The Kitchen Witch (16 page)

Logan took her hand and directed the chocolate to his mouth, instead of hers.

Surprised at first, Melody watched him take a bite.

In his attempt to draw her attention from her failure, he'd turned it toward himself in a way that heated his blood. He'd sat too close. She smelled too good.

Ah, who was he kidding; she smelled of smoked ham, and still she enticed him.

"More?" she
asked,
her voice low and sultry.

Oh yeah.
Lots more.
No way to take the other half of that maple cream without touching his lips to her fingers. Bad move, he warned himself, even as he opened his mouth and sanity evaporated.

She squeaked when he nipped a finger and held it to his mouth, as he licked every bit of chocolate from it. Then he drew her hand to his nape, pulled her into his arms, and drank champagne from her lips.

When her mouth opened on a moan, Logan went in for a greedier taste. In the process, she climbed into his lap, or he lifted her there, as he sunk deeper into the cushions, Melody practically on top of him. The kiss went on, their hands exploring, hers, his, everywhere.

Logan found the slit in her dress, and Melody squeaked again as his palm rode her inner thigh… until he felt an embarrassing wetness on himself, as if he'd—"Jeez," he said, sitting up and nearly throwing her over. "Damn." He grabbed her hand to keep her from falling off the sofa and pulled her back. He looked down at his unbuttoned pants, more grateful to see the unbroken champagne glass between his legs than the embarrassing stain the dregs had made. "Jeez."

Melody giggled when she saw what happened.

Logan swore. He looked as if he'd had an unplanned spill of his own.

"Take off your pants," she said.

Now why hadn't she suggested that before sanity slapped him upside the head? "I don't think that's such a good idea," despite the fact that he was growing hard before her staring eyes. "Mel, the more you watch it, the worse it's gonna get."

"Oh." She looked up at him, face pink. "I meant for you to take your pants off so I could use my hair dryer on them, unless you want me to blow—" She blushed pinker. "Blow them dry while you wear them."

Logan chuckled. "Yeah,
wanning
an erection always helps." He brought her face to his neck, so they wouldn't have to face each other over his words. That would be too much like admitting they wanted each other. It was safer avoiding the issue, he thought, as they'd been doing.
"Never mind.
I keep a spare pair in the bathroom. I'll change in a bit." He picked up the ticket sales printout from the floor and handed it to her. "Read this."

"I don't need to. I'm finished, and I know it."

"What makes you say so?"

"Please, I was a disaster."

"You usually are." Logan earned a halfhearted swat for that, but when her eyes filled, he pulled her back into his arms. "Talk to me," he said, tracing his way up her spine in small circles.

"Woody told me that Gardner wanted to see you," she confessed, her discouragement clear, her voice muffled against his neck. "I know Gardner's mad. I know I'm fired."

"I won't kid you." Logan pulled away enough to look at her. "He thinks you should learn how to cook. He's hard-boiled that way."

"He didn't fire me?"

"Nope.
Learn to cook, and you're in."

Melody sighed and shook her head. "It's no use. I'm gonna hang up my broom before I make everything worse. Daddy was right."

Logan tapped the paper in her hand. "Read that, will you?"

She did.
Twice.
"Next week's show is sold out? How can that be? There isn't going to be a show next week." She sounded almost relieved.

Had her father programmed her to give up before she could succeed? Did quitting afford a level of comfort? Logan didn't know how to get around the habits of a lifetime. He knew only that she had failed repeatedly, and, if this time was any indication, she did it with panache. Despite her flair, talent, strength of purpose, she gave up anyway—unless someone needed her, of course, like a small boy, a friend, unwed mothers,
stray
kittens.

Logan smiled inwardly when realization hit, and he played his ace. "There has to be a show next week, unless you want Shane to go hungry."

"What does Shane have to do with this?"

"If you don't take cooking lessons ASAP and come back to prepare a dynamite dinner next week, Shane's father is going to be out job hunting beside you."

