43. Noah
I have no idea what’s going on. I’m just rolling with the punches here.
“What are you doing there, Picasso?”
“Don’t you trust me, Heart Eyes?”
More than you”ll ever know. Wait, did she just call me Heart Eyes? The nickname gives me whiplash. She pulled that one out of her fine ass.
“Of course I do.” I scan over the ingredients sitting out on the counter next to the stove. “You’re making a pesto cream sauce, aren’t you?”
She claps her hands together, mocking me. “Good job. You figured it out. Can you take out the large nonstick pan that’s in the bottom cabinet near the stove?”
“Is it on my left or right?” I gesture with my hands.
“On your left.” She shows me with her hand which bottom cabinet the pan is in.
I open the cabinet door, grab the pan, and leave behind a conglomeration of loud noises which make my ears hurt.
“Sorry.” I shrug my shoulders, sticking my hands out with my palms facing up.
She wets her lips with the tip of her tongue and grabs all the ingredients with her hands, placing them all on the countertop next to the stove.
“Do you need any assistance, Chef Dani?”
Her lips sway to the side of her mouth. “Are you actually going to help or are you just going to stand over me the entire time and supervise?”
Sweat is building on my forehead and other places I won”t name.
“Tell me what you need me to do and I’ll do it.”
God, I love it when she bosses me around.
There’s no doubt in my mind she gets off on bossing me around because her eyes sparkle like a freshly clean countertop when she does it.
“I need you to get garlic powder, onion powder, and Italian seasoning from the pantry.”
I give her a military hand salute. “You got it, Boss.”
Walking over to the pantry, I’m immediately overwhelmed by the shelves on the inside of the door. They’re filled to the brim with dried herbs and spices. I’m searching for the shit she told me to find, but I can’t find them.
A finger taps on my shoulder. I turn around to see Dani smirking at me. She finds all the ingredients seasoning within seconds.
“You did that shit on purpose.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She covers her mouth with one of her hands, hiding the fact that she’s laughing at me.
“Alright, smart ass. Can you give me something I can actually do? I want to help.”
“Fine. Go grab a pot and fill it up with water. Just before the silver circle that’s on the inside of it.”
After several minutes pass by, the pot is full of boiling water. Once the bubbles rise to the top of the pot, I hit it with a healthy dose of salt. I dump the tortellini in slow motion, so I don’t splash us with boiling hot water.
She’s watching me while she’s making the sauce. “I don’t remember seeing you cook before,” she tells me, eyes widening and mouth slightly gaping open.
My eyes narrow. “Why would you?”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to say it like that. I just meant we’ve never spent this much time together. We couldn’t even be in the same room when we were younger.”
“Yeah, I know you didn’t mean to say it that way. And I guess that’s because we’ve grown up and realized there are more important things in life than trying to murder each other with words.”
Her lips sway to the side of her mouth, her focus shifting back on finishing the sauce. “Right.”
“Dani,” I say as I stir the pasta clockwise with a giant black, plastic ladle.
“What?”
“That smells so fucking good.”
“It does?” Her tone goes up an octave.
“You can’t smell that?”
“Yeah, I can smell it.”
“It smells like Nonna’s Italian restaurant in here.”
Nonna’s is a local restaurant in Sunset Cove. It’s one of the only Italian restaurants in this town.
Fuck, my mouth is watering. I don’t know if it’s from the food or the gorgeous woman standing in front of me.
She shakes her head. “You’re just being nice.”
“I’m serious.”
She’s stirring the pesto cream sauce in the pan with a wooden spoon. “Do you want to taste the sauce? Or do you want to be surprised?”
I want to taste you instead. Your lips. Neck. Clavicle. Chest. Cleavage. Breasts. Let my mouth find a home in between your thighs. Fucking God, Noah. Pull yourself together, man.
“Surprise me. Um…how long do you want to cook the pasta for?”
“The package says two to three minutes, so let’s start with two.”
“Got it. How do I know if they’re ready? I’ve never cooked tortellini before.”
She looks into my eyes. “They float to the top when they’re done.”
Cooking with Dani is something I can picture doing more often. We have this rhythm in the kitchen, anticipating what the other is going to say before the thought escapes their mouth.
My mom did most of the cooking when I was younger.
I didn’t inherit the Kaplan family cooking gene. My sister did. Lizzie helped Mom in the kitchen until she left for college. She couldn’t even reach the countertop without a stool when she was a kid.
We spent a lot of hours in the kitchen when it came to the Jewish holidays. Passover and Hanukkah were big holidays in the Kaplan family household. My mom always invited Dani and her parents, as well as our extended family.
Dad wasn’t the best cook, but he was a master at the grill. I remember we’d have family BBQs with the Solomon family pretty much every weekend.
I’m taken out of my memories as Dani grabs ceramic bowls for both of us.
“Can you turn on the faucet for me?”
“Yeah, sure.” I go over to the sink, running my hand underneath the water. The chill is taking off the edge of the heat expanding throughout my body.
She turns the heat off where the pot was, bringing the boiling hot tortellini over the sink. The woman is dumping out most of the hot water.
I tilt my head, raising an eyebrow. “Aren’t you going to save that?”
“Some of it, so I can thin out the sauce. I mean I can leave all the water in there. That way we can have mushy tortellini for dinner, if you want.” Her hands land on her hips, a smirk growing on her beautiful lips.
I put my hands up. “I’m good.”
“When I put the tortellini in the pan, can you stir them into the sauce for me?”
