“Yeah, don’t you?” he asks with a teasing grin.
“If I can’t nuke it, I don’t cook it.”
Laughing, we both go to the sink to wash up. “What are the nails for?” I ask, gesturing toward a box on the counter.
“Back deck. I need to get at it before we get too much snow. The wood is being delivered tomorrow. Will you be home to get it?”
Home.
That sounds so strange. This isn’t my home, even if I’m playing house with all these guests.
“I should be.”
After we dry our hands, he grabs the can opener from the drawer and hands it to me. “Why don’t you open the tomatoes, sauce, and paste.”
As I open all the cans, he grabs a pot, fills it with water, and places it on the back burner. He tosses in some salt, reaches for another pot, and puts it on the front burner. “That one is for the pasta, and this one is for the sauce.”
“Should I pour these in?” I ask, and he nods, his hard body brushing mine as he looks over my shoulder. Working to ignore the quiver along my spine, I dump the tomatoes, sauce, and the tomato paste into the pot.
He gestures to the jar on the counter filled with ladles and spoons. “Give it a stir, and we’ll let it simmer while we make the meatballs.”
I reach for one of Gram’s big wooden spoons and mix the sauces together. “Now what?”
Nate opens the package of ground beef and dumps it into the bowl. “We’ll spice these up and put them in the oven.”
I help him toss in onion, garlic, basil, oregano, breadcrumbs, and an egg, finishing it off with a dash of salt and pepper. I must say, cooking with Nate is rather fun and educational.
“Now, we get messy.” He mixes it with his hands then takes about a spoonful of beef into his palm, shapes it into a ball, and places it on the parchment paper on top of a tray.
“That looks easy enough.” I reach in, and when I do, our hands touch and linger for a second. My gaze flashes to his, and I breathe a little quicker. Lord, how desperate am I if the touch of a man’s hands when making meatballs together is messing with my libido? Nothing about this is sexy. Nothing. Then why the hell does it feel like it is? I pull my hand out, form the ball in my palms, and show it to him.
“Perfect,” he says, but he’s not looking at my meatball. Nope, not looking at my meatball at all. His gaze is on my mouth.
I drop the ball onto the parchment paper, and a heavy, tension-filled silence ensues as we empty the bowl and fill the tray. Once done, we go back to the sink and wash our hands, but this time we’re touching a little more, our fingers tangling, lathering the soap as the hot water pours over us. I can barely breathe, let alone speak, when he turns off the tap.
“What now?” I practically squeak out.
He puts the tray into the oven and adjusts the temperature. “Now we spice the sauce,” he says, his voice thick and rusty.
I lean against the kitchen table, admiring his body as he pulls a set of measuring spoons from the drawer. “How did you get so good in the kitchen?” I manage to get out through the tightening of my throat.
“I used to fend for myself a lot,” he says, and I recall his absent father and his mother, who clearly spent a lot of time alone in her room. That had to be tough. Nate said he hadn’t seen her in years. I’d like to ask what happened, but don’t want to pry too much. Still, watching so many women come and go from his life must have had a lasting impact.
“Can you crush the garlic and toss it into the sauce?” he asks, and hands me some strange piece of equipment that I might find at the doctor’s office during my regular girly routine. I stare at it like it’s some foreign object because, basically, it is.
“Uh…”
Nate laughs. “Like this,” he says, closing his hands over mine and squeezing until the garlic oozes out of the little holes. I don’t miss his little intake of breath, and when he takes his hands away, his thumb brushes lightly over my flesh.
“Now, put that into the pot and stir,” he says.
I dump the garlic in, and he adds a mixture of spices, his body close to mine, touching intimately as I mix and he works around me.
“Like this,” he says, his mouth near my ear, his chest pressing into my back as he closes his hand over mine and helps me stir. Except, the delicious smell of the sauce is quickly overpowered by Nate’s unique aroma of freshly soaped skin with a splash of testosterone.
“Perfect,” he says, and the heat in his voice seeps through me. I turn to face him, and for one pulse-pounding moment we stand there, eyes locked, tension taking up space between us.
No man, and I mean no man, has ever looked at me the way Nate is looking at me now. Eyes dimmed, hungry, he presses against me, and the bulge between his legs dents my stomach. It seems incredible—I don’t attract men like Nate. But evidence points to the contrary. The proof that he’s as hot for me as I am for him is growing, thickening, pressing against my body. Holy Hell, is it ever going to stop?
I sure as hell hope not.
I throb deep between my legs as my body takes stock of his girth and size. I’ve only been with one other guy, and he definitely didn’t measure up to Nate. That thought inspires me and frightens me at the same time. But there is one thing I know for certain, I’m in over my head with this one.
“Kira,” he says, his breath fanning my face, and I lecture my knees to stay strong.
I probably should put a stop to this, end it now and get my focus back on the tasks at hand. His fingers go to my face, and he brushes the backs of his knuckles over my cheek. That touch goes straight to the needy juncture between my legs and dances around and shouts loud enough to make itself known.
I shiver, determined to break free, but that inner voice stops me. Why shouldn’t I go for it? This man has no idea who I really am, or what I do for a living. He’s obviously not into my brain, which is a refreshing break. Just yesterday I said I’d love for a man to want me for my body only. Isn’t that what’s going on here? He’s not looking for anything but a hot roll between the sheets.
Go for it, Kira. Hook up with the hot lobster fisherman while you’re in town.
He’s seasonal, will be shipping out soon, and I likely won’t be around much longer than that.
Thick fingers grip my hips, drag me closer. His head dips and my lips automatically part. As we stand toe-to-toe, his slow inhale fills me with a rush of things to come, but a niggling hint of unease trickles in behind it. I have no doubt this guy is a masterful lover and knows exactly what to do and say. What if I screw it up, turn it into that same fumbling mess as I did in university? We have to share this house. How would I ever face him come morning?