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“I can help.” He pulled himself up using the bannister.
“I got it.”
“D, I can microwave some damn Campbell’s.”
She chuckled. “Fine.” She followed his slow climb up to his kitchen. That room wasn’t as sleek and modern as the style of his basement but was neat and tidy with its white cabinets and counters. The main spots of color in the room came from the black coffeemaker, a red bowl filled with apples and bananas that sat on the counter, and the set of salt and pepper shakers in the shape of two superheroes’ heads.
They gathered what they needed and worked side by side, her at the stove, him at the microwave. And it was weirdly…nice.
Dani used to love making meals with Anthony. The quiet intimacy of it. The way they’d move around each other, stealing kisses and touches and tastes. It’d been a lot of years since she’d last had that, and she hadn’t even realized she missed it until she stood next to freaking Sean Riddick making one of her all-time favorite casual meals. How had the guy made her think of both of father and her husband with just the stupid little enthusiastic suggestion of making tomato soup?
She wasn’t sure. But it threw her off kilter a little, as if she was being pulled both back in time and forward into some unknown and unknowable future that she hadn’t yet decided to embrace. She flipped the sandwiches in the hot pan then peered over at Sean and found him concentrating really hard to pull the plastic seal off the top of the second microwavable soup bowl. “Need help?” she asked.
His expression morphed from one of deep concentration to frustration. “No.”
Dani lowered the heat on her pan and covered it so the cheese got nice and melty. “You sure?”
His frown deepened. “No, I’m gonna make this soup can my little bitch.”
A smile was just cracking on Dani’s face when the plastic seal gave way so suddenly that the whole can went flying, sending soup arcing through the air and all over Sean.
He froze with his hands out at his sides. “What…the shit….”
Pressing a hand over her mouth, Dani turned off her burner and stared at the carnage that was the entire area around Riddick. A little puff of amused air escaped her effort to hold back from laughing her ass off.
He pointed at her with a hand dripping with tomato. “Don’t. Say. A word.” With that, he turned toward her. Orange-red liquid covered his arm, his shirt, his jeans, one of his feet. There was even a splotch of it under his good eye.
“Are you okay?” she whispered, because if she let herself do more than whisper, she was going to legit lose it.
He arched a brow. He might’ve looked fierce if it hadn’t been for, you know, the freaking tomato soup explosion. “You mean, besides looking like an extra in a slasher film?” He waved a hand at himself, sending a spray of orange from his arm onto the floor.
Splat splat splat…
Which was when Dani lost it, just lost her ever-loving mind. Laughter burst out of her so hard it was nearly a cackle. She snorted with the hilarity of it, grasped her stomach to try to catch her breath, and finally crouched against the cabinet. Her cheeks hurt and her eyes were watering. She kept trying to remind him of his last words before the explosion, but every time she thought of him saying he was going to make the can his little bitch, she started laughing harder again and couldn’t speak.
Sean reached for the paper towels and rolled his eyes. “Ha ha, D. Kick a man when he’s down, why don’t you?”
She pointed and shook her head. “You…you said….” Unable to control herself, she slumped all the way onto the floor, gasping for breath between waves of hilarity. “…l’il bitch…”
He wiped what he could off his arm and shirt, then chucked the roll at her and smirked. “While you’re down there, make yourself useful.”
Finally sobering up a little, Dani used the first sheet to dry and fan her face. Reaching out, she wiped up the spray of droplets that’d fallen from his arm, and then she crawled a little closer to where he stood to get the spill. Still chuckling, she wiped at the top of his bare foot. “Stand still,” she managed.
“Would this be a bad time to mention that this is a nice view?” he said, amusement finally working its way into his tone.
She glared up at him, which suddenly made her aware that she was basically kneeling at his feet. “Only if you don’t mind me punching your tomato-soup-covered junk.” The words made her chuckle again.
With his uninjured eye, he winked. Freaking winked.
Dani got to her feet and sighed out the last of her humor. “That was truly epic. Thank you. I don’t think I’ve laughed that hard in a long time.”
