A November Bride (5 page)

“Hey, Sadie, this is Erik.”

“I know who this is, Erik. If you remember, I was there when you went through puberty and your voice changed.”

Erik pressed his fist against the bedroom wall.
Really?
He’d put in a full morning brainstorming ideas for his new account. He’d spent an hour running on the treadmill. He was hungry. Tired. And now he was calling to ask Sadie out—because Phillip had put him up to it—and she had to knock him all the way back to puberty?

“You still there?”

“Yes.” Erik hummed a few bars of “Born in the U.S.A.” Some people counted to ten when they felt as if they were losing their grip on their patience. He hummed
.
And this was no time to get testy. He would treat Sadie like, well, like a woman. Not like his best friend.

“Are you humming?”

“What? No.” Erik stepped up on the treadmill again. Hit Start—keeping the pace low and slow.

“You sure? Because you only do that when you’re trying not to lose your temper.”

If this conversation didn’t improve soon, he was going to sing the entire song at the top of his lungs.

“Sadie, would you go out with me?”

Silence—and then she laughed. Not her off-tune giggle that always made him smile, but a laugh that probably had her doubled over. When she spoke again, her words were punctuated with gasps for air. “Erik . . . first you asked me if I wanted to kiss you . . . and I said no. You . . . you turned down . . . my marriage proposal . . . Why are you asking me out?”

Of course she was going to make this difficult.
Keep walking, Davis. Charm her.

“Hey, you refused to kiss me. And that wasn’t a real proposal.”

Charming. Now they sounded like two grade schoolers.

“You didn’t really want me to kiss you. What was that line you used?
‘I’ve become a much better kisser. Want to try again?’
” Sadie’s imitation of him was not even close. “Is that how you set a romantic mood for every woman you date?”

Was he supposed to take Sadie’s verbal slicing and dicing without even flinching? If he continued his pursuit of a date, she’d leave him in little pieces, just like the ingredients for the Cobb salad she’d served him last month. Was he a man or an avocado?

“Okay, so I don’t want to marry you and you don’t want to kiss me.” Erik stiffened his spine and asked again. “But you didn’t answer my question: Will you go out on a date with me?”

“Come on, Erik, I need to—”

“You need to answer my question. When a man asks you out, you need to tell him yes or no.”

“You’re asking me out?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

Couldn’t the woman just say yes and let it be? “Because I want to go out with you.”

“As friends?”

“As a man and a woman. On a date.”

“But you and I—together—we’re not a man and a woman. We’re best friends.”

Erik fought back the urge to start humming again. “Now that’s absurd.”

“You know what I mean.”

Why had he ever thought asking Sadie out was a good idea? Oh, yeah, because Phillip had gotten into his head and convinced him he might be in love with Sadie. Right now, he wasn’t even sure he liked her.

But he wasn’t quitting—not yet, anyway. “Sadie, will you go out with me, please?”

“No.”

No?
“What do you mean, no?”

“You asked. I answered. No, I will not go out with you. I don’t believe in mercy dates or practical joke dates or whatever this is. If you ever want another late-night meal—any meal at all—cooked by me, end this conversation now. Good-bye, Erik.”

The last Thursday of the month—and Sadie was about to be surrounded by a horde of men and their sons. Again.

“I wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t agreed to help me with this class.” Sadie stood side by side with her friend Mel, setting up cooking stations around the counters in the church kitchen. “When the men’s ministry director asked if I wanted to teach a series of cooking classes to dads and sons, I should have said no.
N-O.
How hard is it to say that two-letter word?”

“You go through this every month, Sadie.” Mel wore an apron emblazoned with the logo of her upscale catering company, Trifles. “Relax. We’ll have fun.”

“You’re only saying that because you think Keegan Fletcher is hot.”

“I do not.”

“Then I’ll help him and his son tonight.”

“Oh no you won’t.”

“My point exactly.”

Sadie glanced at the clock. In fifteen minutes, twenty-two dads and sons would fill the church’s kitchen, ready for a third cooking lesson.

“This will be a unique way for the dads to bond with their sons, Sadie.”

An echo of the director’s voice persuading her to teach the class broke through her concentration. Weeks ago he’d stood there, shaking her hand and nodding up and down like a bobblehead doll, and Sadie found herself bobbling a yes back.

“I’m a personal chef. When you and I graduated from the Broadmoor’s culinary apprenticeship, I never imagined teaching a bunch of guys how to cook.”

“The classes have been an absolute hit, Sadie. Didn’t you tell me they already asked you to teach it again?”

“Well, the one thing I know is that men like bacon. And they wanted the dads and sons to bond during the classes, so it was easy to come up with Bonding with Bacon.”

“You’ve already done the hard work and made a lesson plan. You can just use it again.” Mel pulled her black hair into a short ponytail. “Week one: the basics of knife sharpening and an appetizer of Man Candy.”

“Those guys couldn’t get enough of maple syrup caramelized over thick cut bacon. And since I sharpened the
knives myself, no one ended up in the emergency room.” Sadie set out several large containers of gel sanitizer. “They weren’t too happy the next week when I mentioned we were making a wedge salad with bacon—until I showed them all the extra bacon I’d brought along so they would have enough to snack on.”

“That was a bit of brilliance—bacon and more bacon.” At the sound of the doors swinging open and boyish laughter intermingling with the rumble of men’s voices, Mel snapped her fingers. “And now it’s time to handle the motley crew . . . I mean class, one more month.”

