ROMANCE: Mason (Bad Boy Alpha Male Stepbrother Romance Boxset) (New Adult Contemporary Stepbrother Romance Collection) (87 page)

“Of sorts,” Jessica grinned, stepping out of the lift and immediately being pulled into a warm hug by a short, elderly woman with full, gray hair pulled back into a neat bun. She wore a red dress with a pink and white checkered apron over it. She kissed Jessica once on each cheek, with Jessica responding in kind.

Ethan looked around. The room was a giant, open space with no walls or curtains separating any of the action going on. And there was quite a bit of action going on.

On one side of the room was a row of about twelve small kitchen sets, each with their own stove, oven, sink, and counter and cabinet combination.

On the opposite side of the room were a series of nicely arranged tables, each with fine china and wine glasses on top of them, a crimson table cloth resting beneath them.

“So, you’re a bit late so you don’t have too many options, but I’m thrilled that you’ve brought someone new; who might this be then?” the older woman asked.

“This is Ethan,” Jessica said, not caring to elaborate as she introduced him, “and this is Rosa; she owns this place.”

“And what is this place?” Ethan asked. “I mean, it is rather nice,” he added, shaking Rosa’s hand.

“This, my new friend, is my baby,” Rosa said, gesturing grandly at the room, a proud smile on her face. “It’s also a haven for people who like both cooking good food, and eating it. You see, we don’t hire chefs here, but they all come. And I have a feeling that I’m looking at two very excellent ones right now.”

“Who, me?” Ethan asked, to which Rosa nodded. “Oh no, I’m not really good at cooking,” he said nervously.

“Well, if you don’t cook you don’t eat here. And I’m sure you’ll do fine love.” Rosa smiled, pinching one of his cheeks. “You two can make fish or pasta,” she said, “Jessica here can explain how it works to you, and, most importantly, have fun.”

“Isn’t she great?” Jessica grinned.

“So, what exactly will we be doing?” Ethan asked curiously as he followed her over to a coat rack that held at least a half dozen aprons.

Ethan good-naturedly took and put on the hot pink apron that Jessica handed him while she took a blue apron for herself.

“It’s kind of like a cooking class,” Jessica explained, leading him over to one of the two empty kitchenettes. “We get to pick the meal out of the ones on the menu, go to the kitchen that has all the ingredients, and make it ourselves. Then we eat it over there at the tables,” she said, pointing across the room. “Kind of like a do-it-yourself restaurant.”

“How’d you find this place?” Ethan asked as Jessica detached the Velcro that stuck the laminated menu to the cabinet, setting the menu on the countertop.

“By sheer chance really, –help me with the ingredients?-I was walking one day and I smelled something delicious, but there were no restaurants in sight,” Jessica explained as she and Ethan began unloading the ingredients from the counter and mini fridge. “So, I followed the scent up to this old building and, against my better judgment, I came in and took the lift up and, voila, I found this place.”

“You know,” Ethan said, as Jessica handed him a red bell pepper and a paring knife, motioning for him to begin chopping, “for someone who doesn’t like horror movies, you took a pretty big risk in a horror movie-esque fashion going into a seemingly old and abandoned building all by your little lonesome.”

Jessica snorted. “My little lonesome? Did you seriously just say that?” Jessica chuckled. “My God, you sound like an overconfident cowboy in an old western movie.”

“That’s my goal.” Ethan winked, scooting the peppers off the cutting board and into the pan. “Hand me the olive oil will you?”

“You’re liking this,” Jessica said in a sing-song voice, referring to Ethan’s small smile, “I bet you have your own little professional chef buried down deep inside somewhere.”

Ethan laughed. “Perhaps; I think he and the cowboy get together for drinks sometimes, that’s a real show, you’ll have to see it sometime. Or maybe they’re really just one person, you know, like the cowboy has an alter ego, kind of like superman, or batman.”

“So you’re comparing yourself to a superhero now?”

“I mean, if you’d like I guess I can say I’m more like Hannah Montana, plain old high school girl by day, blonde wig-wearing superstar by night.”

