Lunch, which was a ham sandwich, celery, and carrots—that had been hours ago.She normally ate an hour sooner, so her body thought it was starving.She had taken nibbles of food from the fridge and had tried one of the potatoes, but it had done nothing to curb her hunger.
As hungry as she was, she waited for Rob to join her.Manners had been ingrained into her from early childhood to wait until everyone was seated before eating.
Rob sat down at the head of the table.“Dig in.”He didn’t have to tell her twice.As hungry as she was, she was not going to stuff her face.She took her time taking each bite.
“What do you think?”she asked after he’d taken a hesitant bite of asparagus as if it would come alive and eat him instead.
Rob chewed a moment and started choking.June feared he was really choking or something until he started laughing.“No food poisoning.”
“You’re evil.”Now that she knew he hadn’t been in danger, she could laugh.
“It made you laugh though.”That it had.After that, they ate in silence.
Rob’s eating habits reminded her of her brother.It must be a military thing—head down and shovel food into your face as quickly as you can.
Liam had told her that was how it was in basic training.Hurry up and eat.A trait that he hadn’t quite broken.Sometimes he took his time but not often.No wonder Rob’s seasoning selection had been slim.He didn’t take the time to taste food.
“That was really good,” Rob said, cleaning off his face and pushing his plate away.
“Thanks.Even the non-boiled asparagus?”
“Especially the asparagus.”
“Good.The steaks are quite good.”
“Thanks.”
“Who taught you to cook?”She knew it wasn’t the military.June couldn’t picture him in that kind of role.With Special Forces, he would be on frequent deployments.Cooking wasn’t a top priority.
“My dad taught me to grill.”
“And cook?”She hadn’t had any of his cooking yet, but he had to feed himself.
“My mom, though I admit I was a terrible student.I felt I had more important things to learn than how to feed myself in the future.”He chuckled at his own joke, and June joined in.
Yes, she was sure training for combat missions took a lot more time and skill than cooking did.“I hear one can live off of MREs for a while and on base has a chow hall.So, you would have been set.”
“You do seem to know a lot about military life.”
June shrugged, not wanting to get into it.She really should pretend to know less about military life to avoid certain questions she couldn’t answer.Stealth and evade was her brother’s specialty, not so much hers.“So how often do you think we should get together to train?”June loved spending time with Rob, but she didn’t want to overwhelm him if he had a pretty full schedule.
Rob’s features pinched.He knew she had purposely avoided answering his question.She took it as an observation.“I think at least twice a week.An hour or so each session.I’m not expecting you to be Bruce Lee by any means, but comfortable should you face an opponent.You are a quick study, so I don’t see lessons needing to take too long.”
Well, that sucked, but at least some time was better than no time.It would still give her a chance to get to know him better, and who knew; maybe he would want to hang out.“Sounds good.Does the same time work for you?I don’t want to push it too much later during the week.”As it was, it was close to eight o’clock.She still had to drive home, shower, and manage to get sleep before getting up at six for her run.
“This time works.We’ll work out and do dinner afterward.”
“I can always bring stuff too, so it doesn’t put you out or we have to eat late.”She could do casserole dishes that just needed reheating.
“I’m not going to complain about a homecooked meal,” he remarked with a wolfish grin that made her stomach do somersaults.
“Even at the risk of food poisoning?”Not that she worried about her cooking.Rosa was an amazing cook and an even better teacher.She always said the quickest way to a man’s heart was his stomach.June hoped that was true.All of her friends loved her cooking and apparently, now Rob did too.
“If it tastes as good as this meal, I’ll take the risk.”
“Now days.I’m sure you have stuff going on the weekends.We can do Tuesday and Thursday,” she suggested.He’d said he wasn’t dating, but that didn’t mean he wanted to spend his weekend training her.
“Works for me.”
