Gimme Some Sugar

by Kimberly Kincaid

  “Still straight to the point, I see.” His voice took on a sharp edge beneath the smooth demeanor. “Winslow called me a few days ago about the show. He wants us back for another season.”

  Carly barked out a laugh in a total knee-jerk reaction. “You’re serious.”

  In the flurry of favorable reviews that had followed Carly and Travis’s debut at Gracie’s a few years ago, she’d been approached to host a cooking show on a local cable channel. The original deal had been for her to do the show solo, but as usual, Travis had other plans. One dinner meeting and half a case of pinot noir later, he’d schmoozed both Carly and the producers into believing that Carly in the Kitchen should be Couples in the Kitchen, and thus, their first and only cable season had been born.

  “Of course I’m serious,” Travis continued in his saccharine-sweet voice. “We garnered great ratings last season in the northeast market. Winslow and the other producers don’t want to scrap the chance at another run, and frankly, neither do I. They’re even willing to overlook the longer than usual break we’ve had between tapings.”

  God damn it. She should’ve known better than to ignore her instincts. How had she not seen this coming?

  “Winslow never called me about this,” she said, still trying to get over her shock. Of course Travis was locked and loaded with a cool reply.

  “The producers called me late last week, but I told them just to let me tell you. What’s the big deal? The show is great PR. And no offense, but you could really use some right now.”

  Carly clenched her jaw so tight that her ears popped. “I hate to break it to you, Travis, but it’s kind of hard to do Couples in the Kitchen when there’s no couple.”

  He humored her with a patronizing chuckle. “We wouldn’t have to actually be a couple in order to tape the show. Come on, Carly. What do you say? Another season for old time’s sake wouldn’t hurt, would it?”

  “Uh, yeah,” Carly replied with sarcasm so thick she could’ve sliced it up and served it with basil and olive oil. “In case you haven’t noticed, I have a kitchen to run. I can’t just up and come to the city to tape a show. Not that I would.”

  God, Travis was so freaking smug! And Winslow was eating right out of his hand. She made a mental note to call the cable network first thing in the morning to personally set the producer straight. She’d rather take a leisurely stroll through Times Square in her birthday suit than spend five minutes with Travis, never mind put on a happy face for the sake of boosting his livelihood. Again.

  Travis exhaled audibly. “Look at it from a business standpoint, Carly. Coming back to New York to do the show would be a boon for your career, one you need. I’m trying to do you a favor. You can’t hide out in the middle of nowhere forever.”

  To think she’d once been a sucker for that sexy-smooth baritone. Carly took a deep breath to try to keep her voice from shaking in anger. “I’m not hiding from anything. I have my own kitchen out here. I didn’t need any favors from you to get it, and I sure as hell don’t need any favors from you to keep it. Thanks but no thanks on the show. I’m not interested.”

  Travis’s tone flipped from lovely to Lucifer in less than a breath. “I really think you should reconsider.” He paused before slithering in for the kill. “Otherwise who knows how long our divorce settlement could take.”

  An icy fist slipped around Carly’s gut and gave it a sick twist. “Are you threatening to drag out our divorce if I don’t come back for this?”

  Her heartbeat slammed beneath the thick cotton of her chef’s whites. Travis had done some pretty underhanded stuff in the past, but come on. He couldn’t be serious.

  “I’m just saying I think it would be a smart move all around for you to come back to New York and do the show. Who knows? You might even be able to get a job as somebody’s sous chef if you’re really lucky.”

  Something ugly snapped in Carly’s chest, shoving the words right out of her. “Oh, I’ll be back in New York, but it’ll be when I’m good and ready and not a minute before. Until then, I’m going to have to call your bluff.”

  Please God let it be a bluff. Was it too much to ask to just get on with her life?

  “Fine.” Travis’s voice wrapped around the word like a dirty dishrag. “You’re not good enough to hack it in the big leagues anyway. Have fun committing career suicide out in the sticks, Mrs. Masters.”

  Before she could work up a reply, Travis hung up the phone.

