by Sable Sylvan
“Yeah, yeah,” said Mason. “Just a second. I guess I’m just trying to say…I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry, too,” said Savina. “Thanks for…”
“Back to work!” shouted Herb from his office. “You two can make out on your own time!”
Savina and Mason went back to work, but couldn’t help but blush when they looked at each other. Herb’s comment about making out had got in their heads, and both Savina and Mason were unable to stop thinking about what the other’s lips might taste like on theirs. There was only one thing they knew for sure, and that was they had to make sure they maintained their strength in the hot sauce competition…even though that meant that there was no frikkin’ way that they could mess around and win. If they had any chance of taking gold, they had to resist taking off their pants.
Chapter Forty-Six
That Friday afternoon, while the others were at the movies, Savina took the driver’s seat, and Mace took the passenger seat. Savina and Mace were working so hard on their recipe that they didn’t even have time to fight over the car keys. Mace was going over their itinerary. They had a narrow window in which to hit all these stores before they closed. The store and restaurant were being run by other employees that day, as Mace and Savina had been given the afternoon off as well.
The first stop was the restaurant supply shop. There were only a few items they were missing, items they’d seen used in the back of the shop by Herb and Alice. They needed to pick up a kitchen mill to grind up peppers more finely than a blender could blend them up, and they also needed some bottles for their sauce. They had both come up with ideas for recipes and needed to pick up ingredients at a few specialty stores. There were ethnic stores with exotic spices they wouldn’t be able to find at a grocery store and they made a stop at a local farm stand to pick up some habanero, chipotle, jalapeño, and cayenne peppers. At the basic grocery store, they picked up some basic yellow mustard, vinegar, and a gallon of milk and some soda so that they could have something to wash out their mouths with between trying their sauces.
At the grocery store, Savina was ready to hit the register after getting the mustard, vinegar, and milk (a combination for one awful smoothie) but Mace took the cart and went to the vegetable section.
“What are you doing?” asked Savina. “We have a sauce to make.”
“Well, we’ve got to try it with something,” said Mace. “How about a simple, fast stew of potatoes and carrots, maybe some celery? We can add some lamb from last night’s leftovers in.”
“Okay, that is a good idea,” admitted Savina. It was weird being around Mace in private. They had to pretend to fight a little in public, but in private, she didn’t have a reason to argue with him anymore. They’d put their beef to rest and it was almost like she was getting to know Mace on a personal level, which was the last thing Savina wanted to do…at least, that’s what she had thought before. Now, she wasn’t so sure about what she wanted with Mace. Were they really going to go back to hating each other after all this?
“Is there anything you wanna try it with? Maybe some broccoli? It’s got a mild taste, so we won’t have to worry about it overpowering the sauce,” said Mace, tossing a head of broccoli.
“Perfect,” said Savina. “Maybe we should get some tomatoes, too, in case we want to try a tomato base with the sauces.”
“Great idea,” said Mace. “Can you get a bag of those?”
“On it,” said Savina.
Everything with Mace was so confusing to her. It seemed like just last week they’d been at each other’s necks. Wait. It had been last week. Now, they were shopping like an old married couple! It was weird, but Savina knew the only thing that would make it weirder would be bringing it up with Mace.
They went back to the manor which was still quiet, as the staff was working on cleaning the upstairs suite bathrooms, now that nearly everyone was out of the house. The kitchen was empty, and Savina and Mace were free to mess around…with the sauce, that is.
Savina and Mace laid out their ingredients. While Savina lay out the ingredients to make her sauce, Mace made preparations to make his simple stew, and then put a pot of water on the stove. When it was boiling, he added the carrots and potatoes. Meanwhile, Savina started work on her sauce. She used the blender to puree a tomato and used the mill to grind the habaneros and some garlic. She mixed them together just as Mace was finishing up the stew.
Mace served them each a dish of potatoes and carrots, with leftover gravy and Norwegian lamb meatballs tossed into the mix.
“Is the sauce ready?” asked Mace.
“It will be soon,” said Savina. “Can you put out the milk and the soda and whatnot, sugar?”