“You’re ridiculous.” Jessica laughed, pulling out another pan and setting the thawed chicken in it, covering it in crushed red peppers and olive oil before turning on the heat.

“Yes, but I find it to be one of the more loveable characteristics about me; I think you’ll come to love it yourself.”

“Who says I haven’t yet?” Jessica smirked, glancing at a stunned Ethan out of the corner of her eye. She shook her head, smile firmly in place. “Start straining the pasta please.”

“Of course m’lady,” Ethan joked, getting out the strainer and dumping the now perfectly-cooked pasta into it.

“So, do you really come here that often?”

“Not as often as I’d like. It’s great cooking nice meals, but it costs quite a bit of time and money to go out to the supermarket and buy the ingredients that I would need. This place keeps them handy and perfectly measured out for me. And, as an added bonus, the meals are all delightfully low in calories.”

“Excellent,” Ethan laughed, “this place really is amazing,” he said, dumping the now strained pasta into the baking dish and coating it in the red wine sauce before handing it over to Jessica to mix the now cut and seasoned grilled chicken into it. “I didn’t know what to expect, but it really is great.”

“I’m glad you like it,” Jessica said, a genuine smile on her face. “It’s quite hard, you know.”

“What is?” Ethan asked, taking a sip of the wine, noting the disapproving but good humored look from Rosa across the room before putting it down, deciding that the taste wasn’t all that good to begin with.

“Trying to find the perfect place to take an Alpha on a date. I worried that you would prefer ballroom dancing. Or, perhaps your inner cowboy classical chef would have preferred some nice line dancing.”

“Please, don’t think of me as an Alpha. I’m just, an ordinary cowboy with an inner lust for the culinary arts that I’ve only just now realized. If it helps, you can call me Russle.”

“Russle?”

“Yes, it’s highly reminiscent of the West don’t you think?”

“Eh, I was thinking something more along the lines of Jethro.”

“Jethro, as in the haired-haired man that my pack members obsess over from NCIS?”

The corner of her mouth quirked up in a tiny smirk. “I have to say that I’m surprised that you managed to get the reference at all. You don’t particularly seem like the television watching sort.”

“Not often, although, I have to admit that I am fairly keen on watching Full House reruns at three in the morning. But that’s usually the result of insomnia. And my recurring desire to see what new banter occurs between Uncle Jesse and Joey and what Mary-Kate and Ashley were like before they grew up.”

“That’s delightfully unexpected,” Jessica said, opening the oven to check on their dish as Ethan leaned up against the counter, taking a not-so-covert look at her backside.

“Do you like what you see?” Jessica murmured quietly, humming in contentment as she noted that the dish was cooking at the correct pace.

Ethan flushed. “If I say yes, very much so, will I get slapped?”

“You might,” Jessica said, standing, “but then again, you might actually like it. Kinky, very kinky, but honestly, I can’t say that I’m entirely surprised.”

Ethan spluttered. “That’s not . . .  I’m not . . . I don’t.”

Jessica chuckled, pinching his cheek. “You are entirely adorable.”

Ethan pouted, giving her puppy-dog eyes. “I’m not adorable; I’m a man, a big, burly man that is not cute but entirely masculine.”

“Mhmm,” Jessica said, laughing at him. “I’m sure you are,” she placated, patting him soothingly on the back and rubbing his shoulder.

Ethan pouted. “I am.”

“I believe you.”

Ethan pouted further.

“Oh, you’re being ridiculous you big baby. Make yourself useful and take the pan out of the oven.”

“You know, I could take this out with my bare hands and not even flinch.”

Jessica gave him a deadpan look, rolling her eyes at him. “For the record, I could as well if I concentrated. Now, please take it out.”

Giving her one last puppy-dog-eyed look, he begrudgingly took the pair of oven mitts hanging next to the oven and put them on, opening the oven and taking the dish out before setting it on the stovetop.

“Thank you,” Jessica said smugly, leaning over to give him a quick kiss on the cheek, making him feel oddly warm inside. “Now, it says we’re supposed to wait ten to fifteen minutes for it to cool off but, we could probably eat it sooner.”

