Sweet Stuff (27 page)
Authors: Donna Kauffman
Her lips curved.
“What is that smile all about?” he asked.
“What a pair we are, Quinn Brannigan.”
He leaned down and kissed the tip of her nose. “Finally,” he teased. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you all along.” Gathering her in his arms, he kissed her the way a man did when maybe, just maybe, he was falling, too.
Chapter 19
“
I
t’s coming along really well, Dad.” Quinn stretched his feet out on the deck in front of him as he leaned back in his chair for leverage, and launched the huge stick toward the pergola. Brutus dutifully watched it hurtle and fall into a large palmetto, then hauled his butt up and trotted over to retrieve it. Quinn shook his head and smiled, then shifted the phone to his other ear. “It’s a departure from what I’ve been doing, so I’m excited and a bit nervous to see how it will be received.”
I
t’s coming along really well, Dad.” Quinn stretched his feet out on the deck in front of him as he leaned back in his chair for leverage, and launched the huge stick toward the pergola. Brutus dutifully watched it hurtle and fall into a large palmetto, then hauled his butt up and trotted over to retrieve it. Quinn shook his head and smiled, then shifted the phone to his other ear. “It’s a departure from what I’ve been doing, so I’m excited and a bit nervous to see how it will be received.”
“Sounds good,” his father said, which was the same response he’d have given if Quinn had told him he’d decided to paint his body blue and jump out of a plane. “I’ve got a meeting. Good to catch up.”
“Yes, Dad, you, too. Love you,” he said as his father signed off. His father wasn’t comfortable with expressing emotions, or receiving them. He was a policy wonk on Capitol Hill, which suited his sober, serious nature and allowed him to avoid pretty much all emotional ties. If his dad didn’t regularly play racquetball and golf, most often with a small group of guys who dated all the way back to his far more social frat days, Quinn would worry about him more. But, all in all, he seemed content with the status quo. Quinn knew his father loved him, and he figured his dad could put up with hearing it expressed occasionally from his son.
He looked over his shoulder into the breakfast nook off the kitchen. Still a busy beehive of activity going on in there. Baxter and Lani were baking up a storm, along with a handful of assistants; then there was the art director, the photographer, Riley, and who knew who else. They were finishing up principal photography for a glossy booklet that would be stuffed in bags and handed out at huge, regional cooking shows around the country.
Quinn laid his phone on the side table next to his closed laptop. He’d been on the boat earlier, but had decided to come back here. It was a gorgeous day, above average temperature, but no humidity, so he figured he’d camp out in the pergola and enjoy the perks of making his living on a mobile device. He heard a squeal, then something crashed, but he didn’t turn around. He smiled to himself and leaned down to pick up the slobber-covered log Brutus has deposited. “Ten-to-one your mom just busted something expensive,” he told the dog, who offered a baleful stare in return. “I know. That’s what I said.” Laughing, Quinn launched the log across the back yard again, and watched as Brutus made his slow and steady trek toward it.
Quinn had come to have a great appreciation for the way Brutus observed life. He was all for balance and not sweating the small stuff, which the mammoth dog seemed to have down to a science. “It doesn’t hurt that you get regular meals and lots of love from a beautiful woman. I’d take that life.”
Quinn’s cell phone chirped and he picked it up.
That wasn’t my fault.
He grinned, but before he could text Riley back, another one came through.
This time.
Brutus returned and dropped the log, then sat and let his tongue loll to the side as he stared at Quinn. The tongue lolling meant he’d had enough of the game. Quinn reached in his pocket and pulled out one of the superdog-size Milk-Bones he’d stashed away there, tossed it into the gaping maw that was Brutus’s mouth, then watched with bemused pleasure as the dog sank into a boneless heap and munched on his treat, as if it were nothing more than his due. He picked up his phone again, smiled ... and typed out a message.
What are you wearing?
A moment later: You’re such a guy. And then: Thank God.
Come out and play with me.
I can’t. I’m drizzling glycerin all over the top of this nice, plump red cherry so it looks all sticky and sweet.
You play dirty.
And sticky, she wrote back, which made him bark a laugh out loud. It even startled the dog.
