‘I’m intrigued. What on earth constitutes a weights and measures issue?’
With a sheepish frown, she asked, ‘Have you any idea how much meat there is in two and half kilograms?’
‘Yup.’ His voice rang with confidence, making Ella scrunch up her nose. He would. Of course he did. ‘It’s two thousand five hundred grams.’
‘Smart.’ She smiled and rolled her eyes. ‘It’s also an awful lot of raw mince. More than I’ve ever seen in my life. By the time I saw the butcher weighing out enough to feed ten armies, and he’d asked me three times if I was sure I wanted that much, I couldn’t admit I’d made a mistake.’ She was going to be living on spaghetti bolognese and lasagne for the next six months.
‘Good job, I love spag bol.’ Devon’s cheerful wink made her smile.
‘I didn’t say it was any good.’
‘It’s got to be better than my cooking or my mother’s.’
‘What, Audrey?’
‘She’s the only mother I’ve got.’
‘Audrey can’tcook? But she’s president of the WI. I thought cooking was mandatory.’
‘That’s why. She’s so busy she never has time to do it properly. The problem is she’ll start something and then becomesidetracked, so recipes never quite work or they’re burnt or overcooked.’
Ella stifled a giggle, still not able to believe it. ‘Well, don’t get too excited.’
Although with the amount of tomatoes, onions, red wine and herbs that had gone into it, it ought to be bloody brilliant.
‘To be honest, at this point my stomach doesn’t care. Is it all right if I bring Dexter in with me? He’s in the car.’
As she said the words, ‘Of course,’ Ella marvelled at how much things had changed. Who’d have thought two months ago she’d be calmly inviting a second dog into her home? Let alone be living with one. And there was Tess’s excited bark. ‘It’s yes from me and a yes from Tess.’
Dexter burst through the door despite Devon’s restraining hand on his collar and even though he’d met Tess a million times before immediately homed in on her back end. Ella had to plant her feet firmly, so she didn’t get knocked over by Tess and Dexter’s excited tails sideswiping her with every manic circuit of her legs.
‘Dex, behave!’ said Devon, hauling on the exuberant dog’s collar. ‘Sit. Where are your manners? Leave Tess alone.’
The dog promptly sat. Plonking his full weight on Ella’s feet, panting up at her with adoration. Tess bounced up and down in excitement.
She gave his ears a quick ruffle and Tess immediately stuck her nose in, pushing at her hand in good-natured jealousy.
‘Don’t worry, I still love you.’ Ella shook her head and carried on stroking Dexter’s head. ‘But you, Dex,’ she complained, nudging him with her thigh and shuffling her feet out, ‘are heavy.’
‘Sorry,’ Devon grinned. ‘He just wants to be friends.’
‘I can see that, but my toes aren’t convinced.’ Ella wiggled her feet. ‘Come on through.’
Devon handed over the bottle of red wine and she promptly handed it back to him.
‘Actually, would you mind doing the honours? I need to put the pasta on. Corkscrew in the drawer by the bread bin.’
There was a loud clang as Devon, dodging the two dogs, tripped over Tess’s bowl in the middle of the kitchen floor.
Ella leaned down and scooped it up, taking it over to the far side of the kitchen where Tess’s bed and water bowl sat and opened the French doors to let the two mad dogs out. ‘Sorry, Tess is incapable of eating without chasing the bowl around the room.’
She crossed the room and opened the cupboard to pull out two wine glasses, horribly aware that her hands were shaking a little. ‘Honestly, she attacks her food as if it were her last meal ever. It’s a wonder she doesn’t go through the French doors. In fact, she eats so quickly, I think she just inhales the biscuits. She can’t possibly taste them. Although they look and smell so disgusting, you can hardly blame her.’
Devon raised an eyebrow at her sudden flow of words but calmly poured two rich ruby red glasses of wine and handed her one.
‘Thank you.’ Ella took a sip, while still on the move. ‘Sorry, you must be starving. I haven’t even got the water on to boil. Do sit down or would you rather go into the lounge and I can call you when it’s ready.’Shut up, she told herself.Stop talking. Clamping her mouth shut, she busied herself putting the kettle on and trying to get into the pack of spaghetti. Since when had they put childproof packaging on pasta?
He leant back against the counter, watching her, and sipped at his wine.
