“I didn’t have a look,” I state, but he is completely unfazed. “I didn’t have a look,” I repeat, but Flynn just twirls pasta around his fork to take a big bite.
“Eat your food, babe,” he says once he finishes chewing. “After dinner, if you want to try to tempt me into spanking your sassy ass, be my guest.”
Damn, can he read me that well?
I put on a show of acting like I’m innocent and narrow my eyes at him. “I wasn’t thinking about that.”
“Then what were you thinking about?” he challenges, calling my bluff.
“Uh…” I pause. Shit. “Um…couch…es…I was thinking about couches. For a new listing.”
His steady gaze drips with “I call bullshit.”
“Shut up,” I retort on a snort and proceed to take my first bite of Flynn’s fettuccine Alfredo. The instant the creamy pasta hits my taste buds, I practically fall out of my chair over how damn good it is. “Holy hell, you can, like, really cook.”
Flynn looks up from his plate, and I don’t miss the amusement that flashes across his eyes. “Were you expecting something inedible?”
“No… Well, maybe? I don’t know, but this is insanely good,” I answer, and an apologetic smile lifts the corners of my mouth. “I wasn’t doubting your cooking skills. I just didn’t know what to expect.”
“You were expecting something revolting, which is why you brought home two bags of groceries,” he retorts with a sly grin.
“I wasn’t.”
He just stares at me.
“Okay, fine. I was. I mean, I hoped you would exceed my expectations, but just in case the meal didn’t turn out, I grabbed a few easy-to-make options to have on hand as a backup.”
“You brought home microwavable freezer meals, babe. I think it’s safe to say you were anticipating a fucking disaster.”
“I wasn’t!” I exclaim through several giggles. “I mean, I might’ve had the fire department on standby just in case, but…”
A soft, raspy chuckle jumps from his lungs.
“So…is this meal a one-hit wonder? Or can you cook more things?” I question and take another bite of my pasta. “Because, seriously, Flynn, this is otherworldly.”
“I can cook, Dais. Lots of shit,” he comments. “And I do recall I’ve made you a few things before. Steak. Eggs. Grilled chicken.”
Okay, he has a point. He has cooked for me a time or two, but this is, like, gourmet kind of cooking. The type of cooking that involves spices I’ve probably never even heard of.
“And how did you learn this awesome skill?”
“I don’t know.” He shrugs. “My mom, my aunt Paula, a few cooking classes here and there.”
“Wait…Flynn Winslow took cooking classes?”
He furrows his brow. “That’s strange to you?”
“I don’t know…” I look up at the ceiling and then back at him. “Maybe? I mean, you’re like the big, bad, sexy leather-jacket dude on a Harley, but you also cook like Julia flipping Child? It’s unexpected.”
He just smirks and dives back into his food.
And since I’m starving and this is the best damn fettuccine Alfredo I’ve ever tasted in my life, I do the same. But also, I make a mental note of the newest insight into Mr. Mystery.
He can cook. Like, really cook.
He’s even taken cooking classes!
I don’t know why but the mere thought of Flynn in a cooking class makes me smile.
“Why are you smiling?” he asks, surprising me, and I look up from my plate again to meet the depths of his ocean-blue eyes.
“Because I’m a woman who loves delicious food, and one who just found out she’s married to Wolfgang Puck. Wait, no, Emeril Lagasse. No! Curtis Stone. Yeah, he’s the cutest of them all.” I wink. “Plus, the idea of you in a cooking class with a chef’s hat on is an amazing visual.”
He shakes his head on a laugh. “I’ve never worn a chef’s hat in my life.”
“Oh, don’t even try to ruin this visual, Flynn. In my fantasy, you’re definitely wearing a chef’s hat.”
“In your fantasy?” he questions with a raise of one curious brow. “If you want me to fuck you with a chef’s hat on, all you have to do is say so.”
“You wouldn’t, you liar.”
He just stares back at me, and I know instantly, he actually would do that. Flynn Winslow is a man of his word. And he’s also a man I’m always desperate to find out more things about. Things that no one else knows. Only me.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, but what about the chef’s hat fucking, Daisy? Or the spanking? Those sound promising…
“Flynn!” I call toward the living room where I know post-dinner Flynn is currently relaxing on the couch, watching whatever boring sports game is on ESPN. “Your presence is requested in the kitchen!”
A minute later, he’s standing in the doorway, and his eyes survey my setup on the counters.
“What is all this?”
“Cake baking time,” I answer and hold out the paper chef’s hat I made just for him. “Here. Put this on.”
When he doesn’t take it, I stand up on my tippy-toes and shove it on his head. After one pat to his broad, firm chest, I grin up at him. “There. Perfect.”
“What’s the plan, Daisy?”
I wink and hold up a box of Betty Crocker cake mix. “The plan is to let me see Chef Flynn in action.”
Pretty sure the real plan is to entice Chef Flynn to bang you…
“Anyone can make cake from a box, babe.”
“Yeah, well, it’s what you had in the cabinets,” I answer on a shrug. Plus, I, personally, don’t have a clue how to bake a cake from scratch. That would’ve required far too much Googling for what I’m actually trying to achieve here.
Cake is great. Fantastic, even. But getting Flynn to do dirty, sexy things with me? Well, that beats cake every day of the week. And, trust me, I’m a cake-lover from way back. I could write a twenty-paragraph essay, APA formatted, with the bibliography, on my love for it, but nothing beats a naked Flynn getting me to do bad-girl kinds of things.
“And don’t worry, I made us both chef’s hats for the baking cause,” I add and snag my white paper hat from the counter and pointedly put it on my head.
A smile whispers across his mouth, almost lifting his lips up at the corners.
“So…Chef Winslow, are you ready to get started?”
“Do I have a choice?”
I shake my head, and his smile is visible now.
“Let’s bake some shit!” I exclaim, fist-pump the air, and grab him by the hand to drag him the rest of the way to the counter where I have his KitchenAid mixer set up. “First of all, I’ve always wanted one of these mixers, and I’m almost positive I’ve never dated a man who owns one.”
“Married,” he corrects me with a playful tap to my butt, and I giggle.
To my surprise, Flynn actually gets to work, grabbing the box of cake mix. But he doesn’t do what I expect him to do. Instead of checking the instructions on the back and opening the package, he returns it to the cabinet and proceeds to get out containers of flour and sugar.
“What are you doing?”
“If we’re baking a cake, we’re doing it right.”
“Wait…you know how to make a cake? Like, without Betty Crocker’s assistance?”
He doesn’t respond. Instead, he grabs milk and butter and eggs from the fridge and proceeds to start adding shit to the bowl locked inside the mixer.