Recipe for Romance
By J.M. Snyder
Published by JMS Books LLC
Visit jms-books.com for more information.
Copyright 2015 J.M. Snyder
ISBN 9781611528183
Cover Design: Written Ink Designs | written-ink.com
Image(s) used under a Standard Royalty-Free License.
All rights reserved.
WARNING: This book is not transferable. It is for your own personal use. If it is sold, shared, or given away, it is an infringement of the copyright of this work and violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
No portion of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form, or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, with the exception of brief excerpts used for the purposes of review.
This book is for ADULT AUDIENCES ONLY. It may contain sexually explicit scenes and graphic language which might be considered offensive by some readers. Please store your files where they cannot be accessed by minors.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are solely the product of the author’s imagination and/or are used fictitiously, though reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Published in the United States of America.
* * * *
Recipe for Romance
By J.M. Snyder
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 1
“Abby, hurry up! Breakfast is almost ready!”
Preston Pruitt turned away from the hot stove as he hollered for his daughter, then turned back to flip over the small, four-inch round pancakes sizzling in the frying pan. He was careful not to break any—Abby didn’t like it when the pancakes fell apart, no matter how many times he pointed out they still tasted the same.
Aesthetics meant everything to his precocious eight-year-old daughter, which was part of the reason why she took so long getting ready in the morning. Or, at least, why her breakfast took so long for him to get just right. None of the patrons at the River City Restaurant where he worked every day complained about his cooking half as much as Abby did when it came to what went on her plate.
First, the pancakes had to be the right golden shade—not too raw, and not too burnt. Then the syrup had to be the right consistency—not too runny, not too thick. On top of the pancakes, the butter had to be melted enough to puddle but still hold its pat-like shape. Getting everything just right and on the table in front of her was a carefully coordinated balancing act Preston went through every morning before he had to take her to school.
And if she didn’t come downstairs right this second, the whole production would tumble down around him like a falling house of cards.
“Abigail Louise!” he yelled, putting a little steel into his voice to show he meant business. “Right this minute!”
Finally, she answered. “Coming!”
There was enough attitude in the word to tell him he might not want her to come down after all. At least he only had to put up with it for another forty-five minutes or so, long enough to get her to school. After that, she would be someone else’s problem for the next six hours, more than enough time for her mood to improve.
Heavy footsteps clomped down the steps. He almost called out a reminder for her not to run, but thought better of it. Scooping the pancakes out of the pan, he stacked them on her plate the way she liked, then added a pat of butter in between each to make sure they were buttery. The pat on top was extra thick so it wouldn’t melt too soon. The syrup went into the microwave for ten seconds to warm up—he couldn’t pour it on for her; she liked to do that herself.
When he heard her come into the dining room, he called, “Come get your drink, honey.”
“Daddy!” she shrieked.
He jumped. God, everything was so life and death with her! Had he been so dramatic at her age? “Abby, please. Is that necessary?”
Apparently she thought so. “Daddy!” she cried again.
There were real tears in her voice, and the sound scared him into hurrying to the doorway to see what was the matter. She stood by the end of the dining room table, half-dressed in jeans and her nightgown. She had one sock on, and her other foot was bare. But her hair was the worst—it was a rat’s nest of blond tangles, with a comb stuck halfway down its length.
Preston struggled not to grin. Trying to sound composed, he asked, “What’s wrong, sweetie?”
Abby tugged at the comb. “Get it out! Get it out now!”
“Okay, don’t pull on it.” He caught her hand before she could do any more damage and deftly plucked out the comb. “Come on, honey. Sit down, your breakfast is ready.”
But Abby didn’t want to eat; she wanted her hair combed, and now. “Fix it.” When Preston didn’t immediately do so, she stomped her bare foot. “Daddy! Fix it!”
“Eat first,” he told her, tucking the comb into his back pocket. Hopefully not being able to see it would help her to forget about it. “Have a seat and I’ll get your pancakes. Then I’ll comb your hair, okay? Or hey, I’ll comb it while you eat, how’s that sound?”
He pulled out the chair to the left of the head of the table, the one designated as “her seat.” She looked at it dubiously, then leaned back to try and see his pocket. He moved to one side, blocking her view. With a sigh, she sat down. “Pancakes?” she asked, as if she didn’t have them every morning. “Are they blueberry?”
“Is there any other kind?” he asked.
Before she could answer, he hurried into the kitchen to retrieve her food. The microwave had gone off while he was in the other room, but now it beeped again as he entered, reminding him he had something inside. He set it for another five seconds to heat the syrup up again, replaced the melted pat of butter with a fresh one, then carried the plate and a fork into the dining room. Abby had pulled her chair up to the table; now she sat back as he set the plate down in front of her. “Yum!” she said, dipping her finger into the butter.
“Let me get you a drink,” Preston said.
“And the syrup!” Abby reminded him brightly, her earlier near-tantrum already forgotten.
Preston tousled her hair. “Coming right up, m’lady.”
