Page 17 of Whisking It All

Ethan and Jamie sat at a four-top in the corner, three mugs of coffee waiting on the table. She set a shallow bowl in front of each of them before taking a seat next to her father. Each bowl was dressed with a swirl of caramel sauce, half a flambéed banana, a perfect quenelle of white ice cream, and a sprinkle of pecan-studded granola, little flecks of edible glitter dusting the pecans. The presentation was a bit subdued for her taste, but she hoped it was just the right amount of refined to prove to Jamie that she was all grown up. A true professional.

“You had time to make ice cream?” Jamie asked.

Tessa shrugged, pouring sugar into her coffee cup. “I made it last night. I wanted to test the ice cream machine at the bakery.”

He shot daggers at her with his eyes as he slid his spoon across the bowl, gathering a bit of everything into the perfect bite, and ate. She held her breath, anticipating the moment the ice cream melted on his tongue.

His eyes flew to hers. “Goat cheese.”

She leaned back in her chair with a satisfied smirk. The complexity of flavor, the cool ice cream with the still warm banana, the crunch of the granola and the smooth caramel, the peppery cardamom and the earthiness of the rum—the dish was a masterpiece. She knew it and now he did too.

“Teej, this is fantastic,” Ethan said, digging into another bite.

“Thanks, Ethan.” She saw the hurt flicker across her father’s face at her use of his first name, there and gone before anyone else would notice. But what was she supposed to call the man she only saw twice a year for the last decade and a half—dad? Then, as if she couldn’t help rubbing salt in the wound, she added, “I go by Tessa now.”

“Right. Sorry. Old habits,” her father said with an apologetic smile.

“It’s good, but it won’t work for the festival. You can’t flambé bananas to order,” Jamie said.

“I’m aware,” she replied. “It wasn’t meant as a possible menu item.”

“Then what was it meant as?”

Ethan’s head snapped back and forth between his daughter and his best friend as they lobbed barbs at each other across the table. He took the final bite from his bowl and pushed it aside. “Jame, this dish might not be appropriate for the festival, but I think you should bring Tessa in on the menu planning, just like you were going to do with Cheryl. She’s got some really interesting ideas—”

“Do they involve edible glitter?” Jamie asked, gesturing to the granola with the tip of his spoon.

“What’s wrong with edible glitter?” Tessa asked, crossing her arms over her chest.

Jamie scoffed. “It’s edible glitter. If you need pyrotechnics to make your dish memorable, then it’s not a very good dish.”

“Hey, now,” Ethan said.

“That dish went viral when one of my customers posted it on Instagram last month.”

“The people on Instagram only have to look at the food. Not taste it.”

Tessa’s blood thundered in her ears at the challenge. “I guess you don’t want any more of it then,” she said, reaching across the table and pulling his bowl away from him.

A low growl formed at the base of his throat as he gripped the bowl and pulled it back towards himself. “I didn’t say that.”

“I wouldn’t want to diminish the pretentiousness of your restaurant with something as low-brow as edible glitter,” Tessa fired back, pulling the bowl back towards her.

Jamie tugged it again, dragging the bowl across the table and Tessa with it. She lurched forward to keep her grip on the rim of the bowl, the movement bending her over the table. Jamie’s eyes dipped to the flash of her cleavage, her electric blue lace bra now very visible down her shirt. He only looked for a second, but it was long enough to send a shiver of awareness down her spine.

He still wanted her. He might not like that he did, but she knew that look in his eyes—she’d seen it the other night right before he’d put his mouth between her legs.

“Was there something you wanted?” she asked, staring daggers at him, and arching her back just to watch him squirm.

Jamie released the bowl like it had burned him, sending Tessa reeling backward until she landed, with a humph, in her seat. Jamie held her gaze as he licked the last of the caramel off his spoon. For all his griping, the man certainly enjoyed her food. And she enjoyed watching him eat it, maybe a little too much.

Her father’s eyes darted between Tessa and his best friend. “Are you done?” He shot a pointed look at Jamie. “Tessa’s food is very popular—”

“On social media,” Jamie said with just enough derision in his voice to make it clear exactly how he felt about her internet fame. “I heard.”

“She’s good, Jamie. That dish was fucking incredible,” Ethan said, pointing at his own empty bowl.

A lump formed in her throat and tears sprang to her eyes that she quickly blinked away. It shouldn’t matter that her father liked her food, that he was standing up for her, but it did.

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