Page 24 of Loving Decker

He washed his hands, and there was a sort of long pause, long enough it grew awkward. He turned around, and her cheeks turned bright red.

“Oh sorry.” She laughed, a funny nervous laugh, and then moved over to the counter to dig into the bags he brought.

He dried his hands slowly, wondering what that was all about. Then he stepped up close behind her. “Did I get everything?” His voice was quiet and close to her ear. She seemed to pause a moment and close her eyes, and then she nodded. “Yep. Looks like everything.”

His grin grew. Then he reached around her with one hand and peered into the bag over her shoulder. “You sure about that? I could help you look.”

She laughed and then swatted him. “Oh stop. Stop. We have work to do.”

“I’m just trying to do the work here.”

“Mm-hmm.” She turned and handed him one of the bags. “How about we start with the crust.”

“Sounds good. Like I said, you talk, I do what you say.”

“This just keeps getting better and better.” She laughed again, and he thought the sound of her laughter was prettier now than he ever thought in high school. Everything was better now.

She poured the flour in a bowl, slightly softened the butter, and added a pinch of salt. “Okay, here we need to combine this butter with the flour. And you do it with this pastry cutter, or even a fork will work.” She cut into the mixture and twisted, making the butter smaller and smaller. “What do you think?”

“I got this.” He grinned. But when he took over, it just didn’t function the same way it had for her. But she’d reached for a second bowl and at least pretended not to notice his awkward attempts. “This is tough work.”

“It’s worth it, though, right?”

“Oh yeah. When you do it? Absolutely.”

“You remember my pies?”

“How could I forget? Best thing a girl has ever given me.”

She laughed.

“And maybe the only thing, but that doesn’t discount the pie.”

She shook her head as though she just couldn’t understand something.

“What?”

“I don’t get it.”

He paused to see her expression. She seemed more curious than anything. So he leaned his hip against the counter to fully face her.

“Why didn’t you ever have a girlfriend or anything in high school?”

His gaze travelled over her face, lingering on her lips for a moment with a new wave of desire to pull her close and kiss her. Then he considered her question. “I don’t know. I guess Dylan had enough girlfriend for the both of us?” He shrugged.

“And Shelby was a lot of work. I can see that.”

He knew it was more than that, but he wasn’t exactly sure how to say it. “And you know, I had you.” He grinned, feeling self-conscious. “We were good together.”

The pink to her cheeks made him curious again. “What about you? Why weren’t you ever dating anyone?”

She turned back to her bowl and stirred lemon juice into her berries. “I dated. A little.” She didn’t say anything else for a minute, then turned back. “I guess I’m the same. People thought we were together.”

For the first time he wondered if their friendship had held her back in that way. “Did the guys stay away because of me?”

She opened her mouth and then closed it, then she shrugged. “I don’t know. I always thought…I don’t know. Does it matter?”

Things were tense all of a sudden. She obviously didn’t want to talk about this right now. But maybe they should?

---