“Sure thing, sugar,” said Mace.
Sugar? Oh heck! Had Savina just said that out loud by accident? Although it wasn’t uncommon for a Southern gal to drop a ‘honey,’ ‘sugar,’ or ‘darling’ by accident, she hadn’t meant to use that word with Mason. She was sure it meant something more serious back in Norway. Savina felt her cheeks turn bright red. Maybe she could lie and say it was from chopping up all those dang habaneros, although, she was wearing a bandana over her nose to keep the smell out.
Savina put the finishing touches on the sauce and carried the bowl of sauce out to the table with a spoon. She took her seat next to Mace. They were using the kitchen island as their tasting center because it would make clean up easier.
“Cheers,” said Mace, raising his glass of milk.
“Cheers,” said Savina, clinking her glass against Mace’s.
Mace put two big spoonfuls of sauce on his meat and potatoes.
“Whoa. That’s a lot of sauce,” said Savina.
“Trust me. I can handle it,” said Mace. He put some meat and potato on his fork, dipped the food into the puddle of sauce in his bowl, and put it in his mouth.
Mace chewed the meat slowly, tasting how the sauce went with the meat and with the bland potatoes. The sauce was hot, but were the habaneros, tomatoes, and garlic enough?
“I guess you can handle your stuff,” said Savina. She put meat on her fork, a little sauce on her meat, and put it in her mouth. The sauce was hot. It had that going for it…but the tomatoes and vinegar gave it an acidic taste. Maybe the tomato flavor overpowered the flavors of the habaneros.
“Darn,” said Savina.
“Darn?” asked Mace.
“I think this one’s a bust,” said Savina. “Tomatoes are a bad choice. They add great texture and color, but…”
“…The flavor is too much for the sauce?” asked Mace. “My thoughts exactly. And maybe the garlic…”
“…The garlic has to go, too,” said Savina. “Which just leaves habaneros and vinegar. We already have a habanero sauce anyway.”
“We can always have another,” said Mace. “You know, there’s more than one kind of habanero, Savina.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m aware of my namesake pepper,” said Savina. “But trust me, I’ve lived in Bright Star County my entire life and never seen a savina habanero. I think it’s something my grandpa made up for kicks.”
“Savina, your namesake peppers are real,” said Mace. “They’re not something out of a fairy tale. We just have to find them.”
“You think we can find them?” asked Savina.
“Savina…if I have to steal another private plane and fly us out to California to pick them up, I’ll do it,” said Mace. “You just have to make me one promise.”
“What’s that?” asked Savina, before taking a drink of her milk.
“If I go to jail for grand theft aircraft, you take those peppers and make one heck of a sauce,” said Mace.
“Deal,” said Savina.
“You know I’m not joking, right?” said Mace.
“Uh-huh,” said Savina. “Sure.”
“I’m not kidding,” said Mace. “You know I wasn’t at Bonimolean University last semester with Clove and Sage and Addy, right?”
“You weren’t?” asked Savina.
“No. My Grandpa Morten made me stay home at the Scoville Manor,” said Mace. “He had me doing hard frikkin’ work. Luckily, I’ll be back at Bonimolean next semester.”
“Why did he pull you outta school?” asked Savina.
“I sort of…stole his private plane and flew it to Iceland,” said Mace sheepishly.
“Sorta? How do you ‘sorta’ steal a private frikkin’ plane?” asked Savina, looking at Mace wide-eyed.
“Hey, I was hungry,” said Mace. “They don’t make kæstur hákarl in Norway.”
“Keester what-now?” asked Savina.
“Kæstur hákarl, fermented shark,” said Mace.
“Well, we sure as heck don’t have that in Fallowedirt neither, but don’t go stealing a plane to get it,” said Savina. She shook her head. Stealing a frikkin’ plane? Mace really was a bad boy, but she had to admit, she was impressed he’d pulled it off.
