21. Daphne
Daphne
After the family meeting, I help Mom set up the tables and chairs outside for Thursday dinner. Then I take a basket of sandwiches and cold drinks out to where Dylan, Chastity, Zach, and Rickie are working.
Today is a scorcher, so the men are all shirtless, of course. I will not ogle Rickie’s tattoos. I will not ogle Rickie’s tattoos …
“Aren’t you going to eat lunch with us?” Chastity asks as I plunk the basket down and turn to go.
“Sorry, I’m in the middle of…a thing,” I say as Rickie climbs off a ladder, his hot body glistening in the sun. He’s wearing a pair of steel-gray shorts, and that’s basically it. Just sun-kissed skin and lean muscle as far as the eye can see. “Later guys!”
He gives me a smirk as I walk away.
But avoidance only gets me so far. After lunch, Zach and Griffin load up three juvenile bulls to deliver them to the slaughterhouse, while Dylan and Chastity head out to measure and map out the farmland we bought from the Abrahams, and plan their future together.
Rickie is sent back to the farmhouse to help prep for Thursday dinner with me and Mom.
“Put me to work,” he says, pulling his close-fitting T-shirt down over his head. As if that even helps dull my attraction.
“Fine.” I grab an apron off the pantry door and toss it to him. “Suit up. We’re making pies.”
He drops the apron over his head. It’s blue-and-white calico with a ruffle across the hem. I may have grabbed the girliest one we have, accidentally on purpose. But it doesn’t even put a dent in my hormone spike. He crosses those strong arms in front of his chest and smiles. “Teach me your ways.”
Wow. Just wow.
Dragging my eyes off him, I tug the kitchen scale into position and set a big mixing bowl on top.
“First you sift the flour. Here.” I fetch the sifter out of a cupboard and set it on the work table.
Then I heft the flour canister onto the table and open up the top.
We buy flour by the fifty-pound bag because we use so much of it.
“What does this do?” Rickie picks up the sifter and squeezes the handle, which turns the mechanism.
“It makes the flour lighter and easier to work with,” my mother says. She’s arranging fresh cherries, blueberries, and frozen strawberries on the countertop.
“Awesome.” Rickie scoops the sifter into the flour and aims it at the big metal mixing bowl.
“Wait!” I yelp just as he starts to squeeze the handle. “You have to tare out the scale first.”
Rickie holds up his free hand like a busted perp. “I don't know what you just said, but okay.”
“Sorry.” I reach over to set the kitchen scale properly, and my knuckles brush against the ridges of his abdominal muscles. Not even a frilly apron can disguise how cut he is. Wowzers.
Like I need to be any more distracted than I already am. “We use three hundred grams per double crust, and we can do two double crusts at once,” I ramble. “Six hundred grams. Go.”
“Yes sir, thank you, sir!” he barks.
My mother chuckles. “Daphne can be a bit of a drill sergeant. She can't help it. She was born into chaos, and she hates chaos.”
Et tu, Mom ? “I’m right here, you realize?”
“Yes, you are.” She picks up the cherry pitter and gives me a knowing smile.
Rickie squeezes the sifter repeatedly, and I kind of hate myself for noticing the flex of his forearm muscles on every stroke. “I know,” he says. “We can sift Daphne to make her lighter and easier to work with.”
“Excellent plan,” my mother agrees, and I want to smack them both.
The kitchen is just too small. Coming home already felt claustrophobic. I have secrets to keep, and a family to appease. My inconvenient curiosity—that’s the word I’m using—about Rickie shrinks it even further.
And did I mention it’s legitimately hot in here? The thermometer stuck to the outside of the kitchen window says 86 degrees.
My mother pulls the stems off the season’s first cherries, while I measure out salt and a bit of sugar for the crust.
“What else do you use?” Rickie asks. “Oil? Shortening?”
“ Butter ,” my mother and I say at the same time.
“And then ice water,” I add. “The butter and the water have to be absolutely frigid. Like my cold little heart.”
The two of them laugh. And when my eyes meet Rickie’s, I feel an unwelcome tremor. His smile sees right through my bullshit and confusion. There’s heat in those gray depths.
Just what we need around here. More heat.
“Brace yourselves,” my mother says, which is funny because I’ve spent the whole summer doing just that. "I'm going to preheat the oven."
“Gawd,” my grandpa says, shuffling into the room. “It's going to be hotter than the devil's armpit before these pies are baked. Totally worth it, though.” He glances at Rickie. "Nice apron, boy. A real man can always rock the ruffles."
He holds up a fist, and Rickie bumps it. “Damn right.”
I busy myself checking the total weight of Rickie’s flour and then whisking in the other ingredients. But my mind is back three years, to the day when Rickie put on that eyeliner and told me, Don't give anyone that power .
But how do you stop? I’ve spent a lot of energy trying to be a certain kind of person. The smart twin. The ambitious kid. The overachiever.
It's so exhausting. But I can’t find the off ramp. It’s not like I could just suddenly unload my troubles on my family, either. I’d get six or eight conflicting opinions about how best to unfuck my life. No thanks.
“Okay, now what?" Rickie asks.
"Now we quickly add butter chunks. You’ll use this." I hand him the pastry blending tool, which is made of wires attached to a wooden handle. “You’re going to break up the butter into gravel-sized globules, surrounded by flour. Then we add just enough ice water to bring it together.”
