Page 84 of Devoured By the Forbidden Mountain Man

The kitchen had changed almost as much as the rest of the house.

My recipe notebook lay open beside his coffee maker. A pair of my gold earrings sat near the little ceramic dish where Rex dropped his keys. My cardigan was hanging over one of the dining chairs because I had gotten too warm ten minutes after putting it on. The cabinets held ingredients I used often enough that neither of us thought of them as mine anymore.

Four weeks ago, I had walked into this room and found takeout containers, mustard, and a block of cheese that had already lost the will to live.

Today, we were trying to find enough counter space for Thanksgiving dinner.

Beyond the windows, the November afternoon had gone pale and cold over the trees. Most of the bright October color was gone from the property now, leaving dark evergreens, bare branches, and damp brown leaves gathered along the edge of the gravel. Smoke from somebody’s woodstove drifted faintly through the valley whenever the wind changed. Inside, the heat from the oven had fogged the lower corners of the kitchen windows and made my deep-green sweater warmer than I had expected when I dressed that morning.

The dining table was set for eight.

Seeing all those plates in Rex’s house still did something to me.

I had spent most of the morning cooking because I enjoyed it, not because Thanksgiving would collapse if I stopped moving. Rex had handled the potatoes, set the table, hauled extra chairs where they needed to go, and cleaned behind us as we worked. When I had started to reach for a job he was already doing, he had simply kept doing it until I found something else.

That was becoming one of my favorite things about living with him.

My last boxes had come down from the loft in stages rather than one ceremonial move. Clothes had migrated first, then shoes, books, toiletries, and the kitchen things I actually cared about. The rest had followed whenever one of us was already going upstairs and had free hands. There had never been a moment when Rex stood back and announced that his house had become ours.

I had simply stopped needing the loft.

The old North Fork cleanup job had ended exactly the way a temporary job was supposed to end, with Annette able to find what she needed and Rex considerably less likely to bury a receipt beneath a takeout menu. At the Lantern House, I had accepted the permanent general-manager position before the first week of November was over.

That decision had been even easier.

The restaurant had been mine in all the ways that mattered before anyone put the title on paper. I liked the owner, respected the staff, and had already discovered that Case and I could work together again without either of us attempting homicide during a dinner rush. My new office was small, the desk drawer stuck in damp weather, and half my first week had involved correcting schedules left over from the previous manager.

I loved it.

The timer sounded behind me.

Rex reached the oven before I did, opening the door while I moved the gravy to a cooler burner. Warm air rolled into the kitchen carrying sage, butter, toasted bread, and onion. He lifted the stuffing onto the cleared section of counter, shut the oven with his hip, and set the mitts down.

“We’re ahead,” he said.

I looked at the clock over the doorway and then at the food spread across the kitchen. “Don’t say that too loudly. Thanksgiving can hear confidence.”

Rex laughed as he reached for the dish towel. “Is that restaurant experience talking?”

“Years of it. The minute someone says everything is under control, a pipe bursts or the dishwasher starts smoking.”

He dried his hands while I gave the gravy one last stir. “I checked both.”

I turned toward him. The completely serious expression lasted until I started laughing, and then the lines beside his eyes deepened.

The first set of headlights appeared through the trees a few minutes later.

Annette had told us she and Earl would arrive at two. The clock read one fifty-eight when their vehicle came up the drive.

Rex looked toward the window, unsurprised.

“She’s going to be pleased with you,” I said as I lowered the heat beneath the gravy.

“That sounds unlikely.”

I had spent enough time with Annette to know Rex was grading on a strict curve. “You made potatoes and submitted every October expense before she asked twice.”

He considered that while walking toward the front door. “Maybe mildly pleased.”