by Melissa Tagg
She had, had she? No denying a grin at that. “I might’ve prepped her some.”
“I can’t believe you dragged a woman all the way from Colorado just to make you look good in front of your family.”
Drew saw through him way too easily. And there was just enough guarded criticism in his brother’s tone to raise his hackles. “Yeah, well, you don’t generally give me much benefit of the doubt.”
“Can you blame me? You do remember all the times I’ve bailed you out of jail, right?”
“Twice, Drew.” Once for disorderly conduct outside a frat house. Once after waking up drunk in an alleyway. Did Drew honestly think he wouldn’t remember? That the shame didn’t still pay him regular unwelcome visits?
“I’ve paid your rent I don’t know how many times. I’ve helped tide you over when you’ve been between jobs.” Drew had abandoned his perch on the sawhorse. He paced the small space between it and the table saw.
So not how this was supposed to go. “I don’t need a recitation of your every Good Samaritan moment.”
“You never seem to know what you do need, Col.”
“Look, if you don’t want me here—”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Well, your welcome home speech could use some work.”
Drew halted, heaving a sigh and combing his fingers through his hair. “I just . . . Colin, can you try to see things from my perspective? The first thing I saw last night was you pawing that woman.”
“Her name is Rylan and I wasn’t pawing her.” He hadn’t even kissed her. Not yet anyway.
Hadn’t stopped him from lying awake half the night thinking of what might’ve happened if he had. Whether she’d have pushed him away or let the moment stretch. Wondering if she was tossing and turning up in the attic as much as he was down below.
“Then I get two different stories from the both of you about why you’re here and I find you’re on the brink of being expelled from culinary school.” He was pacing again. “And, yeah, culinary school? That’s your deal now? You’re in Denver? Would it have been that hard to pick up a phone and send an email? Or maybe answer one of mine? Smoke signal, carrier pigeon, anything?”
Colin rubbed his hands over his unshaven cheeks, down his arms, wished he could force himself to meet Drew’s eyes. “I wanted to wait until I could tell you honestly that . . . that I was doing well. That things were looking up.”
Drew stopped in front of him. “Instead, you almost got kicked out and your solution was to flirt with your instructor until she agreed to lie for you?”
That was it. His coffee mug clanked to the metal surface of the saw’s table. “I don’t know why I thought it would be different this time. That you’d actually listen instead of tearing me down just so you could be the one to fix me again.”
“Colin.” A flash of remorse joined the frustration in Drew’s eyes.
Too late. He angled past his brother, sidestepped a sanded down chair.
“I’ll clear out by the time your wife’s back.” Didn’t know what he’d tell Rylan, but hopefully she’d understand. Or better yet, not understand. Because he wouldn’t be able to handle it if she suddenly realized how far the gulf between his mess of a life and his brother’s really spanned. If she looked at him with the same disappointment as Drew.
The same disappointment he’d seen so many times from Dad.
“You don’t have to leave.” Drew followed him toward the door. “You’re right, I shouldn’t have dragged up everything. Stay. We should talk about Dad—”
He sprung as if attacked, whirling to find himself nearly nose-to-nose with his brother. And then his hands were at Drew’s chest, pushing. What was he doing? “Don’t bring Dad into this.”
Drew stumbled backward. “Colin!”
Why was he now barreling toward his brother, ready to throw himself into a fight neither of them wanted?
He tasted dirt as Drew grappled his way out of Colin’s grip and sent him tumbling against the wall. His cheek hit first.
“What is wrong with you?” Drew’s voice heaved.
“Drew?” A woman’s voice. A flood of light. Maren? “What in the world is going on here?”
Colin lifted his hand to shield his eyes. Oh, please tell him Rylan wasn’t there, too.
But of course, it was her voice he heard next. “Colin?”
He tasted blood as his lungs clenched.
Rylan had decided she liked Maren, Colin’s new sister-in-law. Quite a bit, actually. But the jury was still out on the brother.
Way out.
