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“Of course they do.” Levi nodded, seeming unsurprised. “Point of clarification: Will there be dancing around bonfires in the woods?”
“There will be bonfires on the front lawn, because no fire is allowed near the trees,” Hannah told him.
“Noted. So, what do we make to preserve the festival spirit of the holiday, while also presenting our guests with a gourmet experience? What says, ‘let’s rejoice that the world is fertile again’?” He cocked an eyebrow at the wordfertile. Hannah swore she heard someone swoon off camera.
She propped her elbows on the counter and rested her chin in her hands, looking up at him with all the sweetness she could muster. “Well, Levi, since you are the chef, I thought it would be better if you told me the menu.”
She didn’t want to be having this much fun. But that was the thing about the two of them, when they weren’t tearing each other apart, no one ever made her have as much fun.
“We need everything to be portable, so we’ll have booths set up across the lawn with traditional May Day foods from around the world, updated with a Levi Matthews twist. Sticky buns, oatcakes, grilled salmon skewers, miniature herb tarts, and more.”
“Okay, I am looking forward to eating all of that,” Hannah admitted, mock grudgingly.
“I appreciate your vote of confidence,” Levi said. “The recipe I’m going to show you today is a twist on a traditional lemon shortbread, baked into a stick like a Pocky, then dipped in freeze-dried raspberry powder.”
“This sounds complicated, Levi,” Hannah said.
“Ah, that’s the secret,” Levi said, winking. Hannah rolled her eyes at him. “It looks very complicated, but it’s actually easy enough for beginning home bakers, like yourself.”
Hannah huffed in indignation, her hands over her heart. “Must you tell my deepest, darkest secrets? No Rosenstein publicly admits she can’t bake!”
“Can you handle measuring the flour?” he asked with mock concern. “You’re going to need to weigh it on the scale.”
“I think I can figure it out,” she said, sticking her tongue out at him.
“I’m sure you can. You run a very demanding, complicated business with ease.” He looked into her eyes as he said it, and she felt her knees start to buckle. She looked away and dumped the flour into the bowl of the stand mixer. It poofed out at her in a cloud.
Levi caught her eye again, and they both started giggling. He reached over to wipe the flour off her cheek, and their gazes got trapped.
They fell into an easy rhythm, handing each other ingredients without needing to ask, seeming to understand where the other was about to be. All those years of being hyperaware of where he was at any time paid off. When he brushed an arm or a hip against her, she knew he was doing it on purpose, which didn’t stop all her nerve endings from being raw at the touch.
When the videographer said she had enough footage, she left them to talk things over with the wedding planner while Hannah hid and took several long breaths to try to regain her equilibrium.
She needed to get away from him. The heat of him next to her while they cooked, the smell of him—still the same as when he left, and when they’d been twenty-five and she’d pined over him, and when they were fifteen and the sight of him had set her body on fire for the first time—all of it was making her hormones do things she hadn’t even known they were still capable of.
He had once been irresistible in his surly, reckless self-centeredness, in his insufferable balance of whiny and cocky. That boy didn’t appeal to her anymore; she’d inoculated herself against him, and she’d thought that would make her safe. Instead, he’d shown up grown, thoughtful, with his heart on his sleeve, and this version was irresistible, too. This version of the boy she’d loved every day of her life, who she’d never met, drew her in to the mystery. What changed him? How did he get this way? How did the Blue she knew become this loose-limbed comfortable man who smoldered instead of sulked?
This feeling of not being in control of her desires, of being pulled along by the tides of a love bigger than she could hope to contain, was what she hated about being near Blue. He had loved being pulled under by the current of the two of them together, but it had terrified her. It made her feel off balance. It wasn’t her plan; it made her want to throw all her plans out and wing it. It made her someone different.
He deserved someone who wanted to fall with him and be swept under. He deserved to be a person separate from the destiny of their story, and so did she.
When all the various parts of the Davenport entourage had seen enough and been bundled back onto the train, she went looking for him to plead with him to do what was best for both of them, and let go of this idea he had of wooing her. They could be friends. They had been most of their lives. If they couldn’t, he needed to leave.
“Blue, are you in here?” Hannah called out. She was standing in the kitchen. His apron was off its hook, the smell of potatoes and cheese came from the oven, prep for tomorrow was covering every available surface, and yet there was no sign of Levi.
“Pantry,” he called out, and she followed his voice into the big walk-in pantry at the back of the kitchen, next to the door to the Matthewses’ apartments. Levi was standing, hands on his hips, glasses pushed up into his hair (when did he get glasses? How hadn’t she known?), wearing a pair of jeans she hadn’t seen in years. She recognized the heart patch holding the back pocket onto the ass, because she’d sewn it there a lifetime ago. It had been before they started dating, but after she’d started whispering his name to herself in the night. His floral-print thermal shirt clung to his shoulders, the sleeves pushed up his forearms (thermals should be illegal, and so should Levi’s forearms). She felt a rush of annoyance at him for being so unnecessarily hot, so she was scowling at him when he turned to look at her. His face was all serious contemplation, but his eyebrows shot up when he saw her face.
“What did I do?” he asked, and she was even more annoyed that he still knew her looks.
“Nothing, other than existing.” She shook her head to clear the lust.
He waved her over, and she came to stand next to him. The fabric of their shirts brushed together and she got goose bumps. It was a mistake to be this close. The door shut behind her, leaving them alone together in the dimly lit pantry. The smell of his deodorant hit her with a profound sense memory of being naked and covered in his sweat. She breathed through her mouth.
“Shouldn’t you be cooking for tomorrow?”
“Probably, but I needed an introvert break so I’m hiding for ten minutes, updating the dry goods inventory.” He turned the tablet he was holding so she could see it. He seemed to have built an Excel spreadsheet to track all of their food expenditures, usage dates, recipes—it was extensive, and impressive.
“I did this while I couldn’t sleep,” he was explaining. “I can’t seem to sleep here. I know my mom kind of runs the kitchen by vibes, but Miriam told me you three are trying to clean up the financial systems, and you’re going to need…”
