I made anexasperated sound.
Ezra peered over myshoulder into the sink. “Was that for dinner?”
Dropping my headinto my hands, I tried to think of a solution, some way out of this mess, butnothing came. I had zero ideas except this would be a fantastic time for azombie apocalypse to breakout.
The worst part wasnow I didn’t have a best friend because I was going to have to kill Vera foreven suggesting that I cook for Ezra. This was her fault. What had she beenthinking?
What had I beenthinking listening to her?
“I ruined it,” Iadmitted to my hands. “It’s totally ruined.”
He made a soundthat could have been a laugh or possibly a wince. Maybe it was the sound hemade before he ran away. “It can’t be that bad.”
I moved out of theway so he could look for himself. Crossing my arms over my chest, I waited forhim, in all his restaurant owning glory, to determine time of death on thissolid but failed effort.
He poked at thebread. “Oh,” he said. Then he moved over to the noodles. They had been soakingin the pot since I’d given up the idea of draining and serving them. “Huh.”Passing by the salad, he sniffed at it. “I don’t… I’m not sure what to say.” Hereached over and flicked off the burner that had still been heating themeatballs. “Do I want to know what’s under there?”
I lifted my headand met his amused gaze. “I’m fine if we want to leave that one a mystery.”
He chuckled,surveying the messy, ruined scene once again. “Molly, I… You… What went wrong?”
My eyes widened asthe full weight of my bad choices were realized. I had invited Ezra Baptiste tomy apartment knowing I couldn’t cook. The man owned four of the most successfulrestaurants in Durham. He sometimes filled in at Bianca because he “knew hisway around a kitchen.” He had probably eaten five star meals every day for thelast decade of his life. At the very least, multiple times a week.
This was the man Ihad invited over to scare away with my cooking.
Missionaccomplished.
“I-I don’t evenknow where to begin,” I told him. God, this was humiliating. My entire face flamedred, spreading a splotchy blush from the roots of my hair to the tips of mytoes. I pressed my hand to my mouth and wrapped my other arm around my waist. Ineeded someone to console me. Apparently, that someone was myself.
Would it be totallyout of line to make him leave? It seemed like a better option than having himwitness this total humiliation.
Finally, when thesilence had stretched to uncomfortable and neither of us had any idea what tosay to make this better, I blurted, “It’s your fault! You started kissing meand… and then this happened!”
Our gazes clashedacross the small space between us and something shifted inside him, somethingwidening and deepening and spreading wings that were bigger than my entireapartment.
He smiled,prompting me to say, “Everything was time sensitive and you… distracted me.”
“Don’t move.” Hewalked back to the entryway and returned with the bottle of wine he’d broughtwith him. “We should open this.” He looked around for a second, then asked. “Doyou have a cork screw?”
Silently, I walkedover and retrieved the bottle opener from a drawer. I handed it to him. He tookit from me and held it up to examine it.
“This is a niceone,” he commented.
I blinked at him.Was he really moving on this quickly? We were surrounded by terrible food! Andmessy dishes. Wasn’t his professional integrity insulted?
“I can’t cook,” Iconfessed. “But I take my wine very seriously.”
He stayed focusedon the task of uncorking the bottle he’d brought, but his mouth widened into asmile. “I thought it was my fault that this happened.”
Nerves hit mystomach and I felt like doubling over to stop the sensation. “It is.” I pulledtwo glasses down from the cupboard and set them on the countertop next to him.“But more accurately, I’m terrible in the kitchen. I can’t even do simplethings like toast, or cookies, or… spaghetti.”
He lifted that sointense gaze again, searching my face and my eyes and my soul. “Then why didyou offer to make dinner tonight? We could have gone anywhere. You didn’t haveto stress out over this.”
I bit down hard onmy lip, trying to figure out how to spin my decisions so I didn’t sound crazy.“I underestimated my propensity for disaster.”
Ezra laughed again.“I think I did too.”
“Sorry,” Iwhispered to him. “You don’t have to stay if you don’t want—”