"Gardner's a rat!" Melody's hackles rose in indignation as she "cut the cord" and moved from his comforting embrace. After a minute of hard pacing, she raised her hands in an expression of helplessness. "Okay, damn it, who's the lucky duck who gets to give me cooking lessons?" She shook her head after a thoughtful minute. "Do we know anybody that stupid?"

SHANE in tow, Logan and Melody made the rounds that night of likely prospects. Jessie welcomed them with enthusiasm, proceeded to show off her second hearse and introduce the D.A. who would be driving it now that her business had doubled. Logan and Melody were forced to say good night early, though, because the judge and the D.A., who had sparred their way through three decades in court, had dinner reservations.

"So much for Jess," Logan said as he herded Shane toward the Volvo. "Let's go ask Grandma
Phyl
to teach Mel to cook."

Shane beamed. "Yes! She bought me
Rockin
' Cruiser Bruisers today."

"What?" Melody asked.

"Video game," Logan said.

Ten minutes later, Melody gaped when Logan pulled into the parking lot of a tired tenement building with peeling paint and missing windows.

"It's seen better days," Logan said, watching her.

"At the beginning of the last century, maybe."

"She won't move!" Logan shouted. "Sorry," he said, when he startled her. They got out of the car. "You don't think I've tried? I've begged her to retire and move to a better place.
Stubborn thing."

"You're just like her," Shane said as he emerged from the backseat. "Gram says 'You're
stubborner
than a nor'easter.'"

Logan cupped his son's head playfully as they walked, and brought him close for an affectionate tussle. "And you take after both of us."

Shane giggled.
"Right!"

They found Phyllis
Kilgarven
packing dishes in moving crates, which stopped Logan dead, while Melody stared openmouthed, in the same shocked state, at her father, his shirt sleeves rolled up, tie askew, hands… dirty?
"Daddy?"

"Hi,
Mellie
Pie.
Saw your show today. I told you not to do it."

Melody sighed and felt
herself
grow smaller before him. She saw Logan bristle on her behalf, and because he did, Shane did as well, which made her feel a bit better, actually.

"I'm about to satisfy your fondest wish," Logan's mother said, filling the awkward breach, as she kissed her son, then her grandson.

"You're finally ready to move in with me?" Logan
said,
his relief apparent. "Thank God."

Melody's father gave one of his abrasive belly laughs.
"Sorry, son.
She's moving in with me."

"You're taking Shane's grandmother to Palm Beach?" On some vague level, Melody knew she was chiding her father—a first—and it felt good.

"Palm Beach!" Logan snapped at his mother. "When the devil were you going to tell me?"

"
Gramma
?
Do you have my
Rockin
' Cruiser Bruisers game?"

"We're not going to Palm Beach," her father said. "Not until after Christmas. I bought the old Endicott place for the rest of the year.
Phyl's
only moving across town."

"You mean the Captain Joshua Endicott mansion?" Logan asked, "
the
one on the register of historic places?"

"Yeah," her father said, "which would be a real pain if we wanted to change anything, but
Phyl
loves it the way it is."

"Jeez, I'll bet she does." Logan looked at his mother as if he'd never seen her so clearly.
"From a tenement to a mansion, Mom?"
There was nothing complimentary about his tone. "And it took a stranger to move you."

"Hardly a stranger, son," her father said, but Melody didn't want to hear that any more than Logan did. She dropped into the nearest chair, at a loss.

"Let me fix some tea," Phyllis said.

"Didn't you think I might like to know?" Logan followed his mother into her kitchen, and after a minute of strained silence between Melody and her father, she joined them.

LOGAN laid rubber as they drove away.

"You never asked her to give me cooking lessons," Mel said.

Logan swore beneath his breath. "They're going to freaking Cancun for a freaking jaunt. She's abandoning her housecleaning customers, people she once claimed depended on her so much she couldn't quit. For years I've been trying to get her to retire, and this self-centered prig comes along and—"

Shane looked from one of them to the other. "Is he a bad man, Dad?"

Logan slammed the wheel. "He's, he's—"

"My father," Melody said, not sure why the truth about him should bother her.

Logan did a double take and sighed. "Sorry."

"I can tell."