“Let's do this. Butter me.” He picks up the blending tool, giving me a lazy wink.
He means it as a joke, and yet I still feel it in some inappropriate places. And the kitchen seems to shrink yet again.
“Ruth, we're going to make it to that library talk, right?” Grandpa says. “I heard there’s mini cheesecakes after.”
My mother glances at the clock and frowns. "I hope so," she says. "An hour isn't much time to finish four pies, and we’re just starting.”
"With all this labor?" Grandpa asks. "I'll help, too. Rickie got the fun apron, but mine is still here somewhere, right?"
"I'm sure it is,” Mom says as Grandpa disappears into the pantry.
He returns a moment later, wearing an apron that reads: I turn all the grills on . "Now pass me that cherry pitter, Ruth. This old man wants to go to the library talk.”
“What’s the book?” I ask.
He shrugs. “I’m in it for the air conditioning and the snacks. Is that so wrong?”
“Not wrong at all,” my mother says.
I drop chunks of butter into the bowl of flour, while Rickie uses vigorous strokes to cut it in. I try not to sneak peeks at his cupid’s bow mouth as he whistles happily.
And the temperature in the kitchen rises yet again.
* * *
“Okay, good work, team.” My mother closes the oven door and sets the timer. Then she lifts the edge of her apron to dab her flushed face.
“We’re off, are we?” Grandpa lifts the apron over his head. “I just need five minutes to get beautiful.”
Rickie is washing dishes in the sink, a job that he volunteered for in a hurry, probably because it involves splashing cool water around beside the open window. I’m stuck scraping pastry dough off the table and wiping everything down.
“Daphne, you’ll take these pies out when they’re done?” my mother asks. “There’s fifty-five minutes on the timer.”
“Of course,” I say as a trickle of sweat runs down my back. “I might have to escape to the air conditioning upstairs while I wait.”
“That’s probably wise.” She removes her apron. “See you in a bit.”
The kitchen is shipshape a few minutes later, and my mother drives Grandpa off to town. I toss my apron onto the counter and eye the oven timer.
Rickie turns around, parks his muscular ass against the sink and spreads his delicious arms wide. “Gosh, how shall we spend fifty minutes? Got any fun ideas?”
“Nope,” I grunt.
Except I do. And the arrogant man in the frilly apron knows it. He pulls that ridiculous thing over his head and tosses it on top of mine. I’m overheated in every possible way.
Rickie's eyes never leave mine as he takes a glass out of the cupboard, fills it with water and gulps it down. And a few things become crystal clear to me:
1. There is nobody else home.
2. It's very hot in here.
3. Rickie and I are alone together, and I don’t trust myself.
4. I can't leave, either, because of those pies.
4(a). I don't even want to.
He sets the glass down on the counter. "You're thinking so hard there's steam coming out of your ears."
“That's just the weather.”
He smiles dangerously. And why does sweat look so good on him? It probably looks pretty awful on me. In fact, I’m sure it does. And now I know exactly what to do with the forty-odd minutes before the oven timer dings. I need a cool shower. Stat.
I break off our little staring contest. “You know, I think I'll head upstairs and…”
Rickie slides his body sideways before I finish, his movement stealthy. Where is he going?
My competitive instincts kick in, and I make a move toward the stairs. But Rickie has a head start. He turns and darts ahead of me, grasping the railing, and leaping up the first stair treads two at a time.
Now I'm in hot pursuit. What the hell? I didn’t even say the word shower out loud.
But it doesn’t matter. At the top of the stairs, Rickie breaks to the left and disappears. By the time I reach the second-floor hallway, I find him in the bathroom, where he's cranking on the water.
I barge in, livid. "You said you were an only child!"
“Yeah, I am," he says, testing the water temperature with one hand.
"I call bullshit. That was a classic sibling move.''
He laughs. “Some people need training, Shipley, and some people are natural-born assholes." Proving his point, he flips his hand, and a spray of water arcs onto my face and sweaty tank top.
“Y-You...!" I sputter, while he laughs. Then he reaches back with one hand and strips off his T-shirt.
And there it is at close range—his shapely, infuriating, tattooed chest, glistening with sweat. How can a girl think with that in her face?
”You knew I wanted the shower!" I complain.
“Don’t be a sore loser, Shipley. There's room for two.” He pops the button on his shorts.
Then? He leans in and kisses my shocked, angry mouth.
For once, I'm not even surprised. But that doesn’t mean I'm ready.
I'll never be ready for one of Rickie's kisses.
I feel a jolt when those firm lips land on mine.
It's like waking up to find yourself in the middle of a terrific party.
Your whole body is invited, but your brain forgot the date and time.
He doesn't ease me into it, either. He's all slick heat and salt and pressure. It’s a kiss that demands an answer.
And I fold like a bad hand of poker. I step closer instead of backing away. His confidence is like a drug, and the sound of the shower muffles the loud arguments in my head.
Rickie licks into my mouth with the finesse of a man who already knows that he's won. The slide of his naughty tongue against mine delivers another jolt to my overtaxed hormones.
He makes a soft sound of pleasure, and his wet hands lift my top over my head. “Come on,” he whispers between kisses. “Cool off with me.”
My last rational decision is to kick the bathroom door shut.