  Carly pinched the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger. “It’s Ms. di Matisse, you asshole,” she told the dial tone before replacing the receiver on the cradle. She’d never gone by Travis’s name in her life.

  After a quick round of deep breathing, Carly turned her attention to the clock. She didn’t have enough time to call her divorce attorney, who would likely have a field day with Travis’s threat. Plus, Carly wanted to be levelheaded when she made that call, and right now, that wasn’t happening. She needed to breathe, to think, to cook. And maybe to pound something while she was at it.

  Yeah. Veal cutlets would make an excellent special.

  A familiar sound made its way through the thin walls of the office, and Carly propped the door open to lean into the frame. Even though her arms were crossed and her mood was for shit, a smile brewed on her lips at the sight of the man in front of her.

  “Someday, when I’m awfully low . . . when the world is cold . . . hey, Carlsbad! You look pissed,” Adrian ventured gleefully, mid-Sinatra.

  Adrian Holt had been Carly’s sous chef, right-hand man, and confidant for five years. Well, technically, for four and a half of them, he’d been Travis’s sous chef, too, but Carly didn’t feel like splitting hairs.

  “I hate it when you call me that.” Despite her mood, a smile bloomed on her lips at the sight of her ginormous sous chef singing golden oldies in his chef’s whites and a backwards Harley Davidson baseball cap.

  “I aim to please. What’s got your knickers in a knot?” Adrian’s singing morphed into a buttery hum as he rolled his sleeves to his elbows and moved through the kitchen to start checking the stations. The wide expanse of his shoulders bunched and released beneath his white jacket with each movement, lean muscles flexing over the tattoo covering his right forearm.

  Carly expelled a breath and fell into step next to him, comforted by the routine of prepping for the night. “Travis.”

  All Adrian needed was the two-syllable punch to understand her sour mood. “Sorry.” His hazel eyes clouded over with a swirl of emotions Carly knew all too well. Adrian’s forehead creased, drawing the stainless steel barbell through his right eyebrow down in a slash. “Everything all right?”

  “Yeah. I’d rather not talk about it.” As it was, the mere presence of Travis’s name on her tongue made her want to go brush her teeth.

  “No skin off my nose, Chef.” Adrian paused for just a fraction too long before moving down the line to the last station.

  “Do you regret it? Leaving, I mean.”

  His head jerked up, the rest of him completely still. “No.”

  “It’s not permanent. I know you went through a lot to come here. And I know you miss home,” Carly whispered, melancholy threading through her chest.

  “We’ll go back when you’re ready. Until then, I’m good here. Capice?” Adrian’s eyes flickered over hers, his gaze gone before she could read it.

  “Well. Dinner staff will be here in less than thirty. Let me grab the book and we’ll talk specials.” Her eyes rested on his for just a fraction of a second longer, but Adrian had slipped right back into business as usual.

  Good. Business as usual was what Carly was made of.

  But the memory of the phone call lingered like stale smoke, and as she headed for the office to grab the leather-bound notebook that held her handwritten recipes, it was the first time she could remember being in the kitchen when her mind was somewhere else.

  Jackson tipped his crew cut at his little brother, Dylan, who sauntered from the back porch
onto the fresh carpet of green grass. The phrase “little brother” was rather ironic when the man in question was six-three and weighed in at a linebacker and a half. Then again, it wasn’t as if either of the Carter men could be labeled as anything other than pretty damn big. The expression “big brother” was actually fitting, considering Jackson outshadowed his brother by a good inch.

  “Hey, you want to tell Mom these are almost done?” Jackson gave one of the burgers on the ancient charcoal grill in front of him a nudge with a spatula. Another minute, and they’d be perfect.

  His brother eyeballed the back of the house where they’d grown up and shook his head. “Are you kidding? I came out here to avoid the horde of women in that kitchen. Here.” Dylan passed over a bottle of Budweiser, still frosty from the fridge. He shifted his weight under the sunshine filtering through an umbrella of oak leaves.