Drew Renwycke sat at the small table in the corner of his kitchen, hunched and far too dejected for a man who’d just returned from his honeymoon.
“I don’t understand you, Drew.” Maren stood behind him, brushing at the sawdust that clung to his shirt. “You spend a year worrying about your brother. Making me wait for you because you didn’t want to get married until you’d magically fixed your family. Then Colin finally comes home and what do you do?”
Rylan hovered in the opposite corner of the kitchen, trying to decide whether to follow Colin’s stalking footsteps up the stairs or make herself scarce altogether.
“I threw it all in his face, Mare.” Drew dropped his face into his hands. “It’s like a decade of wondering when he was going to hit rock bottom . . . it all bubbled to the surface at once. I was a jerk.”
Maren glanced at Rylan over her husband’s slumped form. “That’s a Renwycke man for you. They’ll wait an eternity and then, bam, all at once, action.”
The barest smile tugged at Drew’s lips. “Kinda describes how we got married.”
Maren was rubbing his shoulders now, apparently willing to forgive Drew his part in whatever had happened out in that workshop a lot quicker than Rylan was. She’d seen the anguish in Colin’s eyes the second sunlight flooded the shop. The hurt.
And a fear she couldn’t begin to comprehend. What is it eating away at you, Colin? He’d told her about his past, his regret, but there had to be something more.
Maren pressed a kiss to the top of Drew’s head. “Just tell me you didn’t hit him.”
He shook his head. “No. It was barely even a scuffle. Over before it began.”
The ceiling creaked at Colin’s movement overhead. Shouldn’t he get some ice on his cheek? Maren had gone from lightly reprimanding Drew to practically coddling him. Shouldn’t someone be looking after Colin?
She crossed the room to the refrigerator, wrenched open the freezer door, and grabbed the first bag of frozen vegetables she saw. Good enough. She started for the doorway.
“Rylan?” Drew’s tone halted her. “I’m sorry. I’ve been a pretty poor host so far.”
Maren snorted. “I’ll say. You didn’t even have creamer to offer for her coffee.”
His expression was somewhere between a grimace and a patient grin. The man adored his wife. That much was clear. He reached for Maren’s hand over his shoulder as he spoke again. “Colin and me . . . there’s a lot of history.”
She nodded. Took another step, but stopped again. “He didn’t miss a single class, you know.” She nudged her head upward. “The whole semester, he never missed. He was never even late. And yeah, he drove me crazy and spilled something at least once a session and messed up recipes like you wouldn’t believe. But only because he always had some idea to make things better. He’s not afraid to experiment. That’s not something all of us can say. Some of us need recipe cards just to boil water.” Colin’s own words. Who would’ve ever guessed she’d repeat them—in his defense, of all things.
Drew and Maren wore twin stares.
“And he was really excited to come home for Christmas.”
With that, she rotated on her heels and made for the stairs. Let them make what they would of her words. Oh, it was clear Drew regretted whatever it was he’d said or done. Remorse radiated from him.
But couldn’t he grasp what a weighty thing Colin had done in coming home? Didn’t that deserve some acknowledgement?
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She was halfway up the stairs when Maren called her name. “Rylan, wait.”
Drew’s wife hurried up to her, an urgent plea for understanding in her vivid green eyes. “I know Drew’s probably made a horrid first impression on you. But he feels awful, I know he does. He wouldn’t get so frustrated with Colin if he didn’t care about him so much.”
“I get that.” And it was obvious Colin loved his older brother just as well. Admired him and craved his respect. “What I don’t get is why two brothers who clearly both want to reconcile, would go after each other their first morning in the same house.”
Maren let out a breath. “Because they’re scared. They got horrible news two weeks ago and they’re both just . . . scared.”
Horrible news?
The question must’ve shown on face. Tears welled in Maren’s eyes. “Their father was diagnosed with rapidly progressive Alzheimer’s. His doctor is saying . . . ” She took a breath. “He probably has less than a year.”
Oh, Colin. She could feel her heart splinter.
