Chapter 16
[Lumi]
When I enter my house after what felt like the longest day, I inhale and instantly smell the mouth-watering scent of garlic and tomato in the air.
Although Mondays are typically for martinis and a rushed dinner of soup at The Chowder House Rules, Saint sent me a text, requesting I come straight home after work, and I was intrigued.
Actually, I couldn’t wait to get home to him. Which was all kinds of confusing.
“What is that delicious smell?” I praise, entering my kitchen after hanging up my long jacket and stepping out of my boots. I rub my hands together, then pause when I see Saint’s broad back at my kitchen stove.
Jeans hang loosely from his hips beneath an apron tied across his lower back. He’s wearing only a white tee, and when he turns to face me, I read the front of the apron.
Cooks like it best in the kitchen.
“Where did that come from?” I chuckle.
“Hidden Italy,” Saint explains, glancing down at the apron.
“Is that where the delicious smell came from?” I step closer to a pot simmering on the stove, glancing inside to see thick tomato sauce, heavenly scented with additional ingredients, which explains the aroma in my house.
“Well, the smell is coming from your kitchen.” He arches a brow at his cheeky response. “And I made the sauce with ingredients from Hidden Italy, so if you must give the delicatessen credit, then, yes, picture the Cafiero brothers in this kitchen.”
He pauses. “On second thought, don’t. Those boys cannot do what a man can.”
He’s kidding, both about the Cafiero brothers being in my kitchen and their boyishness, although they are considerably younger than me.
“And what can said man do?” I tease, leaning against my counter.
“Make you dinner.” He leans toward me like he intends to kiss me. Quick, casual, carefree, without thinking, but he stops just short of inches from my face and abruptly straightens himself.
“Anyway,” he mutters, turning back to the sauce on the stove and giving it a stir. “Santos spaghetti for dinner. There’s wine on the butcher block.” The tilt of his head implies the slim table that serves as my kitchen island.
For a moment, I just take everything in.
A sexy man in my kitchen making me dinner, caring for me after a long day.
The small kitchen always feels smaller with him in it but not cramped.
This feels intimate, domestic even, and my pulse flutters.
I cup the side of my neck, overcome with emotion, while savoring this experience.
While I wished he’d kissed me moments ago, I should be the one kissing him. Appreciating him, like he said about me earlier, because I’m overwhelmed with gratitude for him right now. Being cared for is unfamiliar, and a little unsettling, but a rather pleasant feeling on top of everything else.
Eventually, stepping toward the bottle on the island, I find it already uncorked. “Would you like a glass?”
Saint only peers at me over his shoulder. “I’d love one. I’ve just been waiting for you.”
There’s no other meaning in the words than an expression of patience, and yet goosebumps form on my skin.
Has he been eager to see me?
I’ve been waiting to see him all day, after the sweet hot chocolate delivery and the puzzling moment where he looked like a modern-day Santa. I have questions, but for now, I pour him some wine before filling a glass for myself. As I finish, Saint turns toward the table and picks up his glass.
I hold up mine. “To cooks who like it better in the kitchen.”
He chuckles, the sound deep and rich. “To postmistresses who like it better without snow or rain or heat or gloom of night.”
I snort at his reproduction of a rather ancient statement about postal work made by a Greek historian, Herodotus. Neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night stays these courageous couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.
Saint takes a sip of the dark red wine. “Delicious,” he hums after his drink, keeping his eyes on me, making me wish I’d been the wine he’d sampled.
Even earlier, I was jealous of a fucking hot chocolate and the way the liquid got to cross his lips, experience his tongue, and fill his mouth.
On that thought, I take my own hearty drink of wine and close my eyes.
“Long day?” Saint asks.
“Long . . . everything.” I exhale. While I meant the years and days, my gaze drops to the lower region of his apron instead.
Saint runs his hand down his chest, right over those words about where cooks like it best, and I wonder where toy makers prefer their sex.
A workshop? An office bent over a desk? How would one particular toy manufacturer feel about my kitchen? Or better yet, my bed?
Thoughts like this have raced through my head since the result of the other night’s kiss and the double orgasm I gave myself with Saint’s appreciation gift.
“I’m sorry,” he says, compassion in those coal-colored eyes, softening them from deep black to light ash.
