Tease (Cloverleigh Farms #8)(36)

They grabbed beers and went down to carry the boards outside, and I opened another bottle of wine. After pouring some for Frannie and Winnie, who followed the guys and kids downstairs, I offered some to Millie. “I’m just going to get the dishes loaded, and then I’ll come down.”

“I’ll help you. I want to talk to you anyway.” She glanced over her shoulder to make sure no one was in earshot. “Oh my God! I’m dying!”

I filled both our glasses with wine and set the empty bottle on the marble. “Do you think we pulled it off?”

“Definitely. Everyone was so excited because you guys have been friends for so long. I don’t think they questioned it a bit—they want to believe it.”

“Good.” I took a sip of wine. “Although I do feel kind of bad about how happy Dad and Frannie are.”

“They are happy. But you know what?” She leaned back against the counter, draping her hands over the edges next to her hips. “Hutton is happy too.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean he does not look at you like the feelings are fake.”

I turned away from her and started rinsing plates. “They aren’t all fake. We’re good friends.”

“You know what I mean.”

“How does he look at me?” I couldn’t resist asking.

“Like he can’t believe you’re real.”

I looked over at her. “Stop it.”

“I’m serious. The guy has a thing for you. Why else would he agree to this crazy scheme? Ask you to move in? Fly you to Tiffany in New York next week to pick up a ring?”

“I have no idea what that was about,” I said honestly. “It was not part of the story we made up earlier.”

“That’s my point.” She came over and started helping me load the dishes. “Not all of this is made up.”

“Okay, maybe not all of it—there is an attraction there,” I admitted.

She grabbed her wine and took a sip, her eyes sparkling with mischief over the rim of the glass. “Speaking of which, what are the sleeping arrangements Chez French?”

My cheeks burned. “I’m not sure. At first, he put all my stuff in the guest room, but then we thought that would look suspicious, so we moved it into his bedroom. But I don’t know what’s going to happen tonight. Like, when it’s time for bed, which room should I go in?”

“Do you want to sleep with him?”

“Yes, but you’re not supposed to want to bang your best friend or your fake fiancé, are you?”

Millie laughed. “I don’t think there are any guidelines for this situation. You’re going to have to make them up as you go along.” She clinked her glass to mine. “Have fun.”





EIGHT





HUTTON





Felicity shut the door behind her family and turned to face me. “So was it terrible?”

“No. It wasn’t terrible. Actually, your family talks so much that I didn’t really feel pressured to be on once we got through dinner.”

She laughed. “We do talk a lot. And adding Dex’s girls to the mix was another layer of chaos.”

“It was fine. I’m fucking exhausted, but it was fine.”

“Why don’t you go to bed?” she suggested. “I can finish cleaning up.”

“I’m not physically exhausted,” I clarified, sticking my hands in my jeans pockets. “It’s just a lot of work for me to be around a group of people, even people I like. Takes a lot of energy beneath the surface to appear cool and collected on the outside when your insides feel like a bunch of live wires.”

She nodded. “I bet. Thank you for doing that for me.”

“You’re welcome. And you don’t have to clean up. The housekeeper will be here in the morning, and she can take care of it.”

“I’m just going to finish loading the dishwasher and take care of the pans,” she said, heading for the kitchen. “I’ve worked in too many restaurants to leave a mess.”

“Can I help?”

“No. But you can keep me company and you can say it’s okay to shoot some photos for my blog in here tomorrow. The light and surfaces are going to look amazing!”

I laughed. “Of course it’s okay. This is your kitchen now too.”

Her smile warmed my insides. “Thank you.”

I sat down at the island. “So tell me more about your business plans. What’s the ultimate goal?”

As she loaded the rest of the dishes into the dishwasher and washed the pans by hand, she spoke about her passion for creating colorful, delicious, nourishing recipes with seasonal ingredients—local as much as possible. “I love the combination of art and science that cooking takes, and I love the stories behind the places where ingredients come from—especially fruits and vegetables,” she said, laughing. “I know it’s not super sexy, but I think growing up running around Cloverleigh Farms really showed me the love and pride and passion families have for growing good things. And there are all kinds of small farms like that, passing down family traditions and recipes and methods. I’m fascinated by the human side of it. That’s what I missed in the test kitchen. The stories.”