I’d do anything for you.
I nod my head, signaling to her that I understand what she just asked me to do.
I make my way over to the hot stove. The sauce is bubbling, thickening up as it sits in the pan.
She puts a few generous spoonfuls of the tortellini into the pan. “You don’t need to ask my permission to start stirring, you know.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
“Yes, you were. I’m not the only one that makes weird facial expressions, Noah.”
I squint my eyes together, sticking my tongue out. Picking up the wooden spoon, I start combining the pasta with the sauce.
She moves to my side, resting her elbows on the counter with her palms on her cheeks.
I watch her facial expressions and body language.
A smug look appears on her face before her lips form a cute smile. She’s standing upright with her arms crossed in front of her chest.
“Are you going to pick on every little thing I do that doesn’t measure up to your standards?”
She exhales. “I’m just observing. I have to say for someone who doesn’t really know how to cook, you’re pretty good at it.”
“Growing up with a home cook for a mother and a sous chef for a sister will do that to a person.”
That gets a cute little giggle out of her.
I swear I will do everything in my power to make Dani laugh. I want to listen to her laugh on repeat for the rest of my fucking life.
“Are the bowls ready to go?” she asks.
I nod, pointing behind me at the island.
She swipes them off there, placing them next to me. “You can sit down if you want. I can fill up the bowls with the pasta.”
“Is that an order or a suggestion?”
“If it was an order, I would’ve told you to go sit your ass down at the table. Did I do that? No, I didn’t. You can do whatever your little heart desires.”
What if my little heart desires to pick you up, throw you on the counter, and kiss the shit out of you until you come apart screaming my name at the top of your lungs?
I re-adjust my shorts to make the bulge less obvious. “I’m going to sit down, then.”
She shoves her hands in my face, giving me a thumbs up.
As I sit down at the kitchen table, she brings over a bowl of tortellini. There are pieces of shaved parmesan cheese and ribbons of basil on top.
It’s a goddamn masterpiece.
“It’s so pretty. I don’t want to eat it.”
“Then go ahead and starve,” she says, going back to the counter to fill up a bowl for herself and bringing it over to the table.
“Quoting Beauty and the Beast I see. Seriously though, that was uncalled for.”
She gets bit by the chuckle bug, covering her mouth. “I’m not even sorry.”
“I know you aren’t. That’s the sad part.”
She changes the subject. “Hey, you barely moved from that chair earlier. Did you actually get up off your ass at any point?
“I got up.”
She crosses her arms, pushing her breasts up. “To do what?”
Don’t look at her breasts. Don’t do it. Concentrate on her face, man.
“To go to the bathroom. I can be more specific if you want me to be.”
Her mouth shifts to one side before she presses her lips together. “I’m good.”
“I told you I was editing my book.”
“Oh, you were in your editing cave.” She leans back against the chair, crossing her arms and putting one of her legs over the other.
“My what?”
“Well, it’s like the writing cave, but it’s not, since it’s editing. Wait, you don’t know what the cave is…at all?”
“I’ve never heard that term in my life.”
“It’s like a blackhole you can’t escape. You’re hypnotized by your computer screen and keyboard. And you can’t bring yourself to do anything else.”
“Ah,” I say as I pick up my fork, stabbing a piece of tortellini onto it and putting it into my mouth.
Fuck, that’s good.
I roll my eyes so hard it feels like they’ve fallen into the back of my head. “Where the hell did you learn to cook?”
“Why?”
“Did you even eat any of it yet?”
“I’m getting there.”
I watch her as she picks up a piece of tortellini, but her eyes meet mine before she shoves one into her pretty little mouth.
“Can I help you?”
“Sorry.” I let out a small chuckle.
I nonchalantly glance at her while she puts the pasta in her mouth, raising one of my eyebrows up.
God, I wish I was that piece of tortellini right now.
I clear my throat, anxiously waiting to hear what she thinks of the meal she made for us.
“Yeah, that’s pretty good.”
“No, Dani. It’s better than if I would’ve had it at a five-star restaurant.”
“Really?”
“Yeah and you never answer my question. How did you learn to cook like this?”
“My parents. My mom loves to cook, and so did my dad. I learned more from my mom though. And I have a best friend who’s better at cooking than I’ll ever be.”
“Ah, the cooking gene. That one skipped me. Wait, which best friend is better than you? Bella or Sage?”
“Bella. She learned from her mom and Abuela. That’s the ultimate cooking gene.”
“She’d get along really well with Grayson. I’ve been learning a lot from him about the art of cooking, especially traditional Jewish cuisine. Seriously, ask me anything about Jewish food.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, ask me.”
She bites her lip, looking up at the ceiling. “Okay, what’s a latke made out of?”
“Grounded up potato, flour, and egg. C’mon, give me an actual challenge, Solomon.”
“Fine. What ingredients can go into matzo ball soup?”
“That’s a trick question.”
She narrows her eyes. “Why?”
“Because you can put different ingredients in matzo ball soup. Chicken, carrots, pasta, different types of seasonings.”
She’s stunned to say the least. Her face freezes, mouth dropping open.
“You’re going to catch flies with your mouth open like that.”
She stretches her lips out, rolling her eyes at me. Her annoyance quickly turns into amusement. “I hate you.”
“Sure you do.”
We sit in silence for a while, so we can finish dinner.
My thoughts are so fucking loud. I’m surprised that she can’t hear them. I’d be in so much trouble if she could.