“Why don’t you leave his vest on all the time then?” That’s what Eli would do—out of respect for his shoes, sweaters, and non-motorized transportation, if nothing else.
“He deserves a break sometimes.” Marlee opened the door and headed outside. “No one wants to work all the time. You understand that.”
Of course, he did. Eli could use a break, too, come to think of it. “He’ll only tell you if you’re wheezing when he’s wearing the shirt thing?”
“That’d be ridiculous. He’ll always tell me, but he knows he has to behave like a professional when he’s in uniform.”
“How much does one of these dogs cost?” Eli asked, pulling the door shut behind them.
She lifted a shoulder. “Not much, around sixty.”
Sixty? The gears in Eli’s mind cranked.
He stared at her blankly. “Sixty thousand?”
Yeah, definitely, the ridiculous part of the dog was that he only stopped defiling things when he wore his vest—not the fact she’d dropped enough on him to buy a new car.
“Training is expensive.” There was thatduhvoice again. “Are we grabbing stuff for breakfast or what?”
Definitely grabbing stuff for breakfast. And apparently, taking along the dog.
Chapter Three
Marlee had spent many Saturday mornings with Eli and Sadie and their family. She was very familiar with teenaged Eli’s pancake-making skills, and over the years, he’d clearly honed them further.
After a quick trip to the market, Eli had all they needed to make breakfast. Her bedroom was nearly all boxed up, and she was now being fed by the man Denver’s5280magazine called “the most up-and-coming chef of his generation.”
Except he was making her help.
And Marlee didn’t cook.
Like, at all.
She preferred to use the telephone to call for takeout. The kitchen at the townhouse was more for show than function. Her interior decorator had never really understood that. She totally earned her commission, though, because the flinger thing Marlee found in the drawer was really cute. The handle had adorable yellow sunflowers—Marlee’s favorite.
“Mar?” Eli asked.
She glanced toward him and raised her eyebrows. “Yeah?”
He pointedly moved his gaze to the skillet in front of her. The bubbles on the pancake burst through the batter, starting at the edge and moving toward the center.
“On it.” She focused. Waiting.
Eli’s instructions were to wait until the batter bubbled in the center and then she should flip it. That was way easier said than done. So far, she’d burned two batches by not flipping quickly enough and she’d flopped batter everywhere once. He’d said she flipped too soon. Clearly, by the batter splatters all over the stovetop. Meanwhile, he cracked eggs into a pan and fried up bacon like it was the easiest thing in the world.
She happened to know it wasn’t. He had tried to teach her to cook eggs and bacon first, but there had been shells in her scrambled eggs and the whole batch had stuck to the non-stick coating. The bacon wasn’t quite done when she’d pulled it off the burner. Apparently, bacon was not like steak where rare was a good thing.
Eli slipped behind her, close enough that it felt really nice.
She stilled. What was she supposed to do with his proximity? The bridal etiquette books said nothing about jilted brides and the appropriate amount of time before they could find comfort in another man’s presence. Was this one of the stages of a breakup? She had no idea, but two hours likely wasn’t long enough. She was barely single. The ink on her not-a-divorce wasn’t even dry.
This was ridiculous. Eli watching from behind was fine. He wasn’t touching her or anything. She turned her attention to the pancake.
His fingers curled around hers on the spatula.
Well, hell. Her heart beating faster and all the little nerve endings in her skin perking up only happened because Scotty hadn’t really touched her in weeks. Not since he’d moved downstairs.
“Now,” Eli said into the air around her earlobe. It felt intimate and right when it was absolutely wrong.
