What's Cooking? (11 page)

"I suspect what I'm really providing is a cheap thrill," she taunted, deliberately wriggling her hips in a move designed to drive him mad.

Rick's breath caught as every bit of blood rushed south. "Bad move, darlin', at least if you hope to have dinner anytime soon."

"Thought so," she taunted triumphantly. "Let me go so I can fix the chicken."

"I'm not stopping you," he insisted.

"You're not getting out of my way, either."

Rick chuckled at her firm refusal to try to wriggle free on her own. He finally stepped aside. "Bet you don't have this much fun in that test kitchen at work."

"I don't know," she said, her expression thoughtful. "Mordecai is pretty sexy."

He stared at her. "Who the hell is Mordecai?"

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"My assistant."

Rick didn't recall any sexy males around the City-side test kitchen. "Really? Was he at the photo shoot?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"He's shy."

"You have an assistant who's sexy and shy?" Rick asked, unable to hide his skepticism.

"Very sexy, very shy," Maggie confirmed.

Rick studied her with a narrowed gaze. "You're pulling my leg, aren't you? There is no Mordecai."

"Of course there is. I would never lie to you."

"But...?"

"There's no but," she insisted.

His suspicions were not allayed. Nor was this unexpected and totally unfamiliar streak of jealousy. "Well, there's definitely something you're not telling me," he groused.

She laughed then. "You are so hysterical. You're practically turning split-pea-green right in front of me."

"If you're suggesting that I'm jealous, you're nuts," he retorted, though the truth was he wanted to find this Mordecai person and remind him very forcefully that Maggie was officially off-limits. Come to think of it, maybe he should punch the guy for good measure.

"Then you don't care if I spend a lot of late nights with Mordecai?" she asked, looking innocent as a lamb.

He studied her with a narrowed gaze and concluded she was having way too much fun at his expense. He knew precisely how to put a stop to that.

"No more than you care if I spend a lot of late nights

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with the Sports Illustrated swimsuit models," he retorted just as innocently.

As Rick had expected, her amusement instantly vanished. "Mordecai is very sweet and very sexy," she repeated, then added, "for a seventy-year-old man."

Rick felt as if a huge weight had been lifted off his chest. "Ah, I see."

She gave him a hard look. "Now's the part where you tell me you're only doing landscape photography for the rest of your life."

He had a hunch she wasn't entirely joking. "I can't do that, Maggie."

She sighed with undisguised disappointment. "No, I suppose not."

"My work isn't really going to be a problem, is it?"

"I wish I could say it won't be, but I honestly don't know," she admitted. "It's not very enlightened of me, is it? I'm sorry."

"Forget about being enlightened," Rick said with a trace of impatience. "Tell me what I have to do to prove to you that you have nothing to worry about."

"I don't think you can prove it," Maggie told him. "I think this is something I have to work out for myself. It won't happen overnight, either. It'll take time."

Rick had no idea where this low self-esteem of hers came from. From the instant they'd met, he would have bet money that Maggie had more confidence than any ten women, but maybe that was just in the professional arena. He studied her intently.

"Would it help if I hauled you up to bed right this instant and showed you just how much you excite me?"

She frowned at him. "You are such a guy," she ac-

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cused. "You think everything can be solved with sex. I know we're fantastic together in bed."

Rick bit back a sigh. He'd gotten it exactly wrong, after all. "Maggie, you're going to have to help me out here. lama. guy. And you're sending out a million signals, but they're getting garbled."

She whirled on him, looking! as if she might explode, but then all the steam went out of her. "You're right," she said at last.

She looked so forlorn, he couldn't help reaching for her. She resisted at first, her body still and filled with tension. "Come on, sweetheart. I'm not hitting on you, at least not right this second. I just want to hold you. I want you to talk to me," he urged. "Tell me what you want, what kind of reassurance you need for this to work."

"I need to know this thing between us is about more than sex," she said simply.

