Page 92 of Since We're Here
“Go. The brewery needs you.” I gently push him out the door.
I’ll make grilled chicken with rotini on the side and a homemade sauce. He has several packages of mushrooms in hisfridge, so even though I’m not the biggest fan, he must love them.
After the groceries show up later that afternoon and I start dinner, I shower and put on a short blue dress, one of the things we picked up at my flat yesterday. Just because I now own more appropriate clothing for Ireland doesn’t mean I can’t dress up sometimes.
He gets home as delicious scents of garlic chicken and simmering sauce fill the house. Patrick drops his bag on the kitchen floor and turns to me, seeming almost surprised to find a woman in his kitchen cooking dinner.
“I missed you.” I slide my hands around his waist, pulling him toward me, then run them up his chest. He smiles and encircles my waist with his hands, connecting them at the small of my back.
“I feel good.” I remove one hand from his neck for a brief moment and push his hands onto my ass. “That’s better.”
“You look good.” He presses me against him.
“Dinner’s in ten, okay? Let’s continue this later.”
“Feck.” He groans.
“This is really good,Maddie, thank you for cooking.”
I smile at him and bite into the chicken. I learned a few tricks working at restaurants for so long, and one of them is how to make perfectly tender and flavorful chicken.
“No problem.”
“Why aren’t you eating the pasta? The sauce is delicious.”
“Oh, I don’t like mushrooms and I’m too lazy to pick them out.”
“Then why’d you put them in?” He gives me a confused look.
“Because you like them, I guessed.”
Patrick blinks, then reaches over and carefully removes the mushrooms from my plate one by one. “You don’t have to always do things to please other people, you know. You hate mushrooms, so don’t put them in your sauce.”
I freeze with my fork of mushroom-free pasta halfway to my mouth. “Hmm. This sauce might be a metaphor for my life.”
“Maybe.” One side of his mouth twitches up.
“So your dad approved of the IPA?”
“Yeah. He called it perfect, which is a huge compliment from him.”
“Congrats.”
“He actually seemed impressed with everything. He’s not been to the brewery since he handed everything over to me. I think he misses it.”
“Think he’d come back to work?”
“I don’t think so. But he agreed to help while I’m down a head brewer. I asked him if he could give me any advice on the Sean situation, and all he said was to give him time.”
“Not super helpful.”
“Nope. Oh, I have two more quirky stops for you.”
“Yeah? What are they?”
“Mam suggested this creepy Viking cave in Kilkenny where a thousand people died. It’s haunted, or something.”
“Nice, that’ll go well with the gateway to hell in Donegal that your sister suggested.”
