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Audie giggled. "Well, first off, I don't cook. You realize I don't cook, don't you?"
Qui
She snickered. "Oh, yeah, there's that. But even if I did cook, I could easily leave the kitchen till the morning if you werestanding naked in front of my dishwasher."
"This is good to know," he said, taking another bite of salad. "It may ease your mind to know we'll never face that dilemma, because I always clean as I cook."
Audie's head popped up. "Huh?"
"Clean as I go along. I wash what I can while the food cooks and soak the rest after I serve. I put the utensils and measuring cups in the dishwasher. I clean off the counter. That way, when the meal's over, it only takes a few minutes and I can go enjoy myself with a clear conscience."
Audie stared at him. "Wow-I think I read about that in a Homey Helen column once."
Qui
Audie went very still, and Qui
She put her fork down and turned to him. "The truth is Helen didn't have much timefor me, even before she and Marjorie started the column. Everything had to be just so-the meals, decorating, cleaning, entertaining my dad's business partners-I always felt like I was in the way.
"Then when she started the column, she hired Mrs. Splawiniski to cook and a whole parade of cleaning ladies to do everything else, and I don't think my mother ever set foot in our kitchen again unless it was to oversee the latest remodeling project or give instructions to the caterers."
Qui
"So the answer is no. My mother never taught me to cook and never showed me how to make people feel welcome because she didn't have the time-she was too busy telling the rest of the world how it was supposed to be done."
She picked up her fork again and took another bite of fish. "This has got to be the most delicious thing I've ever tasted in my life."
"Was there anything at all you liked about your mother?"
Audie stilled again, then shrugged. "I admired her for being a successful businesswoman. I admired her going for what she wanted in life."
Qui
"I've decided I'm not going to sign the syndication renewal, Qui
Qui
"Really?"
"Really. I've been sitting here trying to figure out why the hell you haven't done it sooner."
Audie laughed softly. "Because I've been a wimp and a fool, Stacey."
"That's not-"
"It's true. I think I've been spending the last year trying to earn the love of a dead woman. Pretty pathetic, huh?"
"I'm sorry."
"Yeah, it is pretty sorry."
"I meant I'm sorry you had to go through that." Qui
"No." She looked right at him. "It was you."
Qui
She wasn't sure if this was the time to say this. She wasn't sure if there would ever be a right time, because this was going to be another one of those firsts Qui
"Because being with you these last few weeks has reminded me what it feels like to be happy. Now I want more, and I can tell you that being Homey Helen isn't the way to get it."
Qui
"And I realize that nothing I do is ever going to make her love me, because she's gone. If I want to be loved, I think I should stick with living people. The odds are better."
He pulled on her wrists. "Come here to me."
"The kitchen's not clean."
She landed with a thud against his chest, and his deep laughter rumbled through her. He leaned her back into the crook of his arm and kissed her, pressed her close, and he tasted like caramelized vinaigrette and sweet lust, and Audie was powerless against the slam of desire she felt for him.
"How much happiness and love do you think you can stand, woman?" His lips were on her throat and his hands were pulling her silk shell from the waistband of her ru
"I couldn't begin to tell you, Qui
"I thought you said I was the most aggravating man you ever met in your life. So how can I make you happy?" His hands were sliding up and down the front of her blouse, and her nipples stiffened with each pass of his palms. He leaned forward and began to nibble at her through the slippery fabric, his mouth leaving little wet marks all over the front of her.
"Oh, God, that was weeks ago-now you just make me completely insane." She gasped. "Especially when you do that."
"We're going inside, Homey." Qui
"Here's another good reason to clean off the counter as you go," he said.
Audie started laughing, but Qui
"God, what are you doing, Qui
"I want you naked in front of my dishwasher."
"I'm on top of the dishwasher."
"Same diff."Heyanked the blouse over her head, then the bra.
By the time he grabbed her legs and hooked them over his shoulders, his eyes were drilling into hers and his smile had grown completely wicked. Audie was nearly hyperventilating.
"How about whipped cream? Damn, I don't have any. Hold on."
"What do you have?" It occurred to Audie how bizarre it was to be chatting in this position, naked, sitting on top of a dishwasher, her legs flung over the shoulders of a man in an apron.
"How about some honey, honey?"
"Honey?" Audie let her head fall back because what she was imagining made her brain too heavy to hold upright. Then she felt him shift in front of her, heard him groan. She looked up, and he was opening the cabinet directly overhead. "Perfect."
Next, it occurred to her that despite the fact that she was thirty years old, she was about to have another first.
He crooked his arms beneath her legs and unscrewed the lid to the honey jar. She closed her eyes. Then she heard the utensil drawer slide out to her left and heard him grumbling as hesearched for something. A melon bailer? A garlic press? She tried not to think about it.
"Now we're cookin' with gas," Qui