She giggled as she licked the butter off her finger.
Back in the kitchen, Preston got the syrup out of the microwave and a small box of apple juice out of the fridge. Both went on the table in front of Abby’s plate. As she set about getting herself ready to eat, he pulled the comb from his back pocket and tackled the tangles in her hair.
She had a system to her breakfast, one Preston had to admit he didn’t understand. If anything disrupted her before she was finished setting things up just right, she’d get upset, sometimes so much so that she wouldn’t be able to eat. First the napkin had to be unfolded onto her lap. Next, the butter had to be spread across the entire top of the pancake—if the pat was too thin or the pancake too large, and the butter didn’t cover the whole thing, she wouldn’t eat it. Adding more butter didn’t fix the problem.
Then she cut the pancakes into quarters with the side of the fork. In half once, turn the plate, then in half again. Next came the syrup, which was poured on until it covered the entire plate up to the thin blue line that ran around the inside of the base. No more, no less. Every drop would be sopped up w
ith the pancakes until nothing remained by the time she finished eating.
Only after she ate everything on her plate would Abby pull off the plastic straw on the side of her apple juice box, unwrap it, and poke it into the box to drink. All the food was consumed first, then every sip of her drink. The two chewable vitamins beside her plate were the last thing she ate. She went through the same routine every morning, without fail. Not even Saturday cartoons could distract her or disrupt her rhythm.
Now she concentrated on her pancakes as Preston combed her hair. For once her single-minded focus was a good thing, because she was too busy to pay him any attention. He worked through the knots as gently as he could, careful not to tug too hard, and by the time she got to her drink, he’d reached the scraggly ends of her long hair. They were splitting a little; time for a trim. Which would involve an argument of epic proportions, he was sure. Abby was currently in a princess phase where she had to have long hair like all the Disney princesses, and she didn’t believe him when he tried to explain that trimming an inch off the bottom would help the rest grow longer.
Maybe it’d look better up. At least then it wouldn’t be hanging in everything or get tangled up so badly throughout the day. But when he gathered her hair up to pull it back into a braid, she shook it free. “No, I want it loose,” she told him.
“Honey, it looks so nice pulled back,” he argued. “It’ll be out of your face—”
“I want to wear it loose,” she said again. Then, to clarify, she added, “Long and flowing, like a fairy.”
So today it was fairies, no princesses. It’ll be a tangled mess again by the time you get to school, Preston thought. Out loud, he only asked, “Don’t you want it off your neck?”
Running her hand under her hair to pull it over one shoulder, Abby shook her head. “I want to look like a fairy for my pictures.”
Preston had been chasing after her hair with the comb; now he stopped, surprised. Was she talking about school pictures? “Wait, is that today?”
“I gave you the paper to sign last week, remember?” She leaned back and looked up at him, bumping her head against the back of her chair. “You said I could buy some of them for my friends. Remember?”
To be honest, he didn’t. She told him so many things in the course of a day that most of them he tuned out or forgot, but he’d never admit that to her, not in a million years. And he could hear her mood beginning to shift again, so he nodded quickly. “No, you can. Of course you can. Go on upstairs now and finish getting dressed, okay? Wear something pretty—”
“Daddy, I’m always pretty,” Abby said. “You told me that.”
With a laugh, Preston hugged her in the chair. “And you are, sweetie. You are.”
* * * *
Preston was cleaning up the morning dishes and glancing at the clock above the oven—another five minutes and he’d holler up at Abby to get a move on or she’d be late for school—when his phone dinged with an incoming email. It wasn’t a text message; the sound he had set for those was different. There was only one person who would send him a message so early in the morning.
Drying his hands on a dish towel, Preston leaned over the phone where it rested on the counter and tapped the screen. Sure enough, the display read, 1 new message from SPC Teresa Williamson. What time was it over in Afghanistan right now? He tried to do the math in his head, but couldn’t. Mid-afternoon, most likely, though with her, there was no telling. She sent messages when she could grab computer time, when she wasn’t on patrol or sleeping or eating. At least she hadn’t sent a Skype request.
Preston pulled up the email and scanned it quickly, which was easy to do—Tess’s messages were always super short. They all began the same way: How are you two doing? I’m still alive.
Which made Preston mentally respond, No shit. If you weren’t, we’d get a telegram from the Army instead of an email. At least, he hoped it’d be a telegram, or someone knocking on the door, something tangible he could see ahead of time and anticipate, so he could steer Abby out of the room and prepare himself mentally for the news. The Army didn’t really notify next of kin via email nowadays, did they?
This message was like her others, brief and to the point. I can Skype on Saturday at 1530 hours my time. I know it’s early for you, but Abby should be up by then, don’t you think?
With a groan, Preston clicked on his clock app to check the time. Tess had been in the military for six years and he still didn’t know what oh-hundred this and fifteen-hundred that meant. Luckily the iPhone had everything at his fingertips. She wanted to Skype at 3:30 in the afternoon her time, which—checking the app’s world clock feature—meant an ungodly 7:00 A.M. in Virginia.
