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“I taste peanut butter too,” he said, shutting his eyes.
“I always add peanut butter to my chocolate chip cookies. Like a double dose of yumminess.”
“Shit yeah,” he said.
He finished off the first one and reached for another, then caught the smile on her face.
“You’ve got chocolate on your lip. Let me get it.”
She reached up with her hand and caught it, then wiped it off. His hand caught hers. “You’re not who I thought you’d be.”
She lifted an eyebrow at him. “Good or bad?”
“Both,” he said. He didn’t expect her to be almost nurturing and didn’t want to insult her by saying that.
Most of his life he was looking for this.
He wasn’t being sexist. He just wanted the comfort of home.
He’d left for a better career and life than his parents had. He just never thought he’d be the type to go to college.
He wasn’t a fan of sitting in a classroom and never saw himself working in an office.
The service called to him and his parents supported it.
It wasn’t good enough for Lara’s parents. It wasn’t the life a lot of women would want.
It’s not that he wanted a woman at home waiting on him. He just wanted someone who wanted ahome.
A place that was theirs. Where they could relax together and make memories.
He hadn’t realized it was going to be so hard to find that though and Grace was the last person he expected to see parts of it from.
Then he had to tell himself that was stupid.
She came from a family where the bond was tight.
“You might need to explain that to me,” she said. “But I can see you don’t want to and I won’t push you now. Was there another reason you came in or was it the smell of the cookies?”
The fact that she even knew that about him was something too.
“The shelves,” he said. “Do you want them stained or painted? I can install them today and we’ll be able to take them down to finish them. I guess I should have asked that before.”
“Hmm,” she said. “I didn’t think of that, but I know you have to at least put something on them, even if it’s a clear stain. What do you think?”
He looked around her house. The trim was white, which wasn’t common in a house this old, but she’d said she’d had work done and his guess was that was changed throughout the house.
“You could go white like the rest of the house, but I think keeping it to its natural color will add some warmth. Not that you don’t have warmth here.”
She laughed. “I know what you are saying and I agree. So a clear stain is good enough. I’m sure I can handle that myself.”
“I can do it,” he said.
“I’m trying to figure out if you want to do the work for food or you are doing the work because I’m feeding you. As if you need to even things out.”
His head went side to side and he snagged a third cookie. “Does it matter?”
“It does,” she said. “If you’re doing it to be nice, that’s great. That is the reason I’m cooking. I enjoy cooking and it does feed my ego well to see people enjoy what I put in front of them.”
