A shirt is draped over a chair. I grab it. It's his, and it's huge on me. But it smells like him. I pull it on, the hem falling to my mid-thigh, and button a few before marching out of the room.
Behind me, I hear, “che donna” in an exasperated tone and have to stifle a laugh.
Chapter Twenty Six
Giovanni
I come down barefoot, still warm from her, and find the kitchen alive with scent and action. The timer blinks red. The room smells like lamb and lemon, sage and garlic, and something sweet from the beans that’s made the air enticing.
She’s at the oven in my shirt—only my shirt—bare legs lit by the last of the light reflecting through the window. The hem skims the top of her thighs when she reaches for the oven door. I take the handle over her hand.
“Careful,” I say.
“I am.” She tips me a look that tightens my gut. “Hot.”
“I know,” I say, my voice husky.
We open the door together. The lamb has gone bronze. Fat has rendered and basted the shoulder until every edge shines. She spoons the pan juices up and over, slow.
Steam climbs around her face; a curl sticks to her cheek. I want to press my mouth there. I settle for sliding the pan out, setting it on the board, and stepping behind her so she’s between my body and the heat.
“Rest?” I ask.
“Fifteen,” she says, already reaching for the beans. I lift the lid. Garlic and sage bloom. The beans are perfect—soft with a little integrity left. She tests a few on a spoon, salts with a steady hand, then tips half the lamb juices into the pot and stirs until they gloss.
I watch her move like she owns the room and everything in it. The shirt falls open one button too many. I don’t fix it. I’m the man in loose pants and nothing else, and I’m not thinking about food. I’m thinking about the new name she gave me upstairs, in the dark, in that voice. Gio.
It’s not the first time I’ve heard it, but the way she says it…
“Stop staring,” she says without looking up.
“No,” I answer.
She cuts me a sideways smile that makes the muscles in my stomach tighten. “Plate the puntarelle,” she says, pointedly to hide the smile. “Dress it now. Anchovy will soften it just enough while the lamb rests.”
“Yes, Chef.”
She gives me that warning look; I grin anyway.
I spin the chilled curls dry, drop them into the dressing, and toss until the green goes glossy, and the scent of garlic, fish, lemon, and black pepper wafts into the air.
She slides a sheet tray into the second oven: wedges of radicchio with a swipe of balsamic and a thin coat of oil, a pinch of salt. “Ten minutes,” she says.
“Copy.”
The bottle of Sangiovese already sits open on the counter, resting until it’s just perfect. She’s trimming the twine off the lamb, and I take one more second to look: the strike of her legs, the way the shirt cuffs brush her wrists, the line at the corner of her mouth that isn’t tension anymore. Satisfaction sits there now, and hunger.
Her eyes flick to my hands. “You can pour now.”
“I was going to,” I say, pour a splash into each glass, and set one near her hand. “Don’t taste yet.”
“You’re bossy,” she says, amused.
“Efficient,” I say back, and earn the small shake of her head that makes my chest feel too tight.
She pulls the lamb to the board and rests her palm on the crust for a second, like she’s thanking it. Then the knife goes in. The blade meets no resistance.
She slices thick. The interior is rosy where it should be, the edges lacquered with paste and fat. When she reaches the bone, she turns the knife and liberates a ridge of meat that would tempt even the strongest will. I take two slices to a warm platter and spoon beans in a wide crescent beside them so the juices can run down and meet the starch like an arrangement.