“Drew wanted to fly down to Arizona immediately, but his mom asked him not to. She said they needed some time to digest the news on their own. Instead, they’re planning to come up here for Christmas.” Maren shook her head. “It’s killing Drew. This is something he can’t fix. Somehow, our elopement was still wonderful and romantic and all of that, but I’m sure as soon as we got home it all just came crashing back in.”
And he’d taken it out on Colin.
That explained the fear she thought she’d seen in Colin’s face. It wasn’t just the past bothering him, but the shock of the present and the uncertainty of the future. “Thanks for telling me.”
Maren blinked away her tears. “I’m glad you’re here, Rylan. Partially ‘cause it means I won’t have to play referee for the Renwycke men on my own. But mostly because I can see you care about Colin. He needs that.”
Eight days ago if she’d heard someone suggest she cared about Colin Renwycke, she’d have laughed until her sides hurt, assumed they’d been dipping into the cooking wine. But now?
How could so much change in a week?
She did care. Not because he was the means to an end, her hope for nailing that recipe for Chef Potts. Not because he was her student or even because Potts was right about his potential.
But because Colin was a man with a heart and layers she was only now beginning to understand. Because he was constantly trying—not just to make a way for his own future but also to give her a real holiday season, to help her prepare for Potts, to make life easier for Leigh in the one practical way he could.
And because where she’d chosen to avoid her family just to escape a few bruised feelings, he’d chosen to humbly face his head-on.
Maren nodded up the stairs. “Go on.”
She followed the sound of running water, down the hallway to the second floor bathroom. She hesitated only a moment before knocking. “Colin, it’s me.”
The faucet squeaked as the water stopped. A pause. Then the door inched open. He must’ve just washed his face. Water dripped from the ends of his hair, so in need of a trim that it fell over his forehead and around his ears.
He glanced down to the bag in her hands. “Weird breakfast choice.”
“For your face.” Not that it appeared all that needed. No swelling on the cheek she’d watched hit the woodshop wall.
He took the vegetables from her. “Crinkle cut carrots. Trust you to pick the fanciest of the frozen vegetables.” He set the bag in the sink. “But my face is fine. Bit the inside of my cheek so hard it bled, but that’s all. I’m fine.”
“Colin.” She took a small step forward, into the bathroom. Surely she was meant to say something more. Something kind and consoling and helpful. But all she could do was look at him, this man she’d spent so many weeks disliking, and wish away every scrap of hurt that marred his expression like the sawdust on his shirt. “Why didn’t you tell me about your dad?”
At her gentle question, his gaze grew even more stricken, the blue of his eyes deepening into a storm of emotion. “I didn’t . . . I don’t . . . ”
She couldn’t help it, saving him from words he didn’t know how to say. She closed the space between them, reaching her arms around him, and burying her head in the crook of his neck. She felt his shock as thoroughly as her own—his sharp inhale, his surprised stillness.
But before she could ask herself what she was doing, reverse course, and pull away, he released a ragged exhale and pressed into her embrace. His arms wound behind her as a shudder jolted through him.
Or maybe that was her. She really had no idea. Knew only that suddenly and completely, everything felt so very right. Colin’s face in her hair and her hands on his back, the burdens he carried and maybe, too, somehow her own, lighter for the wordless sharing.
She didn’t know how long they stood there, the floor vent breathing warmth over her feet, the faint scent of Colin’s aftershave filling her senses.
“For as many times as you’ve said you can’t stand me, you’ve got a funny way of showing it, Rylan Jefferson.”
His tenor voice slid over her ears like music. She tipped her head back. “It’s good for a woman to be a little unpredictable.”
The wound in his eyes had made space for wonder. “You are, at that.”
He held her gaze so long she could feel her face warm and heartbeat pick up. And every last semblance of logic and restraint fled as he lowered his head, his lips meeting hers. One soft kiss, and then two.
