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His hand slipped under her skirt and trailed a sensuous path up her inner thigh until it reached—oh, yes, that felt so good. She melted like butter in a hot pan.
“No underwear? This is how you planned to meet this morning’s delivery?”
She adjusted, ensuring more friction where she needed it. “Gotta pay those invoices any way we can.”
Of course she was kidding, but Jack’s brow furrowed all the same. He still projected His Royal Broodiness whenever another man was mentioned, not that Sal, with his beer gut and eight grandchildren, even qualified as a man. Knuckle-dragging Jack turned her on to an unreasonable degree. Her head did not approve but everywhere else was fairly okay with the situation.
Speaking of knuckles, he slid one inside her sensitive, quivering flesh. “Time to schedule the next meat delivery.”
She burst out into a laugh. “That’s terrible, even for you.” But soon, her amusement fell away as his eyes shifted to that smoky hunger she loved. Reaching behind her, he pushed the dishes out of the way and hoisted her to the table in one fluid motion. Like she was a slip of a thing. His strength always unraveled her.
He stood, and with a stretch of his ropy-muscled arm opened a countertop cookie jar, the one with the blue iced snowflakes ringing the rim. She didn’t even keep treats in there because, why create more dirty dishes when her cookie habit was strictly of the box-to-mouth variety.
Bafflement boosted to pleasure when he pulled out a condom and slipped it on in a practiced motion. Such clever hands.
“My nonna’s cookie jar, Jack?”
“Great chefs are all about the preparation,” he murmured, right as he plunged into her and everything glittered.
God, she loved this table.
Thirty-Four
Jack’s mind buzzed with all he had to do. Finalize the décor on his new place. Finish interviews for the Chicago brigade. Complete negotiations on a multi-million dollar network contract. Repair his frazzled relationship with his sister. And save DeLuca’s Ristorante without pissing off his girl.
Easy as un, deux, trois.
He had slotted neatly into Lili’s life, her long-distance lover who showed up to fill a need and take her mind off her problems. That wasn’t going to fly for much longer. She might want to keep things on a low simmer, but Jack was ready to plate and serve. The sooner he could get the monkey of her restaurant’s troubles off her back, the sooner she could start focusing on her own needs. And on them.
So this morning, when Jack entered the DeLuca restaurant kitchen and found Tony standing at the sink wearing a face like an overwound clock, he thought checking off the hardest thing on his to-do list would be a great way to start the day. Or second greatest because his mid-breakfast sexcapade with Lili was going to be tough to beat.
Tony glowered.
Dirty mind wipe, activate.
“Tony.”
“Jack.”
They clasped hands with manly firmness then Tony slid several sticks of celery and a knife across the counter. Jack started chopping, but could feel Tony’s scrutiny even as the older man’s hands made fast work of dicing an onion for what Jack assumed was soffritto, the Italian version of mirepoix. Three weeks in and he still felt like a horny teenager who was about to get the third degree from the over-protective father.
A problem for later. Today, he just had to appeal to that other part of Tony’s personality.
The vainglorious chef part.
“So, you probably know I have a cookbook.”
Tony looked up from chopping, eyes narrowed to slits as thin as the blade in his hand. “You have some good ideas though you do not simmer your veal stock for long enough. It should be sixteen hours, not twelve.”
Okay. The prickle of pleasure Jack felt that Tony had actually read one of his recipes went some way to minimizing the underlying tone of Tony’s back-handed compliment. Sort of.
“I have another one in the works and I wondered how you’d feel about a collaboration.”
The older man pursed his lips and resumed the whip-fast knifework. “And what would you possibly gain from that?”
“Doing it by myself, it gets stale. I think you’re a great chef and I’d like to work with you on this.”
Tony heaved an audible sigh like he’d been unaccountably insulted. “Do you think you can buy my blessing?”