“Don’t go giving me ideas,” said Mace. Mace’s eyes flashed bright blue as his bear roared. His bear told him that if he was going to steal anything, it better not be a plane. It better be Savina’s heart, or at the very least, a kiss. Mace shut his bear up. He was willing to do pretty much any crazy thing, but there was no frikkin’ way he was about to do the craziest thing of all: taking the next step with Savina. They weren’t even friends, Mace told the bear, but the bear roared back. Mace could deny it all he wanted, but the bear knew better. The banter he’d had with Savina over the last week had been different than their cutting jabs the weeks before. They’d changed their relationship in so many ways in just a few days. What harm would it be to see if it could go any further? Mace roared back at his bear and told it to be quiet before he took another sip of milk.
“What was that?” asked Savina.
“What was what?” asked Mace.
“Your eyes. They flashed,” said Savina.
“Oh, that,” said Mace. “It’s…my bear.”
“Your bear did that?” asked Savina.
“My bear roared and wanted me to listen,” said Mace. “It’s nothing. Sorry if I scared you.”
“I’m not scared of your bear,” said Savina. “I know you can control it. You can, right?”
“Sometimes, I’m not so sure,” said Mace. He looked over the ingredients on the table and leaned back on the kitchen island before going to the fridge.
“You’re not so sure?” asked Savina, staying seated.
“Yeah, sometimes my bear tells me to do weird stuff like…add some mango to my sauce,” said Mace, pulling a mango out of the fridge. Mace’s bear grumbled. That was certainly not what the bear had suggested.
“Mango? In a hot sauce?” asked Savina. “I didn’t know being a bad boy meant having bad taste.”
“Trust me. It can work,” said Mace. “You’ve never had Indian food before?”
“Not with mangos,” said Savina.
“Well then, you’re in for a treat,” said Mace. He pulled another mango out of the fridge and started to peel it.
“Need any help?” asked Savina.
“Nah,” said Mace. “If you really wanna do something, you can put your sauce away and label it. We’ll put it in our mini fridge upstairs when we’re done.”
We. Our. Mini fridge. These words were not words that Savina expected, but she had to admit it to herself. They weren’t just Savina and Mace any longer. They were a ‘we’, a ‘we’ that shared a ‘mini fridge’ that they could describe as ‘our mini fridge,’ like a couple with a shared dorm suite in college. Savina bottled up her sauce and tried not to dwell on what Mace had said. It was hard because something in Savina was telling her that it wouldn’t be so terribly awful to be a ‘we’ with Mason. He had rock-hard abs, sexy hair that she just wanted to rub against her face and feel running against her torso as he gave her butterfly kisses, and he was adventurous. She’d seen a side of him that wasn’t just sarcastic and domineering. He was sweet, spicy, and sour, all mixed up in one. He would’ve been the perfect hot sauce, but instead, he was the perfect man.
Savina told the thing inside her to be quiet. Something inside of her had been telling her to go for Mason, while they were brushing arms by accident in the grocery store, play fighting over the music they listened to in the car or were working together, late into the night, on the hot sauce recipe. That thing inside her told her that she should go for it, but Savina told that thing to be quiet. Mason wasn’t the man for her. She couldn’t have any man this summer, and that thing inside her knew just why.
“Here,” said Mace in a few minutes. He had a bowl of mango cubes for Savina. The cubes were sprinkled with red cayenne pepper dust and some rock salt.
“Pepper with mango?” asked Savina, looking at the fruit. “Is this like your weird keester shark?”
“Trust me, this is a lot more popular than fermented shark,” said Mace. “And no, this is not a prank.” Mace popped one of the cubes into his mouth, chewed, and swallowed.
“Okay, okay,” said Savina. She popped a mango cube in her mouth and chewed.
The pepper and salt hit her tongue first. Then, as she chewed the mango, the flavors of the tropical fruit were released into her mouth, mixing on her tongue. The mango was ripe, very sweet and fruity, but it didn’t taste awful with the pepper. At first, it tasted weird, but then she popped in another cube of fruit and chewed. The flavors started to taste good, really good.
“You like?” asked Mace. “You know, what we consider a ‘fruit’ and a ‘vegetable’ is pretty arbitrary. Y’know some people consider a tomato a fruit, right?”