"Of course, it is," Rick said, then realized there was no of course about it. He tried to find the right words to reassure her. "When I agreed to stay here and keep my hands to myself, it was because you matter to me. You, Maggie, not just your body. Otherwise I would have hit the road. I'm not sure where this is going or why it's so important to me that we give it a try. I just know that I couldn't walk away from you the way I have every other woman I've been with." He searched her face. "Is that enough for you for now?"

To his astonishment, tears were welling up in her eyes. She nodded. "More than enough."

Because he didn't want to make another mistake, he asked, "Does that mean I can forget about sleeping here tonight?"

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Even as the tears spilled down her cheeks, she laughed. "No, you're staying, Flannery. I'm getting tired of going to bed all alone when you're right across town. And every time you touch me, I'm reminded of how much I've been missing by being so stubborn."

"Really?" She sounded so eager, he risked pushing for more. "Does that mean I can pack up and move over here?"

For an instant he thought she was going to say yes, but he could see the internal war she was waging over the question. Before she could reply, he touched a finger to her lips. "Never mind," he said, hoping that the short-term sacrifice he was making would pay off in the long run. "Let's concentrate on tonight. We'll worry about tomorrow another time."

It wasn't enough that Rick could make the very air around her sizzle, now the man had to go and get all sensitive and intuitive on her. Maggie was pretty sure she was going to be head over heels in love with him before too much longer if he kept this up.

"That can't happen," she told herself sternly. She didn't realize she'd spoken aloud until she saw the quizzical expression on Rick's face as he sat across from her at the kitchen table.

"It was nothing," she assured him. "Just talking to myself."

"Anything you'd like to share?"

"Nope. Are you ready for dessert?"

"Only if we can eat it in bed," he said, his gaze locked with hers.

Maggie shivered with anticipation. "Dessert can wait."

Rick grinned. "Good answer," he said, scooping her

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up from her chair and cradling her against his chest. "What about the dishes?"

Maggie felt a little twinge of conscience about leaving them where they sat on the table, but one look in Rick's eyes pretty much dispelled that. "They'll be here in the morning."

His smile spread. "That's my girl, throwing caution to the wind."

Little did he know that she usually did. She fought off the mental reminder that she'd been trying to change that. "Kiss me," she pleaded.

"Upstairs," Rick promised.

"No, now."

"We might not get upstairs," he warned. "I'm just about clean out of self-control."

She grinned. "Good. Me, too."

This time the trail of clothes led only as far as the living room. With Rick's hands all over her body, caressing and coaxing, Maggie wondered why she'd ever held out. Wicked sensations, heart-stopping anticipation, the lick of fire through her veins, these were the most basic of life forces. Why should she deny herself this, especially with a man who excelled at it?

She was already on the edge, every nerve raw, every muscle tensed, when Rick finally entered her and sent her reeling. He waited for her delicious spasms to end and then started to move, his gaze on her face.

It was only as she looked into his eyes that she got the difference between this man and every other man she'd ever been with. Rick was looking back at her, reading her, intent on pleasing her. This wasn't just about his pleasure, or even hers. It was about theirs. It

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was about the two of them, united for this moment, body and perhaps even soul.

Suddenly, for the first time ever, she truly understood what all those storybook romances were talking about. And even as she came undone, even as waves of pleasure crashed over her, somewhere deep inside, the magical intensity of it scared her to death.

Rick reluctantly crawled out of Maggie's bed at dawn, gave her a lingering kiss goodbye, then went back to his place to shower and change and make arrangements for the photo shoot she wanted him to do. More than that, though, he needed a little time on his own to think about what had changed between them the night before.

Something had, there was no question about that. He'd seen it in her eyes, a sudden spark of awareness, a sudden look of shock, to be honest. He'd tried to interpret it, but he couldn't. Maybe it was another one of those inexplicable female things that a mere man would never get. For an instant, he'd even wondered if it was the difference he'd always heard about between having sex and making love. Did that awareness come crashing over a person in a heartbeat?

