"Any time. Especially if you're cooking." Technically, they had assembled the pizza together, but Riley already had the dough made when Paige arrived. Paige leaned over and inhaled deeply. The sausage, pepperoni, and tomato sauce with Italian spices made her mouth water. "It's been ages since I've had homemade pizza."
"It's been ages since I've made it, so I can't guarantee how it's going to taste." Riley dropped the oven mitts on the counter and pulled two plates from the cupboard. "Proceed with caution."
"Is this Lottie's recipe?"
Riley's mother-in-law, Lottie Hamilton, was one of the best cooks in the county. She’d been the cook and housekeeper at the Double Diamond ranch that Riley's family owned for over thirty years. Lottie's homemade scones with whipped honey butter were always Paige’s favorite part of sleepovers at the ranch.
"The crust is Lottie's recipe, but the sauce is from a jar. I'm not that ambitious. I'll never be able to cook like Lottie, so I don't know why I even try. Thank goodness Danielisn’t picky."
"I'm pretty sure Daniel didn't marry you for your culinary skills." Paige wiggled her eyebrows at Riley.
Her cousin laughed. "Thank goodness."
"So how are you feeling? Do you still have morning sickness?"
"Some, but it's not as bad as I expected." Riley cut the pizza then lifted a slice of the gooey cheesy pizza onto her plate.
"Are you planning to find out the baby's gender?" Paige helped herself to a slice. "Will you do a gender reveal?"
"We're still undecided. We both kind of want to know, but we kind of want to be surprised too. If we do find out, we willnotdo a big gender reveal. They're anticlimactic." Riley rolled her eyes. "I mean, it's always either pink or blue, and the parents are always happy about both. And if they're not, they should be."
Too impatient to wait any longer for her pizza to cool, Paige blew on it for several seconds then took a bite. The meat, cheese, tomato and dough concoction melded into a tantalizing burst of flavors in her mouth.
"Mmm…not bad, Ri."
They talked about Riley's work for a while before shifting into the success Daniel was seeing with the architectural firm he was building and how busy he was staying.
Then Riley abruptly changed the subject. "Speaking of jobs, how isyourjob search going?"
"Not great." Paige dropped the last half of her second slice of pizza onto her plate and grimaced. "Unless I want to work part-time as a library aide or a custodian. Or you know, I could get my CDL and become a bus driver."
"Seriously? That's all there is?" Riley reached for her third piece of pizza. "Have you tried applying in the Tri-Cities area?"
"Yes, but all I've found there are a handful of jobs teaching band, French, or woodworking at the high school level."
Riley grimaced. "So, what are you going to do if you don't find a job?"
"I don't know. I keep wondering if I made a mistake by quitting myjob before I had something else lined up." But it felt wrong to list Principal Stevens as a reference when he still thought she planned to return to her job in Seattle.
"It's barely the second week of June. I'm sure something will come available soon." Riley attacked her pizza again.
Paige took a bite of her own. "I hope you're right."
"How's physical therapy going?" Riley asked with a pointed look and a grin that hinted at wanting juicy details.
"Fine." Paige refused to take the bait. "I'm getting stronger all the time, but I still have a lot of muscle soreness and weakness. I'm working on getting back my full range of motion in my shoulder."
"And how are things with your physical therapist?"
Wonderful and terrible.
She loved spending time with Gabe and his family, until he pulled away Saturday night. She couldn't even enjoy the fact that he was falling for her because his backing off felt too much like rejection.
Paige couldn't help feeling a sense of deja vu. She’d entangled herself in another relationship—never mind that it was fake—where she was falling for a man who only wanted to use her for his own selfish purposes.
A pain pricked her chest as she recalled Gabe’s shortness with her this morning when she asked how he got all the cuts and scrapes on his hands. He shut her down faster than he did Nikki every time she asked about their fake relationship. Paige tried not to take it personally, assuming his mood had something to do with his mom having a difficult day yesterday.
When she called Grace Sunday afternoon, she asked her opinion on enlisting Marisol's help to make a memory book for Gabe. Paige had been completely unprepared for Grace's emotional response. She'd spent half an hour listening to Grace cry and rant, wishing she could comfort her and Gabe in person.
