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Chapter Twelve
Standing in the kitchen with Spencer made Clarissa’s thoughts scatter. No one had ever invaded her space like this, and she wasn’t sure she liked it. Then the weight of his hand on her hip told her how much she did.
She didn’t want to be alone forever. She wanted someone she could trust explicitly, who understood what made her tick, and who respected her dreams and goals. She wanted to trust and love a cowboy the same way. She wanted to “get” him, and she wanted to support his dreams and goals.
In all honesty, the reason she was moving to San Antonio was because she was giving up on that kind of relationship. She couldn’t admit that out loud, and the fact that she still hadn’t received a single call for an interview despite the handful of new applications she’d put out at the end of last week made her gut writhe.
It was just last week, she told herself.They haven’t even had time to look at them.
With that thought cemented fully in her brain, she began to flip the pages in the binder. “It’s summertime,” she said. “I can put on our social media that we have new flavors. Mint sells well in the summer.” She continued to muse as she looked for the perfect recipe. They usually jumped off the page, striking her in the heart, when they needed to be made.
“Banana pudding,” she said, landing on the recipe. “This is a good seller in the summer. We can make pops too, and those sell out fast.” She looked at Spencer, but he had that wary look in his eye again. At least he wasn’t turning paler by the moment, as he had been a few minutes ago. He really had looked like he was about to throw up or pass out, and Clarissa didn’t want to deal with either.
She didn’t know how to deal with the emotions storming through her chest, and she didn’t know how to tell Spencer that since she’d seen him run into those barrels a few weeks ago, she’d started to doubt everything about her decisions.
She did know how to get out milk, cream, sugar, and vanilla. She knew how to boss someone around in the kitchen. She did both of those things until they had assembled the ingredients on the countertop.
“Okay,” she said, pushing her hair back. “You cook an ice cream base until it’s nice and thick. It’s not hard. It just requires delicate heat. There are eggs in there, and they require a bit of special attention.”
The bell chimed on the door, and Clarissa turned that way. “A customer.” She immediately wiped her hands on her apron, though they hadn’t started cooking yet. “You have to go help the customers when they come,” she said over her shoulder, already moving toward the front of the building. “Then we’ll come right back to where we left off.”
He followed her into the front of the shoppe, where Clarissa asked if the woman there needed any help. Since it was Mrs. Sharpe, and she’d been coming to the shoppe for years, she sure didn’t. She picked out her milk—chocolate for the kids—cheese, and butter, paid, and left.
“The tablet is a life-saver,” Clarissa said. “We take all major credit and debit cards. It emails the receipt if they want one. Done.”
“And you move it back and forth, from out here to in there.”
“It’s usually out here,” she said. “I only had it back there to make the spreads this morning.” She pointed to the refrigeration unit. “We should be stocked for a couple of days now. You don’t have to make everything everyday.”
“We don’t make everything everyday. Got it.”
She smiled to herself as she pushed back into the kitchen. “In fact, I wouldn’t even be making ice cream today if you weren’t here. We don’t need it, but you need to learn.” She looked at the ingredients on the counter and blew out her breath. “All right, we’re going to start by steeping the vanilla wafers in the cream and milk.”
As she went along, showing him how to steep, strain, and season, she realized she should’ve chosen an easier ice cream to make. Vanilla would’ve been best, because then she could’ve told him how he could make it into chocolate. Or add some candy and coloring to make it the rainbow bright flavor the kids loved when they came. Or she could’ve added strawberries to it, or cookies to make cookies and cream.
Mistake, she told herself, but she refused to let that word come out of her mouth. She’d be here next week, and she could make a very small batch of vanilla to teach him all of that.
“And then you just pour it into the machine.” Clarissa supervised as Spencer picked up the huge bowl and began pouring it into the industrial ice cream machine.
Spencer did great, just as he always had. He may not have any degrees or certifications, but he picked up on things quickly. She’d made the spreadable cheeses that morning, and she’d wait until Wednesday or Thursday to make more. They were easy, because it was just mixing together ingredients, weighing out the product, and labeling it. She had recipes for everything too. Easy peasy.
“All right,” Spencer said, setting the big bowl in the even bigger sink. “How long does that go?” He peered at the binder. “Twelve minutes.” Meeting her eyes, he asked, “It only takes twelve minutes?”
“Then it takes six hours in the freezer,” she said. “So if you’re out of the flavor you want in the morning, you’re not serving it that day.”
He moved his focus back to the binder and studied it. “And you really only do this once or twice a month.”
“Really,” she said. “It’s not Baskin Robbins, Spence.” She laughed lightly, thrilled when he did too. He looked much more relaxed now, and she felt brave enough to reach for his hand. “Hey, I realize I should’ve started with vanilla.”
Their eyes met, and his fingers curled around hers and squeezed. “You like to make things a little more complicated than they need to be.” He grinned at her, and he seemed so much like himself again.
“The cheeses are more often. They’re also really easy.”
“For you,” he quipped, those dreamy eyes dropping to her mouth. He pulled them back to hers and blinked. “When will we do that?”
“Thursday,” she said. “Then we’ll have fresh product going into the weekend.”
“And your brothers bring everything else over from the milk parlor?” he asked. “The milk, the butter, that kind of stuff?”
