AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Summer had created a pan-seared bison filet sourced from her family’s ranch as her first entrée. She topped the filet with sautéed mushrooms and placed it on top of a neat mound of mashed potatoes flavored with roasted mild green chiles.
She served the dish with a Scotch ale demi-glace. Brock declared it “that fucking delicious beer sauce” when she’d cooked a test dish for Marlene and him to sample after the breakfast rush ended.
Should he be worried about tomorrow night’s contest? Sure, Summer’s bison filet was damned good, but Brock assured himself that his bison meatloaf was better.
And Summer’s high-falutin’ writeup of her dish on the menu was bound to scare off anyone looking for steak with mushrooms-and-beer gravy.
Her second entrée was fresh Alaskan halibut with ahoney soy glaze, placed on a bed of jasmine rice with grilled broccolini in a wasabi butter sauce.
Tasty but way too fancy for Snowberry Springs, he thought with glee. Like the bison filet, it was surprisingly easy to cook and plate, which would be a bonus if tomorrow’s dinner rush was as hectic as he hoped.
Plus, they’d gotten a great deal on the halibut from Robbie’s Restaurant Supply, with the promise to deliver more by tomorrow early afternoon.
Robbie’s would deliver the fish whole, so they needed to butcher it into portions before dinner service started. Summer suggested reserving all the leftover parts and turning them into a seafood chowder for Saturday’s Soup of the Day.
Summer assured them that butchering the fish could be done quickly, then demonstrated on the test fish.
The woman had crazy-good knife skills. It nearly killed Brock to admit it, but hecouldlearn a few things from her.
Now, she finished with the basil, and quickly moved on to mincing garlic before she put them in the bowl with the tomatoes, added salt, pepper, olive oil, vinegar, and tossed the mixture. She covered the bowl and placed it one of the kitchen’s low-boy fridges under the counter.
“Okay, I’m off to Jenna’s,” she announced, untying her apron, “to talk to her about the baguettes and the desserts for tomorrow.”
Brock couldn’t help following the sway of her hips and her sweetly-rounded ass in those checked pants as she left the kitchen. Then he caught Marlene watching him, and flushed at the older woman’s knowing smile.
“She’s good for you, you know,” Marlene observed. “You should be nicer to her.”
“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Brock snarled.
Marlene just shrugged. With one smooth motion, she put two plates of food on the pass, hit the call bell for the servers, and shouted, “Order up for table six! Two breakfast specials with French toast, bacon, and eggs sunny-side!”
Chapter Thirteen – Summer
Still fuming from her latest argument with Brock, Summer left the diner and cut across the town square. Downtown Snowberry Springs had changed little since she moved away.
The same old historic brick buildings surrounded three sides of the large, grassy square with the old train depot and tracks bringing up the fourth side. At the center of the square stood a simple, white-painted war memorial column surrounded by bronze plaques commemorating the men and women who had fallen in service to their country in every major conflict since the town’s founding. The large roofed gazebo-style bandstand next to the memorial badly needed a fresh coat of paint, but the picnic tables under the stand of trees were still the hangout for the town’s chess players.
As she walked over the springy grass, Summer tried to figure out Brock’s problem. Alternating between Sweet Sexy Brock and Grumpy Mule-Headed Brock gave her whiplash. And she was so danged tired of his continual opposition to her perfectly reasonable ideas.
His problem is that he wants to be in charge all the time,she thought angrily.He’s such a control freak!
What’s he like in bed? Does he want to be in complete control there, too?The thought gave her a guilty shiver of pleasure.
Instead of Brock the Cock, she’d started thinking of him as Brock the Block. As in blocking every suggestion for improvement. As in completely block-headed.Argh!
Because from what she’d seen so far, he wasn’t doing much partying these days.
No booze, no girlfriends texting or calling him, nothing but working at the diner… which isn’t healthy, either.
With his seven-days-a-week work schedule, he was clearly heading for a burnout if he couldn’t get some work/life balance.
Maybe getting laid would chill him out.
Too bad she absolutely hated the idea of Brock sleeping with anyone.Except me.
She touched her lips. It had been a long time since just a kiss had turned her on so quickly.Oh, jeez, I can’t be falling for him again, am I? Because that would be really stupid.
Summer shook her head angrily to clear out the memory of his kiss. She walked even faster.