“So, what, we just take it over to one of the tables and eat?”

“Yep, after it cools. We can’t have it burning a hole in the tablecloth. But, in about an hour or so, the dinner portion ends. In fact, we’re the last ones still cooking. In a few more minutes they’re going to clean this place out and set it up to make dessert. If we’re still hungry we can stay and make some or we can go out for some.” She laughed lightly to herself. “I remember back when it first opened, it was just Rosa working and preparing everything by herself. But now, she has employees for each shift now that clean everything out.”

“Shifts?”

“Yep,” Jessica said, setting the dishes that they’d used to cook with in the small dishwasher in the kitchenette. “This place does breakfast, lunch and dinner. It’s great.”

“Sounds like we’ll have to come back.” Ethan smiled, before freezing. Jessica smiled at him in amusement as he sputtered, “I mean, that is, if you want another date after tonight, which I hope you do, because I do. But, um, it doesn’t have to be a date, because I do enjoy your company. We can come back as just friends if, um, well if you don’t think it’d be too weird.”

“Shh,” Jessica said, putting a gentle hand over his mouth. “Calm down, I’m having fun, I’d like another date, but don’t worry about that right now. Let’s just enjoy this delicious food that Jethro cooked.”

Ethan smirked, feeling significantly less self-conscious. “You know, we should come up with an alter ego for you as well.”

“Okay,” Jessica mused, handing him the pan with pot holders on either side as she reached in the refrigerator for a bottle of wine that Ethan suspected to be much better than the specially-spiced cooking wine he had tried during the cooking process, motioning for him to follow her over to the table area. “But, instead of a western chef, I want mine to be a Greek gladiator.”

Ethan cocked an eyebrow in surprise. “A gladiator huh? That’s a new one.”

“I just feel like I have an inner fierce female gladiator in me, you know?”

“No, I can honestly say that I’ve never had that particular feeling in me, but I’ll take your word for it.”

Jessica chuckled. “You never know, it could still happen, you could still find one. She may be playing poker or something with your cowboy and chef.”

“Yeah, I don’t think so but I’ll consider it. I’ll ask Jethro later if he’s met her. But what about yours? What’s her name?”

“I don’t know,” Jessica mused, pouring a glass of wine and handing it to Ethan before pouring one for herself. “I guess I’ve never much considered it. But, if I had to give her a name, I think it’d be, hmm . . .” she hummed, tapping her lips with her finger as she thought it over, “I think her name is Cassandra.”

Ethan raised an eyebrow. “Cassandra?”

Jessica nodded. “Yep, definitely Cassandra. And for the record, she’s a total badass. Trust me, you don’t want to get on her bad side.”

“I’ll try and keep that in mind.” Ethan smirked. “I’d hate to have to find myself in the arena with her. I don’t think she’d manage to get a strike in, because I’d have already fallen over at the sight of her beauty.”

Jessica flushed, but tried to cover it up with a snort, laughing. “That’s so corny we should get some butter and salt.”

Ethan shrugged, smiling. “What can I say, I’m a regular minstrel, singing the songs of romance when I see such a beautiful creature as you.”

“Oh my goodness,” Jessica laughed, “what have I managed to get myself into?”

Ethan blinked at her, eyes comically wide in a fake show of innocent. “What, what have I done? I haven’t even begun quoting Shakespearean sonnets at you yet?”

“And I hope that you don’t,” Jessica smirked, “at least save it for the second date. I feel like Keats’s poems are more appropriate for a first date.”

“Keats?” Ethan frowned, furrowing his eyebrows in thought. “I’m pretty sure that I had to memorize The Road Less Traveled but I don’t think that I could quote it for you.”

“What a shame,” Jessica said in mock disappointment, “I had really hoped that you could rat it off over dinner.”

Ethan laughed, taking a sip of his wine before grabbing one of the plates and beginning to dish out some of the food for both of them. “Alright, should we try our gourmet concoction?”

“Yes, let’s.” Jessica smiled, grabbing her fork, waiting for Ethan to do the same. “How about on the count of three?”

“Alright,” Ethan said, laughing. “One.”