"It's just that he—"

"Got her to relax and take time off, move to a better neighborhood, everything you wanted for her. You're just pissed you weren't the one to accomplish it. You weren't looking out for your mother's welfare as much as you wanted your own stubborn way about it."

They drove in silence for some time after that, until Logan looked at Shane in the mirror. "When
Gramma
told you about the
Rockin
' Cruiser Bruisers game on the phone at Jessie's, did she give you a message for me?"

Shane thought about that for a minute.
"Oh yeah.
She needed to talk to you about
somethin
' '
portant
."

At Logan's raised brow, Shane drooped a bit.
"Sorry, Dad."

"Try to remember next time, okay, sport?"

" 'Kay
… but who's gonna give Mel
cookin
' lessons if
Gramma
can't?"

"Hell if I know," Logan said. "I think we're fresh out of likely candidates." Logan regarded Melody, for the first time since she'd reamed him for his selfishness. "You were right," he said. "The truth is
,
I'm glad my mother's going to take life easy for a change, no matter who made her do it."

"Good for you." Melody nodded in satisfaction. "Take a left at the next light. Vickie's grandmother might teach me to cook."

Vickie let them in. "Nana's been confined to bed since she fell last month," she said, so when Logan and Melody went in to say hello, they didn't mention cooking lessons. Before they left, the old lady took Melody's hand. "Did my hashed squash work out all right for your dress rehearsal, dear?"

Cat out of the bag, Melody thought, as she assured Nana it was wonderful, while ignoring Logan's heated gaze.

The minute they drove away, Logan called her on it. "You tricked me."

"Get real. You knew from the beginning that I didn't know how to cook."

Logan gave her a dark, warning glare, because she was right, Melody thought. She hid her smile for as long as she could, until she burst into laughter.

"It's not funny," he said.

"Trust me, it is."

"Dad, I know who can teach Mel to cook."

Melody stifled a new chuckle. "I know, too."

Logan narrowed his eyes and looked from one of them to the other, his shoulders tense, his look guarded.
"Who?"

"You!" they said together.

"No, no, and no!"

Chapter Twelve

IN Melody's opinion, Logan kicked and screamed his way to the inevitable. "How about a professional cooking instructor?" he suggested, even as he pushed her shopping cart of cookware and small appliances through a gourmet specialty shop.

He found a food processor that should clean the house, it cost so much, and placed it in her cart.

Melody took it out. "I can't afford it, and I don't need it."

Logan put it back. "You need everything."

She stopped fighting him. She'd return it later.

In the cookbook aisle, she showed him a copy of
Cooking for the Saucily Impaired
. "Sounds perfect," she said.

Logan took it from her hand and put it back on the shelf. "You're saucy enough."

To prove his point, she chose
101 Uses for Strawberry Jam
, read the title, and winked.

Logan crossed his arms. "Are you turning up the heat?"

"I like to 'cook' fast."

"Slow is better." He chose a copy of
Chocolate Orgasms for Beginners
, put it in the basket, and grinned.

Melody took it out, shook her head, and walked away.

"Don't turn up the burners, if you can't take the heat," he said, and as she turned to respond, he tossed the book, like a gauntlet, back into the cart.

She'd return that, too… maybe.

At the checkout, he took her credit card from the clerk's hand and replaced it with his own.

Though Melody didn't want to make a scene in the store, she left steaming. "Whatever happens," she said, on the way to the car. "I'm paying you back, and don't forget it."

"After what I saw on the show Wednesday, I'll have my money back in no time."

"Are you making fun of me?"

"Judging by ticket sales, no, I'm not."

GARDNER wanted to stick with the New England theme for the second show, and Logan wanted a one-pan meal, since less could go wrong that way. They settled on an Indian Pot Roast with dumplings, and cherry slump for dessert
The
menu became the curriculum for Melody's first cooking lesson, and for however many lessons it would take for her to master that meal before the next show.

On Saturday morning, Melody felt like a domestic goddess. She enjoyed using her new garlic press almost as much as she enjoyed Logan taking over her kitchen in sweats, stocking feet, and a bib-apron.