And then his hand behind her was closing the bathroom door and she was pressed against it, her arms clasped behind Colin’s neck for a third kiss that stretched until her head swam and heart raced and—
Colin broke away, nearly jumped away. Shock seemed to render him speechless and immovable, the sudden foot of space between them not nearly enough to break the magnet-like pull of what had just happened.
Breathless and dizzy, Rylan could only rasp. “Whoa.”
Chapter 8
Renwycke men, it seemed, didn’t talk about things.
They didn’t talk about scuffles in the wood shop. They didn’t talk about years of family discord.
And they especially didn’t talk about devastatingly breathtaking kisses that happened in the tiny space of a farmhouse bathroom.
“I don’t know whether to feel grossed out or completely enthralled by the amount of butter happening here.” Maren stood before the island counter in Drew’s kitchen—her kitchen now, Rylan supposed—holding the pastry scraper Rylan had been shocked to find at the back of a drawer. Leigh and Winnie were on the other side, watching as Rylan laid a four-inch by four-inch square of cold butter over the lean dough she’d already rolled atop a floured surface.
Today’s baking had turned into an impromptu all-female class on puff pastry making. Rylan’s favorite. Sure, a person could opt for the easy route and purchase frozen pastry, save the work of pounding butter and repeated rolling and folding. But it was the work Rylan loved.
“Trust me, the butter is pure magic.” She folded the corners of the dough over the butter and pinched to seal the pocket, mentally reciting the recipe she knew by heart. Place the beurrage (butter packet) inside the détermpe (dough packet) and fold into an envelope. Turn it over so the seams are down. Roll into a rectangle about twelve inches long by six inches wide.
“Actually, it’s not magic. It’s science.”
Her gaze darted to the back door where Colin stood with two bags of groceries. More baking ingredients.
In the four days since he’d kissed her—and yes, since she’d kissed him back—he’d been as diligent as ever in aiding her quest to come up with the perfect recipe. He’d made so many trips to the store for ingredients. He’d suggested flavor variations and taste-tested until he had to have a stomachache. He’d been entirely at her service.
Maybe it was just his way of avoiding his brother, but he’d seemed to enjoy the hours on end in the kitchen, laughing when she b
ossed him around and never once rushing her when she’d stare at her recipe card for minutes at a time. She’d even begun adapting some to his style—the way he took over the entire kitchen when he baked, spread his ingredients from one end of the counter to the other, never putting them away in between steps.
Unlike the quiet she was used to as she baked in her own kitchen, Colin talked as he worked—sharing stories about all his various jobs through the years, drawing her out with questions that somehow didn’t feel at all intrusive. She’d found herself telling him about her old bakery in Denver, the years she’d spent saving, the little storefront she’d found the day before her thirtieth birthday and how she’d just known it was “the one.”
Two nearly perfect years she’d spent making the space her own, existing inside the bubble of her dream. Until money and the economy and a skyrocketing lease had forced her out. She’d told him all that.
And still they hadn’t talked of that kiss. But maybe that was okay. Maybe they’d said all there was to say in those potent moments just after.
“I . . . you . . . that was . . . ” Colin had said as he backed away.
Perfect? she’d mentally completed for him. Wholly unexpected but nothing short of remarkable?
“Probably completely inappropriate.”
She’d wanted to melt into the wood of the bathroom door. “Probably.”
“There are a ton of reasons why I shouldn’t have . . . why we shouldn’t . . .”
No man should look so charming simply trying to complete a sentence. “Right. For instance, I’m older than you.”
He shouldn’t look at her like that—with the dimples and the flash of delight in his eyes. Not if he expected her to keep her distance. “If that’s the best reason we’ve got, we’re doomed, my dear.”
And he shouldn’t call her “my dear.”
“I’ve assured my family you’re here as a friend, not anything else. This is exactly what they’d expect from me—taking advantage of a girl behind a closed door. They’ll think I lied—”
“You didn’t take advantage of me, Colin. And I’m a woman, not a girl. I wasn’t helpless just now.” Or at all passive, if he’d recall.
