Chapter Eight #2
“Do you want me to reheat some pot roast? Popcorn?”
Knox didn't look away from the screen. “Both.”
I don't know why I was suddenly so flustered. Knox worked for me. If anyone should be nervous in our relationship, it was him, right? I was the one who'd invited him to stay. It was my house. My couch. My movie.
None of that soothed the butterflies in my stomach. It wasn't a date or anything—that would be ridiculous—but every time we'd spoken, he'd been strictly business. Watching a movie over popcorn was anything but.
I paused the movie. “It won't take me long.”
Knox followed me to the kitchen where I pulled out a well-used pot and turned on the gas flame, grabbing a bottle of popcorn oil from the cabinet and pouring a liberal dose inside, along with a sprinkle of rosemary and garlic powder. Knox leaned against the island, hands shoved into his pockets.
“You make popcorn from scratch?”
I swirled the pot with two hands and looked over my shoulder at him. “Of course. Don't tell me, you throw a bag in the microwave and pray it doesn't burn?”
“Pretty much.”
“Then prepare yourself for the real thing. I usually add seasonings and cheese. I hope that's okay.” I hadn't thought about it before adding the rosemary and garlic, but I could pour out the oil and start over.
“I'll eat pretty much anything, Lily,” Knox said.
“Except my coffee cake.”
Knox didn't apologize for passing on my baking. Why should he? It had been terrible. Even I knew that. “I promise my popcorn is good.”
While the oil heated, I put together a bowl of pot roast from the leftovers and popped it in the microwave. “Bread?”
“Please.”
I wondered what it would take to get Knox to say more than a few words at a time. I probably didn't want to know. He didn't talk much, but his eyes were alert, picking up everything, absorbing every detail of his surroundings.
His dark gaze moved around the room, soaking in the homey, country kitchen that didn't fit with the rest of the house. I'd mostly let Trey do what he wanted. I hadn't wanted to cause friction, hadn't realized how much I'd dislike the end result.
When it came to the kitchen, I’d dug in my heels.
I'd mostly gotten what I’d wanted. Instead of endless stainless steel and glass, there were touches of wood.
Counters of warm, gold-flecked granite instead of concrete.
Locally-crafted cabinets versus the shiny black Trey had favored.
The end result wasn't quite the farmhouse look I'd pictured, but it was as close as I was going to get.
My back to Knox, I focused on the popcorn rather than trying to come up with empty conversation to fill the silence.
I chattered when I was nervous. Knox made me nervous for all sorts of reasons I wasn't ready to explore, but I didn't feel the need to fill the quiet with words.
Silence with Knox was comfortable. Maybe because I sensed he didn't need conversation from me.
I went about making the popcorn, adding thyme and some finely-ground black pepper, swirling the oil and kernels with every addition before putting the lid on, just in time. The first kernel popped, flinging itself across the inside of the aluminum pot with a light, crisp ping.
Leaving the pot, I grabbed an oversized wooden bowl I'd picked up at the town arts festival a few years before and set it on the counter beside the pot.
The popping kernels were coming faster now, so fast I couldn't distinguish one from another.
It wasn't long before they slowed, and I waited, listening, trying to find the exact moment when the last kernel had popped but the corn hadn't yet begun to burn.
Judging it was ready, I turned off the burner, pulled the pot from the stove and dumped the fragrant, steaming popcorn into the wooden bowl. Beside me, the microwave dinged. Leaving the popcorn, I got Knox's dinner from the microwave and made up a tray.
Throwing a glance over my shoulder at Knox, still leaning against the island with his hands in his pockets, I said, “You can take this into the living room. I'll be right there with the popcorn.”
Without a word, Knox picked up the tray and left the kitchen. I would have guessed that Knox's absence would ease my nerves. It did, a little, but the sense of loss took me by surprise. Without Knox, the heat and life had been sucked from the room.
I dusted the popcorn with finely ground salt and parmesan cheese, tossing it so the flavors could work their way into the nooks and crannies of every piece.
I thought about getting two bowls, but there was only one couch with a good view of the television.
It was easier to put the popcorn between us.
We were adults. We could share a bowl of popcorn.
I entered the living room to find that Knox had made himself comfortable on the opposite end of the couch from my discarded blanket, setting the tray with his pot roast on the coffee table.
I put the popcorn beside his tray and sat, busying myself with tucking the blanket around my legs and fumbling for the remote.
“I like the TV set up,” Knox said, raising his chin in the direction of the screen. “Looks good in here.”
“Thanks. “
He was right, it did. Trey, who hadn't been much for television, had refused to put one in the living room.
We had a family room down the hall with a big flat screen so Trey could watch sports.
In his world, sports and regular tv weren't the same thing.
I'm not a fan of football, I don't get baseball, and soccer is boring on tv.
I wanted a place to watch my shows on the nights a game was on.
We compromised with the flat screen built into one of the console tables in the living room.
It wasn't much good during the day when shafts of sunlight glared on the screen, but at night, one touch of a button and the TV rose out of the console table to face the couch.
Perfect for curling up with a blanket and binge watching.
Knox used the side of his fork to cut into the pot roast, and I picked up the remote. “I’ll start it over,” I said. “Basically, Rosalind is on her way out of town with her fiancé, and Cary is trying to use a big story to get her to stay so he can win her back.”
Knox chewed slowly and nodded, his eyes on the screen.
I munched on popcorn and tried to fall into the familiar rhythm of a movie I'd seen countless times before.
I'd had trouble focusing earlier, worried the intruder would come back.
I wasn't worried about that anymore, but Knox's presence made it equally hard to concentrate.
He ate every bite of pot roast and set the plate back on the tray before turning to the crusty buttered bread. I hadn't baked the bread, but the garlic and basil butter on top was all me, and it was awesome. Knox must have agreed because the bread disappeared in three big bites.
He wiped his hands, finger by finger, on the napkin I'd left on the tray and settled back into the couch, his eyes still locked on the screen.
Knox Sinclair was a contradiction. Good manners.
Even eating on the couch, he hadn't made a mess.
His tray was as neat as it had been when he picked it up off the counter.
The used napkin was folded in half, the utensils side-by-side.
I remembered the way he rushed in after I fell from the ladder, his gentle hands checking me for an injury, the concern in his voice.
Knox didn't talk much, and he looked like a brawler, but he was polite and kind. I'd take kindness over pretty words any day.
I reached for a handful of popcorn, jolting as my fingertip grazed Knox's wrist. A tingle went up my hand at the brief contact, and I fought the urge to yank my fingers away. We were two adults sharing popcorn. So what if I touched him by accident?
I shoved popcorn in my mouth to distract myself. Knox did the same. A minute later he said, “This is good.”
“Thanks. Better than the stuff from the microwave?”
Knox's grunt was brief but full of approval. A warm glow settled in my chest. My coffee cake had been awful, and he hadn't braved my blueberry muffins—smart move on his part—but I'd hit a home run with the roast and popcorn.
Why it mattered that Knox liked my cooking, I couldn't say. It shouldn't matter. It shouldn't matter at all.
I ignored that thought and held on to the warm glow in my chest, wondering if our fingers would brush again in the popcorn bowl and ignoring the flare of warning in the back of my head.
Touching Knox Sinclair was a bad idea.
I already knew that.
I knew and I wanted to do it anyway.