Holy hell.
Of course he’d be up—he’d be making Abby’s pancake breakfast and getting ready to dash off to work himself. He might get half a minute to wave at the computer screen before he had to leave Abby with Mrs. Schroedinger for his shift at the restaurant. But if he didn’t leave the house by 7:35, he’d be late.
Speaking of…
“Abby, come on!” he called out, pocketing his phone. He’d reply to Tess later. Chances were she wasn’t sitting at the computer waiting for a response, anyway; communications were crap over there, and he’d learned early on in her deployment that there was a serious lag between the time she sent a message and the time he received it. If the Skype call stayed connected for longer than ten minutes, he’d be surprised.
He scooped up his car keys and jangled them. “Abby!”
“Coming!”
She stomped down the stairs and emerged from above as he came out into the hallway. The jeans were gone, as was the nightgown. In its place she wore a My Little Pony jacket zipped up over some sort of flouncy dress. He couldn’t tell what it was she had on, really—the jacket obscured most of the outfit—but the skirt was made from a shimmery pink and purple material that flowed around her when she twirled at the bottom of the stairs.
“How do I look?” she asked, obviously proud of her appearance. Her hair flared out above her shoulders.
“Beautiful,” Preston declared. “Hurry up now or we’re going to be late.”
Abby turned so he could see the back of her jacket. “Look, Daddy. I’m wearing my wings.”
He gave her the briefest of glances. The jacket had some sort of silly wings sewn into it under the hood, he wasn’t quite sure why. He could barely see them under her bookbag, but they were the one reason why she loved the jacket, and she never failed to brag about them whenever she wore it. “Uh-huh, pretty. Come on.”
“I’m going to look like a fairy in my picture,” she announced. “Race you to the door!”
Preston laughed. “No running in the house.”
She ignored him as she ran ahead.
* * * *
As they approached her elementary school, Preston gave her some last minute advice. “I want you to smile for your pictures this year, honey,” he said, eyeing the line of cars snaking along the front of the school, looking for a spot where he could pull up to the curb and drop her off. “You hear me?”
In the back seat of his Honda Civic, Abby flipped through a small paperback chapter book she was reading. “Uh-huh. Smile. Got it.”
“Comb your hair before it’s your turn,” Preston reminded her. “Do they still give out combs? They used to when I was your age. I might have one in the glove compartment…”
He leaned over to check and the car swerved dangerously in the same direction. Someone behind him hit their horn. “Daddy!” Abby cried. “I have my comb, alright? It’s in my bookbag, so stop worrying already!”
“Ask your teacher to help you if you need it,” he said. “What’s her name again?”
“Ms. Coffman.” Abby returned to her book, bored with the conversation.
Up ahead, a car pulled away from the sidewalk and he hit the gas, angling for the empty spot. Another horn blared but he ignored it. Pulling up his parking brake, he put his Honda Civic into neutral and half-turned
in the driver seat, one hand on the passenger seat headrest so he could get one last look at her. “Well, we’re here. Give me a kiss.”
Abby unbuckled her seat belt and slid forward to plant a kiss on his cheek.
“Have a great day, Abba-dabba-do,” he said, wrinkling his nose at her.
With a giggle, she hugged her book to her chest with both arms and flopped back onto the seat. “You, too, Mr. Magoo!”
“Big smile for the camera today,” he told her. “I want to see all those teeth.”
Abby mugged for him, flashing a wide grin that did a pretty good job of showing off most of her entire mouth—he could even see the hole in the back where one of her molars had fallen out a few weeks earlier, and the new tooth hadn’t fully grown in yet.
Preston laughed. “Maybe not so wide. That’s a bit scary.”
“I can do scary!” she cried, and smiled again, even wider, only this time her eyes bugged out, too, and her cheeks went taut, and the muscles in her neck stood out like cords.
“Okay, okay, that’s enough,” Preston cautioned. A few more seconds and he was afraid she’d rupture something. “Come on, sweet pea. You’re going to be late to class.”
Abby bounced on the back seat. “I’m going to fly there! I have wings!”
“Tell me again why a My Little Pony jacket has wings?” Preston asked. “I mean, it’s a pony, right? They don’t—”
“It’s a pegasus,” Abby cried. “Pegasus have wings. Look it up, Daddy. It’s a fact.”
“Got it.” He tapped the back of the passenger seat to get her moving. “Alright, you might not care about being late, but I do, and if I don’t leave right now, I’m not going to get to work on time.”
Abby snapped off a quick salute. “Okay!” Sliding to the edge of the seat, she opened the back door and gave him one last toothy grin. “Later, gator!”
“In a while, crocodile,” he called after her.
With a bright laugh, she slipped out into the sunny morning and slammed the door behind her. Preston lingered at the curb long enough to watch her disappear into the flow of kids heading into the building, then put the car into gear, released the brake, and relinquished his spot at the curb.
Recipe for Romance Page 1