Fine, fine. Me and Brutus will just sit out here in the garden and eat worms.
Nothing came back after that, which meant she was busy making pastry look naturally sumptuous by using a blowtorch, or motor oil, or spray deodorant. Who knew what? As she’d explained it to him, under the unrelenting heat of the lights, hot foods still cooled, cool foods grew warm, frozen foods melted, greens wilted, and moist foods went dry.
It wasn’t enough to keep fresh duplicates on hand to swap out. Staging one individual dish could take hours all by itself, so swapping wouldn’t work. Good stylists learned all kinds of tricks to sustain and extend the original look of the food by using a few less than natural—or even edible—items to create the necessary illusions.
She’d caught him looking through her Supergirl Tool Belt the other day after climbing out of the shower, and—after copious curious monkey comments—had given him quite the education on how stylists made the food in those magazines and print ads look so luscious. She almost put him off chocolate sauce for life.
He tossed the phone back on the table, and stretched his legs out again. He’d told himself he’d come back to the bungalow to work, and let Brutus have a bit of a romp, but he knew he’d come back so he could be closer to Riley. He missed her—which was kind of crazy, since they’d shared their mind-blowing, life-altering morning together only two days ago. At least, that was how he’d viewed that morning in the grand scheme of things.
They’d spent zero time alone together since. Not all her fault. Or his. She’d gotten hung up that day through the evening and into the wee hours planning the initial shoot with Baxter, Lani, and the art director. The following morning she went back to Savannah, frantically searching for specialty gadgets she needed for the first shoot and ordering the rest of the equipment she’d need.
He’d likely passed her on her way back to Sugarberry, as he’d had to go into Savannah to meet with a producer and screenwriter who’d been dogging him for rights to his current release. David had tried to keep them at bay, but when they’d offered to bring the meeting to him, Quinn had finally agreed to have a dinner meeting and be done with it. That dinner meeting had gone to the wee hours. In the end, though, it had been worth it for all parties involved.
He’d come back to the bungalow after the meeting instead of going to the houseboat, thinking he would just show up with breakfast at the boat in the morning and see if he could start their day in the same spectacular fashion he had two days before.
He’d zonked out and slept straight through his alarm. By the time he’d gotten himself together and out the door, the vans were already pulling in for the day’s shoot. Riley showed up right behind them, leaving little time for any private conversation. She’d told him the boat was his as long as he wanted, that they’d definitely be running long that day, and apologized for being so rushed. Someone had called her name and off she’d dashed. He hadn’t even given her a kiss good morning. Or gotten one.
The desire for her kiss had hovered over and around the edges of his mind the entire morning as he tried to write. He’d managed to pull a few decent pages out of his distracted brain, then had spent another hour digging into some research about horses for the book, but had finally given up and decided maybe he’d get his concentration back if she were at least within viewing distance.
“So much for that, big guy. Right? At least we have modern technology on our side now.”
Brutus responded by heaving his weight to his side and stretching his legs out more fully as the late afternoon sun warmed his half-exposed underbelly.
Quinn smiled to himself as he admitted that he’d developed a whole new appreciation for the connective powers of text messaging. He might not have spent any alone time with Riley in two days, but since she’d hopped off the houseboat that morning with his cell number in her back pocket, they hadn’t been apart-apart for more than a few hours at a time. They hadn’t used their phones for actual talking yet. With her being on set or him being in that meeting almost the whole time, they hadn’t been able to.
Tapping out secret little messages to each other tickled some other place inside him that he was coming not only to appreciate, but to enjoy as its own, separate way of having fun with her. There was a kind of passing-notes-in-class, breaking-the-rules vibe to it that felt a little naughty and rebellious.
“I promise this tastes better than worms.”
Startled, he looked up to find Riley standing over him with the most amazing, piled-high version of a napoleon he’d ever seen.
She had her hair pulled up in a messy knot on her head. Glasses he didn’t know she wore were shoved up into the tangle of curls. Her face was flushed, he supposed from the heat of the kitchen and the lights. She was wearing what he’d come to think of as her standard uniform—loose khakis, long tee, with an open camp shirt thrown over it. The new addition of her Supergirl Tool Belt was slung low around her hips, but he wasn’t really paying attention to that. Or the amazing napoleon, for that matter.
