Page 42 of Playing for Love

“Lucky for you, I don’t.” I got the cutting board and vegetables and had Hunter and Cat chop greens and vegetables for the salad.

“I guess Fontanna is exempt from kitchen duty due to his gimpy arm. But you can handle pouring wine, right?”

“I can drink wine. Does that count?” He took the bottle and filled the five glasses I had out on the bar.

“So what does that leave you to do?” Hunter said, knife waving around.

“I’m pounding the meat.” I couldn’t help myself, knew it was a loaded statement and wasn’t disappointed with the burst of laughter and ribald commentary elicited. Most of all, I was tuned into Mia’s laugh, a peel of tinkling amusement that ran up my spine and across my skin, landing at the nerve endings in my cock, making it jump for joy. Damn. I knew I was going to be taking a second shower tonight, but the next one would be a cold one.

“Do you have eggs for the pasta?” Mia asked, shouting as I pounded the chicken breasts with the mallet, causing a racket and making people laugh all over again. I saw that she was taking the pasta seriously, massing the ingredients in a circle of flour on the butcher-block space on the island. I stopped what I was doing, rinsed my hands off, and got the eggs from the fridge as she took a sip of wine, a shiny smile never leaving her face.

“Here you go. You look like you’ve done this before.”

“Once or twice. What kind of pasta are we making?”

Bending, I retrieved the pasta maker from the cabinet below and lifted out the linguini attachment.

“Linguini—my favorite.”

“Mine too.”

I got the pasta maker ready to operate, watching her mix in the eggs and start working the dough with her hands. She was good. A natural. Mesmerizing.

The others were occupied, drinking, laughing, and chopping.

“Let me give you a hand with that,” I said, reaching around her to take hold of the ball of raw pasta, kneading it and shaping then rolling it into a long rod to feed into the pasta maker.

“What the hell do you have there, Wyatt?” Tate said. “It looks like—”

“Don’t say it,” Cat said, covering her ears, making us laugh.

“I was going to say it looks like a snake. What were you thinking?”

“I’ve heard it called a snake before,” Natalie said, I noticed she was eyeing Tate with interest now and that was fine by me. Backing away from Mia, I took one last inhale of her scent.

“Time to feed the beast. Mia, you’re in charge of catching the linguini when it comes out and laying it flat.”

“Yes, sir. On it.”

“That’s going to make some long linguini,” Tate said.

“I’ve heard it called that too,” Natalie said.

Everyone, including me, cracked up at that, but I watched Mia laugh until she had to wipe tears from her eyes.

We got the pasta into the boiling water and the chicken sauteeing in the pan with the rest of the ingredients for the piccata and I finally had a sip of my wine.

“If you all don’t mind, I think I’m switching from wine to beer. Anyone else?”

“You’ve been holding out. What do you have?” Tate asked.

“Let me,” Hunter said, going to the fridge and opening the door lined with bottles of at least five different microbrews, my current favorites. “I knew you wouldn’t disappoint me.” He grabbed out two bottles and tossed one to Tate, who caught it with his good hand.

“Hey, maybe you ought to be on offense,” I said.

“I played both ways in high school,” Tate said, straight-faced.

“I’ve heard it called that too,” Natalie said.