatoes over and add them to the feast.
“Ladies, please sit and enjoy while I make Bethany’s reservation.”
“You need to eat. I’ll make my reservation.”
Shaking his head, he puts his phone up to his ear. “I know the owner.”
Francine sits, so common courtesy says that I join her. We pass the toppings back and forth as we load up our sandwiches while Nick talks on the phone. I add a slather of both the homemade mayo and the Dijon mustard to my bread. Knowing Nick’s culinary skills, both are going to be delicious.
“Caroline?” He chuckles. “Yes, this is Nick DeLuca. I’m doing fine.” He’s silent while he listens to the other side of the conversation, which I can’t hear. “Thank you. We open in a couple weeks. I’ll reserve a table for you on opening night.” More silence, then he says, “Say, my girlfriend is in town, and she needs a place to stay. Do you have any available rooms? She’ll be checking out on Sunday.”
Nick’s mom squints at me and guilt flashes in her eyes. It’s as if she just realized that her visit has ruined our romantic weekend together.
“Excellent! I’ll bring her by later this evening. Thanks Caroline.” He places the phone on the counter and joins us at the table. “You’re all set,” he says to me, then starts building his sandwich.
“Thank you.” I’m sure the B & B is perfectly nice, but I was looking forward to spending all my time with Nick, so I can’t help but feel let down.
“Bethany, are you also a chef?” Francine asks. “Or part of the restaurant industry?”
A surprised laugh squirts out. “No, not unless you count feeding goldfish crackers to five-year-olds.”
The woman gets a confused look, but Nick hops into the conversation.
“Bethany is a kindergarten teacher,” he says with a touch of pride.
“Oh? Nick’s last girlfriend was also a chef, so I just assumed.”
My eyes widen. Nick and I haven’t talked about our exes so I didn’t know this interesting tidbit. What would his mom think if she knew I can barely boil water and that my go-to appliance is the microwave?
Whomp! Whomp!
Feeling again like I don’t measure up, I focus on eating my BLT lest I say anything sarcastic.
“How did you two meet?”
“I took Nick’s cooking class.”
His mom shoots her son a pointed look. “You’re teaching the public how to cook? I thought you were teaching at Cordon Bleu.”
The statement drips with disdain as if Nick is royalty and he was teaching commoners how to cook.
He ignores the criticism. “It was just a time filler until I open the new restaurant.”
Great. Now I’m a time filler.
An awkward silence fills the air, and we all return to eating our sandwiches. Despite the tasty mayo, spicy mustard, and salty bacon, mine is beginning to taste like sawdust.
“The sandwiches are delicious,” his mom says a few seconds later. “Remember how Grandma used to grow tomatoes in her garden and we’d eat hundreds of BLT’s after they ripened?”
Mom and son laugh. “BLT overload. By the end of summer, I didn’t want to ever eat another one,” Nick says as he takes a big bite, chews, and grins. Obviously, it’s a fond memory.
Feeling like a third wheel, I listen as the pair reminisce about the grandmother and her large garden. My heart sinks. Is this how it’s going to be all weekend?