  “Don’t let Autumn and Brooke gang up on you,” Jackson replied, although it was so much easier said than done. Dealing with one older sister was bad enough. Trying to handle two at once was just courting disaster.

  “Easy for you to say. You’re out here.”

  “When the shift at the firehouse ends in a bit, we’ll even out the score.” As soon as Jackson’s brothers-in-law arrived from their shifts at Pine Mountain Fire and Rescue, the male-to-female playing field would be just about level. Until then, he and his brother would have to tough it out with the estrogen brigade.

  Jackson popped the top off of his beer, and the bottle hissed in approval. “Damn, that sounds like summer,” he mused, taking that first perfect swallow.

  “Whoa!” Dylan jerked his chin at Jackson’s upraised elbow. “That looks like it smarts. How’d you get it?”

  Jackson lifted the bent limb a little higher for inspection. A bruise about the size and color of a plum bloomed just above his elbow joint. “Oh, that? It’s not so bad. And you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  His mind shifted to how the bruise came to be. Something about Jackson’s exchange with the fiery mystery woman had lingered with him all day, whispering to him enough to jostle his concentration.

  Damn those white cotton panties. The way something so demure could cover up something so wicked just turned him on like runway lights. It was almost unfair.

  “Anyhow.” Jackson cleared his throat and pushed the image of the woman—and her underwear—from his mind. “These are done. I hope you’re hungry, little brother.”

  Dylan fidgeted in uncharacteristic nervousness rather than moving toward the house. Any time a Carter man didn’t jump at the chance to eat, something was definitely wrong.

  Jackson narrowed his eyes at his little brother. “What?”

  “I’m getting married.”

  A burger slipped off the plate in Jackson’s hand as it dipped in response to his shock. Otis, the family’s geriatric black Lab, loped over to take full advantage of Jackson’s party foul, while Jackson struggled to gather his wits.

  “Get out of here!” he finally sputtered, still completely floored by Dylan’s admission.

  An ear-to-ear grin spread over his brother’s face, paving the way for a creeping flush. “Yeah. I asked Kelsey last night. We’ve been together for a year, and . . . well, she’s the one. So we’re getting married.”

  “Congratulations, man.” Jackson slid the plate of burgers onto a rickety picnic table to clap his brother on the back. “Wow, my baby brother, getting married.” He laughed, shaking his head. “Wait a second . . . does Mom know?”

  Amidst his happiness for his brother, Jackson’s gut double-knotted. When their mother was done with the requisite shrieking over the prospect of yet another legion of grandbabies, Jackson was going to be on the frickin’ hot seat.

  Again.

  “Not yet.” Dylan rolled his eyes, but kept his grin in place.

  “You know you’re making me look bad,” Jackson said, only half-joking. Their mother had been after all four of them to fall in love, settle down, and have babies ever since Jackson could remember. And now everyone was on board except him.

  Of course, he was the only one who knew firsthand why that version of happily ever after was as impossible as moving the moon. He might’ve discovered it ages ago, but he’d have to be dead in the ground to forget why staying out of love was the smartest thing he could do.

  And the safest.

  “I know the nagging gets old, but Mom means well. She only wants all of us to be happy.” Dylan’s eyes grew a shade more wary as he ventured into touchy-topic territory.

  Ironic that Catherine Carter wanted all of her children to find happiness through marriage when the only way she could find it herself was to end the one marriage she’d ever had.

  Stuffing down the sudden flash of bad memories, Jackson worked up his trademark easygoing smile. He sure as hell didn’t want to go down that road, especially not in the face of Dylan’s good news.

  “I’m already happy,” he pointed out, draining his beer. “Come on. Let’s eat these burgers before they get cold.”

  It seemed that Jackson’s low threshold in the satisfaction department was going to come back and bite him square in the ass. It wasn’t his fault he never really got the love-of-my-life thing. No disrespect to women, mind you—after all, his mother had raised him right. Still, was it such a big deal that he was happy just being single? It wasn’t like he never dated. He was terminally unattached, not terminally stupid.