He groaned at himself. When had he ever given a damn about putting a label on what happened with a woman in bed? He wasn't going to figure it out on his own, and it was hardly something he intended to discuss with the guys. Maggie had clearly gotten some crazy notion that he was sensitive, but he wasn't that sensitive. This was beyond him, which meant he'd just have to backburner it for another time.

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Instead, as soon as he'd had his second cup of coffee, he called Mike to check into the orchard situation around the region. Surely a landscape designer who did jobs all over would be able to point him in the right direction.

"You're up awfully early," Mike said, then added a little too cheerfully, "Having trouble sleeping these days?"

Rick glanced at the clock and realized it wasn't even seven yet. "Geez, man, I'm sorry. Did I wake you?"

"Hardly. I have to hit the road any minute now. I'm meeting Jeff for breakfast. Want to join us?"

The prospect of having those two cross-examine him held no appeal. "Not today. I called to see if you know of any apple orchards around the region."

"I don't, but Jeff would. Give him a call. He'll be up," Mike said. "It's a little soon in the season to go picking apples, though."

"I'm not interested in picking them. Maggie wants pictures for the magazine. And I'm hoping she can snag this incredible recipe for apple pie while she's at it."

"Are you telling me that a woman who writes about gourmet food can't bake an apple pie?" Mike asked.

"I don't think anyone bakes a pie quite like the one I've been getting at a little country restaurant over by Callao. Do you know the place?"

"Afraid not."

"You should try it. The pie alone is worth the drive. If you're free for lunch, you could come with me. I need to get information about the woman who bakes them. Willa-Dean, she's the waitress, says the woman lives somewhere near Reedville."

"Wait a minute, that must be Mrs. Keller," Mike said. "Her pies are always the hottest baked goods at the

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church bazaar. I'll bet Jeff can tell you how to find her. If he's not around when you call the nursery, ask Pam. She's as knowledgeable about the area as he is, and she usually works on the bazaar, so she's bound to know Mrs. Keller."

"Thanks, pal."

"So," Mike ventured casually, "everything okay with you and Maggie?"

Rick laughed at the sudden switch in topic, to say nothing of Mike's lousy attempt at subtlety. "Are you asking for yourself or gathering information for your wife?"

Mike chuckled. "Both. She's hanging over my shoulder right now."

"Then Maggie and I are doing just fine," Rick assured them both. "That's the official statement."

"No details?"

"Not a one."

"Ah, well, at least Melanie knows I tried."

"Think that will satisfy her?" Rick asked curiously.

"Not a chance," Melanie chimed in. "I guess I'll just have to go over to the house and pester my sister."

"Sorry," Rick said, not feeling the first hint of guilt over the lie he was about to tell. He would just work hard to make sure it turned into the truth before.Melanie could get over there. "She won't be home today."

"Oh?"

"We're working," he said, seizing on the most obvious solution.

"Nice try, pal. If you think that's going to put Melanie off for long, you're crazy," Mike said. "Quick, call Jeff before my wife starts in on you again with the third degree about what work the two of you could possi-

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bly have planned when you're both supposedly on vacation."

"Thanks. I appreciate the backup and the information," Rick told him.

Five minutes later he was able to track Jeff down on his cell phone. Jeff was already in his truck en route to meet Mike. Rick explained what he was after. "Any idea how I can find this Mrs. Keller?" he asked. "Is it too much to hope that a woman who bakes apple pies happens to own an orchard?"

"As a matter of fact, the Kellers have an apple orchard about fifteen miles outside of town," Jeff told him. "They're getting on in years, so they don't harvest the crop themselves anymore. Their kids weren't interested in running the orchard, so now they just open it up to families or local businesses to come in and pick their own apples. They make enough to supplement their Social Security, I guess."

"And those pies of hers must bring in a tidy sum," Rick surmised.

"I imagine they do. Everybody around here drives clear over to Callao to get them," Jeff said. "She refuses to sell to any other restaurant. Says the owner there was loyal to her from the start, so she's going to return the favor."