Sadie positioned herself at the front of the kitchen, knowing Mel would finish the prep. “All right, guys, remember to put on your aprons and don’t forget to wash your hands with soap and water and then use the sanitizer. Then choose a work station.”

Toby, an eleven-year-old with Down syndrome, ran over and engulfed her in a hug. “Hey, Miss Sadie.”

“Hey, Toby.”

“What are we making tonight?”

“I hope you’re hungry. Tonight we’re making 50-50 burgers and sweet potato fries.”

Toby tightened his arms around her again, his grin lopsided, his brown eyes shining behind his glasses. “My favorite.”

Sadie exchanged smiles with Toby’s father, a tall, lean man, whose hair was the same sandy color as his son’s. Everything they’d made was Toby’s favorite. “Great. Don’t forget to wash your hands.”

There was no such thing as making too much food when
it came to this class. Leftovers were rare. Tonight her plan was to demonstrate the proper technique for cutting julienne fries and forming a hamburger patty. Then she’d cook the sweet potato fries while Mel assisted the dads and sons in prepping and cooking their hamburgers.

Justin Boyle, one of the several single dads in the class, interrupted her as she piled scrubbed sweet potatoes on the counter. “I was wondering if you could recommend a good basic cookbook? These classes have inspired me to be a bit more creative. Branch out beyond chicken nuggets and hot dogs.”

“Glad to hear that.” Sadie laid her knives on the counter. “I’d be glad to give you some suggestions.”

“Great.” Justin cleared his throat. “Maybe . . . maybe we could meet for coffee at The Tattered Cover and browse the cookbook section?”

Sadie bit her lip, warmth heating her face. “Maybe we could.”

They were interrupted by Toby returning to ask what he could do next to help.

Justin backed up. “I’ll call you.”

“Sure.”

Now all she had to do was teach the group how to julienne potatoes and how to form hamburger patties—and not wonder whether she’d just been asked out on a bona fide date.

“Tonight we are making 50-50 burgers. We’ll be using half ground beef and half ground bacon.” After rubbing a squirt of sanitizer into her hands, Sadie grabbed a handful of the mixture from the glass bowl in front of her. “You’ll
each make your own hamburger, and get to eat it tonight. But first, I’m going to teach you the best technique for forming a burger. Shape your patty, and then press a crater in one side of it”—she and Mel showed the class how to do this, moving around the room to each dad-and-son pairing—“making sure the crater is about the size of a silver dollar. This allows space inside the burger for the juices to expand, but they won’t run outside the patty.”

Bert, one of the dads who came with his thirteen-year-old son, raised his hand. “Does the crater go up or down when we grill the burger?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“How do we know when the burger is done?”

“Good question, Bert. Normally when we discuss cooking meat, we talk about rare, medium, and well-done. But not with a 50-50 burger. You don’t want to eat raw bacon. So these burgers are served either medium-well or well—I recommend well.” Sadie held up a meat thermometer. “You can use a thermometer like this one to check the temperature. Or another way to test if a burger is done is to see if the juices run clear and the patty is firm to the touch in the center.”

Before starting to cook the burgers, she talked the group through the prep for the sweet potato fries with Manchego cheese and rosemary.

“While Chef Mel helps you cook your burgers, I’ll work on the sweet potato fries. Here’s what I want you to remember: the thinner the cut, the crispier the fries. So, a shoestring cut will be crispier than a julienne. I’m going to use a deep fryer tonight—a two-step process—but baking them and then
tossing them in the cheese and rosemary is another, healthier option. And yes, I have handouts with all the recipes and information for you to add to your notebooks.”

For two hours the hum of voices, intermingled with laughter, filled the church kitchen. The salty aroma of bacon and beef and the sizzle of fries scented with rosemary and the nutty aroma of Manchego cheese laced the air.

As much as she insisted she didn’t want to teach the class, Sadie relished seeing the satisfaction on the dads’ faces as they tasted their burgers. How they congratulated their sons for following the recipe even as they joked about who made the better burger. As they cleaned up the kitchen, she encouraged them to try out their newfound skills on families and friends.

“Don’t forget, class: ‘Cooking is at once child’s play and adult joy. And cooking done with care is an act of love.’ ”

With Mel nearby, she even managed a nonchalant, “Looking forward to it,” when Justin said, “I’ll call about going to look at cookbooks” as he left for the night.

“So, how are things going with you and Matt?” Mel removed her stained apron, leaning back against the kitchen counter, not bothering to hide the huge yawn that almost swallowed her words.

Her friend’s question caused Sadie to do a second wipe down of the counters with a healthy dose of cleaner. Generally speaking, the more a cleaner stung her eyes, the more Sadie liked it. How had she not mentioned the drive-by breakup
by text? Oh, that’s right. They’d spent the evening in a room loaded with testosterone and calories—and Mel had spent a lot of that time checking up on Keegan Fletcher and his son.

“Things aren’t ‘going’ with Matt. He dumped me—by text.”

“What?” Mel straightened, hands on her hips. “Sadie—how do you find these guys?”

“Are you blaming me for that man’s lack of social skills?”

“No, of course not.” Mel folded her apron and set it by her animal-print, suede purse. “But didn’t the last guy you dated dump you by text too?”

“Yes. And the guy before him.” Sadie held up the white dishrag, waving it like a surrender flag. “Don’t ask anymore. I give up.”

“I’m sorry, Sadie.”

“No—I’m
Sorry Sadie
.”