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Chapter 11
Whoever said women were great at multi-tasking was a liar, Judith thought as she dashed from the bathroom towards the smell of burning eggplant.She’d decided after work that following the recipe by oven baking them would take way too long.So she’d pan-fried them instead.
All very well, until you forgot you’d left the heat on high while washing your hair.
She flicked off the gas, and after twisting a towel tightly round her head, flipped the eggplant slices out of the pan with a spatula.They were salvageable.After all, wasn’t babaganoush meant to taste smoky?
Smoky, not burnt to a cinder.
She took a big breath and squeezed her eyes shut.Okay Judith, one thing at a time.Leave the eggplant to cool.Go dry your hair.Then come back and finish off the meze platter.There’s still fifty-five minutes until he arrives.You’ve got this.
She had to smile.She’d talked herself through things ever since she was a child.Her very first day of school, her inoculations, all the times when she’d sat alone eating her lunch in a corner of the playground.Pretending she had her very own fairy godmother sitting on her shoulder.
Yeah, she might be sensible on the outside, but deep inside, secretly, she did believe in fairy tales with happily ever afters.
Back in the bathroom she blow-dried her hair into soft waves and thought about how she seemed to be the one initiating most of the kisses.Like Sleeping Beauty in reverse.But if Polly was right, then… maybe… oh, the poor darling.They were really on a par, weren’t they?
Because sex had barely been on the agenda with Mark for the past couple of years.
Rusty.Totally out of practice.Her lady bits put into cold storage, but clearly, all it took was a couple of kisses with Carts and everything was suddenly wide awake and ready for action.Slicking mousse into her hair, she grinned as a glob of fluff caught in the front.It reminded her of that scene in—what was the movie?Where the hair gel wasn’t gel at all…
She brushed her hair harder.
It was almost exactly fifty-five minutes to the second when the doorbell rang.Like aMasterChefcontestant, she arranged the finished platter on the table.It all looked so beautiful, the babaganoush whipped and smooth and scattered with parsley from her little garden, next to a vivid purple beetroot dip and flatbreads.And the lamb tagine she’d prepared and popped in the slow cooker before she left for work, now giving off rich aromas of tomatoes and rosemary.
She took off her apron and smoothed down the second dress she’d bought on her shopping binge.This one was pale blue, dotted with daisy sprigs with tiny fabric-covered buttons all the way up the front.Only the top five actually undid, the rest were for show.If it got to the unbuttoning stage, she’d…Judith.Stop, juststop.Scooting down the hall, she sucked in her cheeks to hold back a telltale grin, but nothing would stop the excitement fizzing like champagne bubbles in her stomach as she flung open the front door.
And then… there he was.
Tall, dark and gorgeous, handing her a gigantic bunch of red roses.Real roses!“For you,” he said.
Mark had only ever stretched to carnations.Once.Under duress, when she’d complained five years into their relationship that he’d never bought her flowers.
She wasn’t going to actually count, but she reckoned there were a dozen.
She felt the caress of his dark eyes on her face as she stuffed her nose into the bunch of roses.
“Wow, thank you.”The smile she’d been trying to contain streamed out in all directions.“These are beautiful.”
The return flash of his teeth sent the blood rushing to her head.
Then he ducked his head and entered.
Carts sat backwith a big sigh.“You know that line about the way to a guy’s heart is through his stomach… well… if it wasn’t such a cliché—”
“I’ll accept the cliché if there’s a genuine compliment attached.”
He met her eyes, drowned a little, resurfaced.“That is the best meal I’ve had in years.”
“Thank you.”She dimpled.“Is there a corner left for dessert?”
“Ah, there’s always a dessert corner.Don’t you find that kind of strange?You can be full up to your earlobes, but there’s always that bit of space left for something sweet.”
“Yeah, the sweet spot.”Their eyes snagged again, held for a beat longer.Make no mistake, she kept hitting his sweet spot.All evening, watching her at the stove, smoothly juggling all the components of preparing and serving a meal.And okay, yes, he’d let himself indulge in some romantic fantasies; Judith with a kid against her hip, stirring a pot on the stove—he pulled himself up short—amend that image,he’dbe stirring the pot andshe’dbe sitting nursing the baby… except he’d freakin’ have to learn to cook first.Or maybehe’dbe feeding the baby, but then, Judith might be breastfeeding so it would depend on the age of their baby.And shite, babies meant overcoming a few hurdles first.His palms went clammy.
He wasn’t even thinking of staying over.
No pressure, no pressure, no pressure.
