Still, the potatoes won’t remain hot for much longer, so either I excuse myself to turn on the oven, or we move on to the next stage.
“Should we eat?” I suggest.
“Yes, please. The meat smells so good I’m practically drooling.”
We stand up together, and I motion for her to go ahead. As she walks her perky little arse up to the dinner table, I admire her silhouette, as mesmerized as when I saw her exit her building. She removed her leather jacket earlier, and I think this might be my favorite dress she’s ever worn. I don’t know if it’s a single thing or two pieces, but I’m going to need her to wear those two things separately—the lacey one and the tiny one, with nothing but those shoes.
Fuck, this woman is beyond gorgeous.
She offers to help me set up the plates, but I refuse and refill her glass with more wine instead, pulling out her chair for her to sit.
I sense her eyes on me as I work with efficient moves, cutting thin slices into the meat, which is juicy and tender, and using a cookie cutter to create perfectly round servings of potatoes. I add a precise pour of rosemary-infused gravy and some fresh rosemary for decoration and get rid of the apron.
“Do you realize how sexy that just was?” she asks when I approach with the plates.
“What was?”
“You, cooking.”
“Well, you should see me cook naked,” I tease with a half grin.
“I have seen you cook naked. Jumped you before you were finished, remember?”
“Oh, I remembereverything, red.”
She blushes from delight rather than embarrassment, and I settle our plates on the table. As I sit, she leans forward to smell the result of my hard work. Once I’m seated, she allows herself to take a first bite with some of everything on her fork. That causes her to moan and roll her eyes.
“I hope you know you’re ridiculous,” she says after swallowing.
“I am?”
“Yeah, I know you’re faking it. There’s no way you’rethisperfect, Jake.”
“I assure you I have my fair share of flaws, red.”
“Name one.”
“I’m possessive.”
Something flickers in her eyes, but it’s more like approval than judgment. “I don’t mind that. I’m ashamed to say it, but I quite like it, actually. Next.”
For the next few minutes, we play this fun little game where I list my flaws and she argues in their favor or diminishes their impact. I’m a workaholic—welcome to the club. I’m stubborn—she’s probably worse. I’m impulsive—she reminds me she joined a dating app to get dicked by a guy with piercings. I’m competitive—she’s willing to crush her colleagues to get to the top. It goes on and on until I run out of things to list.
“See?” she insists with pride. “Not a single flaw on you.”
“What about you? Any you’d like to share?”
Under the table, her foot has been grazing up and down my calf for a few minutes now, and it comes to a full stop as she frowns, acting deeply offended. “How dare you? I’m obviously flawless.” Her graveness breaks quickly, though, and her perfectly plump lips stretch in one of her immaculate smiles.
I absolutely adore this Gen. So confident and carefree. The anxious and uptight woman I first met at The Plaza has entirely vanished, replaced by this foxy, playful, and blooming creature. I hope, maybe arrogantly, it was my influence that broke her out of her shell.
“Believe it or not, but I realized that very quickly, red,” I confess. “I was wondering if you had anything you wished you could change about yourself—which I reckon would be a shame.”
She thinks about it more seriously this time, the perfect arches of her auburn eyebrows knitting together. “I wish I were better at balancing my work life with my private life, but I think I’m slowly getting there. I’d be bored to death with my colleagues in some bar otherwise. Also, I wish I could be better at handling my parents because it would make everything so much easier. And lastly, I wish I was strong enough to say no to the amazing sex and go to Pilates instead.”
That last one rips a genuine and frank laugh out of me. “I’m using my veto to demand you never fix the third one.”
“The studio actually emailed me, Jake! They wanted to make sure I was still alive.”