“Nothing is your fault.” Not my upset over Danny not coming home for Christmas.
Nor the financial state of Rusty’s Wrecks, which will struggle once again to make the payment for this month’s re-mortgage.
While Saint mentioned paying for his stay, I’m not taking his money.
Especially after we’ve both crossed a line in the snow and kissed.
“I’m still sorry,” he states as if he can read my overall sadness. The lingering depression of never having fulfilled a dream. Travel. See the world. I hate that I admitted to him earlier that I still have such a dream.
Budapest will still be there.
Wales can wait.
Argentina is always open.
But how much longer will my dreams be on hold before I’m too old to really appreciate the places I want to visit?
I shake my head, dismissing his apology while appreciating his understanding.
“Life happens,” I state, as if the throwaway comment is any comfort.
“Make every moment magical,” he adds, lifting his glass and taking another sip of wine.
I scoff. “Meaning?”
“Life shouldn’t happen to you. Living shouldn’t feel like it’s on pause. Live every day. Make everyday moments magical. Find the little things to appreciate.”
“Like a belief in Santa Claus,” I tease, circling back to this morning’s discussion.
“A belief in magic or mystery or love.” His eyes, ashen only moments ago, darken again, with a fleck of silver popping into them. A starburst of magic itself. “Or Santa, if that works for you.”
I half-smile, then take another sip of my wine before I speak again.
“I’m not dismissing Santa as only for kids. And I’m not saying I no longer believe in the beauty of Christmas. The hope. The joy. I’m just . . . tired.”
Tired of feeling alone despite my sisters and son.
“I get that.” He offers me an equally compassionate smile, like he really does understand. “The pressure. My dad and the company. The responsibility of being the oldest and the next in line. Upholding tradition.”
“What tradition?”
Saint flinches like he hadn’t meant to say as much. He shakes his head, as if waving away the admission.
“You don’t mention your parents much. Is your dad part of the family business?”
Saint chokes, lifts his wine glass, and speaks into it. “You could say that.” Then he finished the remainder of his wine and reaches for the bottle to refill it.
“You’re really under pressure to get out of here, aren’t you?”
His gaze flicks to me, and he pauses pouring more wine. “Can we not talk about it tonight?” His tone isn’t harsh. In fact, his words are gentle, like he really doesn’t want to discuss something heavy. “I just want to make you dinner. Maybe tempt you into a holiday rom-com on the couch.”
I laugh. “You really want to watch some silly Christmas romance?”
“I want to know what all the fuss is about.”
“Certainly, you’ve seen a few in your time.”
“Are you implying I’m old?” he laughs, finishing the pour on his wine and topping off my glass.
“I’m implying you’ve had dates. Or girlfriends who have conned you into watching something ridiculous and strangely romantic.”
He chuffs. “No to the dates. No to the girlfriends.”
“What?” I choke. Is he a one-night stand kind of man? Was our kiss a one-night-only feature?
He sets down the wine bottle and leans on the butcher block table, arching toward me on the opposite side.
“No dates. No girlfriend. No wife, former or present. No special someone in my life.” He arches a brow. “Yeah, I haven’t forgotten you asked me three times in The Perfect Package.”
“Really?” I don’t know why I sound so surprised, other than he’s him. He’s gorgeous and funny, flirty and kind, sexy and sweet.
I glance over his shoulder where pasta boils and sauce simmers, and garlic bread is prepped for the oven.
“This feels like a date,” I blurt, bursting what’s surely a dinner between friends; no, roommates; no, a woman and her long-term houseguest who—
“It’d be a first.” His eyes observe my face before I notice his cheeks pinken.
“A first date,” I repeat, like I need clarification, making the moment even more awkward.
“Let’s call it that,” he counters, still watching me.
“A first date,” I whisper, my gaze pinned to his eyes. “A Christmas miracle?” I weakly tease to settle the crackling tension sparking around us. The energy of the unknown, other than a man I hardly know who is making me dinner in my kitchen and suggesting we watch a movie together afterward.
Make everyday moments magical.
“No miracle necessary,” Saint says, pressing off the butcher table. “Just you.”
With that, he turns for the sauce, and I’m left stunned a moment, staring at that broad back, wanting to rub my hands over the expanse, and then drag my nails into it while he’s cradled between my hips.
And that . . . would be a Christmas miracle.