  “Oh, it’s about time! If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you two were dawdling out there.” Catherine drew a sharp brow inward, but there was a twinkle behind her sky blue gaze as she waved her sons into the house. The kitchen bustled with premeal activity, both of Jackson’s sisters chasing their respective children to the bathroom for a good hand washing as the last of the side dishes found a home on the already crowded table.

  “I don’t dawdle when food is involved. Where do you want these burgers, Ma?”

  “Right there is fine, honey. Oh! Let me grab these baked beans out of the oven, now.”

  Fitting the platter into the only empty spot on the worn farmhouse table, Jackson retreated to the fridge for another beer. He had a feeling he was going to need it, a hunch that was cemented in place when Dylan cleared his throat with purpose as soon as both of his sisters made their way back to the kitchen with their kids in tow.

  “Before we eat, I have an announcement to make.” The room fell uncharacteristically quiet, the only sound coming from Brooke’s youngest daughter cooing to her spoon in her high chair. Jackson’s pulse popped through him as if it was being directed by the conductor of a marching band. What the hell was he nervous for? He wasn’t the one getting hitched, for Pete’s sake.

  Dylan’s expression fell into a boyish grin, and Jackson was struck by the fact that his brother barely looked old enough to buy beer, let alone get married.

  “Last night, Kelsey did me the honor of saying she’ll be my wife.”

  Time hiccupped for just a fraction before the pandemonium of joyous squeals split the stunned silence of the kitchen. Thankfully, everyone in the room descended on Dylan and Kelsey, leaving Jackson to sneak to the edge of the room like a commitment-phobic Ninja.

  “Oh! Oh, sweetheart, I’m so happy for you,” Catherine gushed, her eyes glistening. “This is just wonderful news!”

  Jackson’s gut jangled with guilt. Okay, so it was good to see his mother happy. God knew those moments of undiluted goodness had been too few and far between for her, raising the four of them by herself. Jackson watched from the periphery as everyone hugged the happy couple, then finally started to move around the table to fill their plates. Another Carter wedding wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world. After all, he’d survived both of his sisters’ weddings, as well as his cousin Lisa’s, without too much damage. Surely he could handle this.

  Just so long as he wasn’t next.

  “We’ll have a party to celebrate, next Saturday night,” Jackson’s mother declared, dabbing her eyes with a tissu
e.

  “Next Saturday is the Fourth of July.” Dylan’s complaint fell flat when Catherine shook her head, resolute.

  “All the more reason for us to have a party. It’s about time we had everyone together, anyway.”

  “Ma, we’re all here now,” Dylan protested, but he was clearly outnumbered, and Jackson wasn’t dumb enough to jump on a sinking ship. Plus, considering there’d been a foot of snow on the ground the last time he’d gone on an official date, the less attention he got with the old marriage spotlight flying around, the better.

  “Oh, but we should include all the cousins. And it wouldn’t hurt to invite the Griffins . . . and of course, everyone from Kelsey’s family. It’ll be our first gathering with the new in-laws. How exciting!” Catherine’s eyes lit up like Christmas morning, and Dylan promptly caved.

  “Well, I guess it wouldn’t be too bad to see my cousins.” His reluctant agreement sent everyone with a uterus into full-on planning mode. Jackson surreptitiously made his way to the table to fill a plate while the women chattered and laughed, but it wasn’t like being six-four made stealth a natural asset.

  “Guess you’re the only one left now, hmmm?” His oldest sister, Autumn, reached up to pinch his ear with a sassy grin.

  “Yeah. I’m thinking of it like the Marines. The few, the proud. That kind of thing.” Jackson heaped enough macaroni salad onto his paper plate to make it droop under the weight.

  Brooke, his second-in-command sister, clucked her tongue and bent down to punch a straw into her three-year-old son’s juice box. “Try the only.”

  Jackson’s defenses stirred around in his gut like a lion shifting in its cage, prowling for a way out. “But living vicariously through you is so much fun.” He parked enough baked beans to sink a ship next to the macaroni salad on his plate, and if he didn’t know better, he would have sworn the damned thing actually groaned.