Chapter Twenty-Two Summer
Chapter Twenty-Two
Summer
The menu is a hit. We haven’t even officially launched it yet, but we’ve been secretly testing it on select nights, and everyone is over the moon with the changes.
And my staff? I would have killed to have people like this backing me up at Lore. It’s like a night-and-day difference. Only a few of them are professionally trained, but it doesn’t matter. They’re all so eager to learn that I’m looking forward to running the kitchen with them.
“I’m home!”
I smile as the front door closes behind him.
Ezra gave me the code to his place a few weeks ago, saying it was so I could lock up after him when he had to take off for doctor’s appointments in Seattle, but I don’t fully believe that was the reason.
I think he likes having me around more than he wants to admit, and honestly, I like being around.
“Sunny.” He grins at me as he comes into the kitchen.
I’ve been working on a new recipe for a few hours now. It’s like whatever was lying dormant inside me after I left Chicago has been woken up, and the old flame that I had for cooking is burning brighter than ever.
It’s making me want to rethink trying to buy Sunnie’s.
I’ve walked by it no fewer than ten times since the for sale sign went up, and I’ve asked just about everyone who has come into the cidery how they feel about the sale.
They want the business to stay local, and I couldn’t agree more.
It has my wheels turning and fingers itching to make a move more than I’d like to admit.
I’m inspired and elated and so many other pretty words, and I have a feeling it has everything to do with the man who just pressed his lips to my cheek.
“How was your day?” he asks, then picks up a piece of balsamic broiled halibut I’ve been working on and pops it into his mouth. “Holy shit. That’s incredible.” He buries his face in my neck, and I giggle. “Have I mentioned how much I love having you in my kitchen?”
“You love me making you food. There’s a difference.”
He pulls away. “Uh, no. I meant what I said. I love having you in my kitchen, even if you’re not actively cooking.”
There’s something in his eyes that has my breath catching in my throat. It’s something that wasn’t there before a few days ago, since the tasting with Noah and Odette. I don’t know what it means, but it makes my heart flutter in a way it never has.
I can’t deny that it makes me nervous. What if I’m reading too much into things? What if I’m just seeing what I want to see? What if . . . What if what I feel for him isn’t casual anymore?
So I paste on a smile and tease, “It’s still the apron, isn’t it?”
He grabs my waist, pulling me closer, his lips ghosting over mine. “Damn right it is.”
Then he’s no longer flirting with kissing me. He’s really kissing me. It’s like he’s starved and hasn’t eaten all day.
I’m more than happy to feed him.
I wrap my arms around his neck, tugging him closer, and he clings to me like he’s afraid to let me go.
I’m lifted off the ground and placed on the countertop, and I’ve come to realize it’s one of his favorite places to have me.
“Missed you at the cidery today,” he says between kisses as his fingers undo the strings on the apron. “You should have seen how mad Tootsie was when she realized she couldn’t escape.”
After fixing the coop last week, we had to go back and do it again. I think we got it this time, though.
“She’s a handful.”
“Speaking of a handful . . .” He slips the apron off over my head, then cups my boob and lifts his brows suggestively.
I laugh. “You’re incorrigible, you know that?”
He shrugs unapologetically. “I know what I like, Sunny.” He kisses the tip of my nose. “And I really like you.”
It’s the closest he’s come to revealing how he’s feeling about this thing we’re doing, and I can tell in the way he pauses momentarily that he realizes it at the same time I do.
So when he takes my mouth again, I know it’s a distraction tactic, and I let him have it because it just feels too good not to.
I kiss him back with just as much fervor, and before I know it, I’m sitting on the counter with my dress pushed down over my breasts and Ezra’s lips wrapped around my nipple as I ride his fingers.
“Fuck,” he says with his mouth still on me. “I love the way your pussy squeezes my fingers, you know that?”
“I think you’ve mentioned it before.”
“Have I mentioned how much I love having my face buried between your thighs?”
“Maybe, but feel free to remind me.”
He chuckles darkly as he kisses his way down my body, dropping to his knees in front of me.
Worry over his hip tingles in the back of my mind, but I tell myself that I have to learn to trust him in knowing his limits.
And honestly, all my worries fade when he swipes his tongue against me.
“Oh god,” I moan, practically coming off the counter, eager for more. “That’s . . .”
“Good?” he asks, pulling away.
“Yes.” I grab his hair, dragging him right back to where I want him.
His laugh rumbles through me, and it feels so good I could cry.