The way the breeze caught and lifted the front panels of her camp shirt away from her body, revealing just how perfectly the long tee hugged her amazingly beautiful breasts, made his body stir. He’d had those breasts under his thumb, under his tongue, between his lips ...
He groaned under his breath and reached out to pluck off the cherry from the top of the dessert, then dragged it through the thick and foamy frosting. It wasn’t going to come close to the taste of her bare breasts, but it would make a decent second choice. He paused with the treat halfway to his open and waiting mouth and lifted a single brow in question.
She raised her hand, palm out. “I swear, no glycerin has been used in the making of this dessert.”
He plopped the cherry in his mouth, then closed his lips over it and groaned. Still not naked nipples, but... “My God,” he said, his mouth still full. “That’s amazing.”
She set the plate down on his side table, along with silverware tucked inside a rolled linen. “Don’t talk with your mouth full.”
“Okay.” Still savoring the last of the frosting, he elicited a squeal from her when he tugged her down across his lap. “You can keep me from talking for a few minutes.”
“My tools,” she cried out, as various things jangled and clanked.
“Will be fine. I have a big lap.” He pulled her in for a long and languorous exploration. The kiss was heady and sweet and better than any napoleon could hope to be.
When he finally lifted his head, her eyes were dazed and sparkly, and he suspected his might look the same.
She smacked her lips. “You taste yummy and creamy.”
He grinned. “Bring a few pieces of that back to the boat and I’ll make you taste yummy, too.”
Her eyes went dark and he was pulling her back down for another round, when he spied the rather large bandage on her elbow. He lifted her arm up in front of them. “What happened?
“It’s nothing, just a scrape, and before you mock me—”
“I would never mock.” He leaned down and pressed a kiss next to the bandage. “I understand my role here is to kiss the boo-boos, confirm that it really wasn’t your fault”—he reached down beside him and fished blindly in his leather computer bag, then brandished a small box in front of her—“and provide copious quantities of cartoon character Band-Aids.”
The way her expression instantly softened, as if he’d given her flowers, or diamonds, for that matter, made him glad he’d given in to the impulse. He’d hoped she’d be amused rather than offended.
“You’re such a guy, though.”
“A nice guy,” he amended, handing her the box.
“Spiderman?” She offered him a wry grin. “Was your manhood threatened by getting Hello Kitty or Powderpuff Girls?” She tucked the pack in her toolbelt, but he didn’t miss the sweet smile she privately allowed herself as she did.
“It was all they had. Well, it was that or plain brown, and on your lovely skin, a plain brown wrapper simply wouldn’t do.”
She laughed. “Well, I appreciate your attention to aesthetics and I take it all back.”
He slid his palm along the back of her neck, nudging her closer again.
“The whole crew is still in there. I have to get back,” she cautioned.
“You know, I didn’t get the chance to kiss you good morning earlier.”
“That’s true. I don’t guess you did. But we just kissed two seconds ago. Doesn’t that count?”
He shook his head. “You have to call it first. Official make-up-kiss rule.” His smile stayed in place, but he caught her gaze and held it intently. “I missed getting to do that.” He reached up and traced a finger along her lower lip, following the motion with his eyes, then lifting his gaze back to hers. “I missed you.” He felt a fine tremor shiver through her, and his body responded with equal enthusiasm.
“Boy”—her voice was a little shaky, though she was striving for casual and light—“give a guy a nooner before breakfast and he gets all needy on you.”
“Spectacular as that was”—he traced her upper lip, delighting in the way her body instantly responded—“I’ve missed you every day since I met you.” That was the simple truth of it. She hadn’t left his thoughts since the day she’d first entered them. He leaned in and replaced his fingertip with his lips, taking her mouth softly, sweetly, working hard to get a grip on the more ferocious needs that ignited the instant he tasted her again. “And I missed kissing you,” he said against her lips, “before I ever tasted you.”
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