“Yeah, I’ve heard that,” said Savina. “But you better not put one in my Fourth of July picnic’s fruit salad. I like this. It reminds me of teriyaki sauce for some reason.”
“That’s because a lot of teriyaki sauce is made with something sweet, like pineapple juice,” explained Mace. “It just goes to show that sometimes, two things that you wouldn’t think to put together can become something amazing. They can become a winning combination. You just have to give them a chance to make something magical.”
Savina sat and watched Mace work his magic on the ingredients he’d selected for his sauce. She sampled his sauce once he was done. As much as she’d liked the mango cubes with cayenne pepper, the sauce wasn’t hot enough, too much like a spicy smoothie for her taste.
“At least we tried out two of our ideas today,” said Mace as he bottled up his sauce. “We still have some time left before the hot sauce competition.”
“You really think we can whip something up that’ll knock the competition out of the water?” asked Savina.
“I don’t think so,” said Mace. “Savina…I know so. After all, with you on my team, how could I lose?” Mace turned back to the bottle he was filling with a funnel. Why the heck had he said that last part out loud? Mace’s bear roared. Either Mace would have to admit to himself that what the bear was saying was true, or the bear would keep on taking over. The bear had waited long enough for Mace to stop playing games with Savina, pulling pranks on her when he should be working on wooing her. Mace hushed the bear, but he couldn’t hush the voice in his heart that was telling him that his bear knew exactly what it was talking about.
Chapter Forty-Seven
Savina was woken up on Saturday by a loud knocking at her door. She got up and pulled on her red hoodie before answering the door.
It was Cayenne.
“Savina, thank goodness you’re up,” said Cayenne. “The girls are freaking out!”
“Freaking out?” asked Savina. “About frikkin’ what?”
“Nobody is hurt, and nobody died,” said Cayenne. “But…from the way they’re going on, you wouldn’t guess that.”
“All right, all right,” said Savina, closing her door. “I’m sure it’ll all make more sense when we see it.”
Cayenne and Savina walked down the stairs to the entrance of the house and walked out to the SUV parked out front. Sitting on the ground, curled in a ball, was Addison, and Abigail and Alice were using paper towels t
o mop up what looked like hot sauce.
Savina and Cayenne reached the car.
“What the heck happened?” asked Savina, which made Addison sob more.
“It’s not a huge deal…” said Alice, before Addison let out a moan.
“It’s all my fault!” wailed Addison. “I’m so sorry!”
“Addy, what’s done is done,” said Abigail, throwing her paper towels down to go and try to make Addison stand up.
“What the heck is going on?” asked Savina.
Cayenne led Savina to the back of the car, and that’s where Savina saw it. It was like a Jackson Pollack painting in hot sauce on a canvas of wedding dresses. It may have made a nice exhibit at a modern art gallery, but it would not do for a wedding. All the wedding dresses were ruined by green ‘Secret Sauce,’ crimson ‘Awesome Sauce,’ brown ‘No Bullshizz Sauce,’ and orangey ‘Fated Mate Sauce,’ which covered the dresses, top to bottom. There would be no getting that out of the dresses. Savina had ruined a few white shirts at the store when she’d cleaned up bottles of hot sauce that other people had dropped, but white t-shirts were cheap. Wedding dresses were another story.
“Oh no,” said Savina softly. “Cayenne…what are we gonna do?”
“We’re mopping the sauce up but the dry cleaner in town is closed today, and the next one is forty miles over,” said Cayenne. “We don’t have equipment here to wash them. I already asked Lauren.”
“What the heck happened?” asked Savina.
“Addison and Sage went to pick up the dresses this morning,” said Alice, sitting down on the ground, emotionally exhausted. “But I guess there was a case of hot sauce in the back of the car, and it wasn’t sealed and packaged properly. It leaked on all the dresses.”
“I’m mad at myself,” said Abigail. “I’m going to need to see what happened at the factory that caused this mess.”
“It’s all my fault!” wailed Addison. “I should’ve emptied the car!”
Savina walked over to Addison and tried to get her off the ground, but couldn’t. Her sister was sobbing, hard.