We’ve done this so many times before, but somehow each one is just as good as the last. I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to it, and if I do, how could I ever move on after that, whenever what we’re doing is over? I don’t think I can.
I don’t think I’d want to.
He pushes his tongue into me, then draws it up to my clit, sucking the pulsing bundle of nerves between his lips.
He flicks his tongue against me quickly, and my orgasm rushes into me unexpectedly.
My body shakes again and again, and he doesn’t let up for a moment.
It doesn’t matter that I’m pushing at him, trying to close my legs to get a reprieve.
He keeps going, and I’m damn thankful for it when the second wave hits, and I’m shaking once more.
When he finally pulls away, his face is wet with my arousal, and it might be the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen.
I grab him by his shirt, jerking him to me and kissing him because I need to. He tastes like me, and if I hadn’t just come again, I might a third time.
It makes me want to drop to my knees and take my turn worshipping him, but he doesn’t let me. Without warning, he yanks me off the counter and spins me around until my ass is in the air, slamming into me before I can even register what’s happening.
“Fuck,” I cry out, my face resting against the cold countertop. “Ezra . . .”
“That’s right, Sunny,” he says, his voice gravelly and dark as he bends over me, his lips kissing the shell of my ear. “Tell me who’s in you right now. Tell me who’s fucking you.”
“You, Ezra. Always you.”
“Always me,” he says through gritted teeth.
He’s pounding into me with a force I’ve never felt before, so rough that my face is pressed against the counter so hard that I’m certain it’ll bruise. And I take it. I take it because if I don’t, I might do something really reckless, like tell him how there’s a chance I might be falling for him.
“God, you feel so good,” he says.
Thrust.
I like you.
“You feel like heaven.”
Thrust.
I want more from you.
“I’ll never tire of this.”
Thrust.
I think I could be in love with you.
“Fuuuuuuck.” He draws the word out, and it’s the only warning I have before he comes with a loud grunt and a string of indiscernible words.
He wrings the last of his orgasm out, and I lie there, trying to catch my breath and trying to hold everything I’m feeling in.
I think I already am, I say to no one, and I only wish I were brave enough to say it out loud.
“Try the Cap’n Crunch with the Smacks. It’s weirdly good.”
He passes me a box, and I pour a small amount into my bowl, skeptical of this combination, though he’s never steered me wrong before. Not even with the Apple Jacks–and–Fruity Pebbles combination that was way better than it sounded.
It’s two in the morning, and we’re both starving after our workout in the kitchen despite the halibut we had earlier.
I take a bite, pleasantly surprised by what I’m tasting.
“Okay, wow. That is actually really good.”
“Right?” he says excitedly, and it’s so cute how much he looks like a little kid right now. “The flavors work well together.”
I grab the box, loading my bowl with more crunchy honey-coated pieces, and snuggle down further into the bed.
Before Ezra, I was always a bit of a night owl.
Working in a kitchen kind of requires it.
But since he’s way worse than I am, I’m now used to staying up so late.
I even look forward to it. There’s something about the wee hours of the morning that feels so magical and far away.
Everyone is asleep, and we’re in our own little world.
Tonight is no different as we watch Pam and Jim from The Office try to fight their love for each other.
The irony doesn’t escape me, but I try not to think about that too much.
“We might have to extend the opening-night party for the new kitchen,” Ezra says.
“Oh?”
“Yeah. We’re getting interest left and right for entertainment. Talked to Noah today about adding another band, maybe tacking on another hour of food and drinks.”
“I’m game if you are.”
He nods. “We are. Have I mentioned how excited I am about this?”
“A few times. Though you mostly just talk about the potential profits.”
“Hey, I like making money. More money means adding to my car collection and being able to pay my lawyer to get me out of speeding tickets.” He shrugs.
“But it’s not just that. I’m excited that everyone in Port Harbor will finally get to try your cooking.
I’ve been feeling a little spoiled by it lately. ”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Should I stop cooking you elaborate meals?”
He cuts me a glare. “Don’t you dare.”
I grin, then finish off my cereal before setting the bowl aside.
“Speaking of people eating your food . . .”
His words are so casual that they aren’t, and I’m instantly on edge.
He slurps up the last of his milk, then sets his bowl on his side table before turning to me and continuing.
“Sunnie’s still doesn’t have a buyer.”
I swallow the lump that’s sitting in the middle of my throat. I had a feeling that’s where this was headed.