Page 91 of Grumpy Darling

“Oh, uh, to interview Coach Ray. Bonnie forgot to tell me she wanted him too.”

“And . . .”

“And what?”

“Are the students of Ransom going to be horrified by the details of his first kiss?”

“No.” I laughed. “His set of questions were different, thank God. No first kiss and no details about his underwear. I guess Bonnie doesn’t hate me after all.”

“I guess not.” Grayson closed the fridge and returned to his ingredients on the counter.

“So, where is everyone?”

“Dad’s still at work, Cammie’s with Mom, and Parker and Reed went to help them with the flat.”

“Not you?”

“Just how many Darlings do you think it takes to change a tire?”

“Hmm. I guess four is enough.”

“Exactly,” he replied. “Besides, Reed is the expert when it comes to cars. I think Parker went along just to watch and laugh.”

“Probably,” I agreed, before taking a closer look at the food laid out across the countertop. “When did you learn to cook? I’m guessing it wasn’t your mom who taught you.Definitelynot your dad.” Danny knew his way around a barbeque, but the one time he’d tried to cook Sunday dinner in the kitchen he nearly burned the house down. He was pretty much banned from cooking anything after that—even toast.

“Uh, no.” Grayson chuckled. “Remember how I used to mow my grandma’s lawn every Sunday afternoon before family dinner?”

“Yeah . . .”

“Well, I’d help her cook dinner once I was done. I’d probably help Mom in the kitchen more often, but hockey doesn’t leave me with a lot of free time.”

“Huh.” The food at Darling family dinners had certainly gone downhill since Grayson’s grandma had moved into the nursing home and his mom took over the cooking. Gray’s training regime was pretty full-on, so it wasn’t all that surprising he didn’t have the time.

I walked over to stand at the counter beside him. “Okay, Gordon, where do we get started?”

“Gordon?”

“Yeah, Gordon Ramsay. I feel like you two have quite similar personalities. Although, I hope you’ll keep any brutal insults about my cooking skills to yourself.”

I could practically feel the heat of his scowl on me as I grinned and picked the recipe up off the table. I gave it a brief glance before dropping it back down. “This doesn’t look too hard.”

“I’m not sure you’re the best judge of that. Did you even look at the muffin recipe?”

“Of course I looked at it.”

“Did you follow it?”

“Uh, sure.” He didn’t look convinced, so I added, “Besides, this is just pizza dough and there are, like, three instructions.”

There was a pained look in his eyes that made me laugh. Gray clearly enjoyed cooking. I imagined he was going to seriously struggle with me being here to mess it all up.

“Perhaps I should be more of a quiet observer,” I suggested as he carefully measured a cup of flour and poured it into the sifter.

“Are you trying to avoid getting your hands dirty?”

“You’re sifting flour, Gray. You’re hardly getting your hands dirty. Besides, maybe I prefer watching you like this.”

“Like this?” He gave me a confused look and then glanced down at his chest and the “Kiss the Chef” apron strapped around him. “It’s the apron, isn’t it?”

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