Page 48 of One Sweet Match Up

“Only if you want to.”

He looked up to see Betty, refilling his coffee mug.

“Oh, I didn’t mean . . .” he started, but corrected himself immediately, an idea forming. Of course. Why hadn’t he thought of this earlier? He couldn’t simply get in the kitchen and assume customers would form a line down Main Street. He needed to be at big, local gatherings.

They needed to see him as one of their own who’d come back to share his love and passion for food.

And he might need to roll up his sleeves and help create those big gatherings. He set the jersey down. No matter what Betty said, simply advertising he was going to be at an event wasn’t going to work. Sure, he’d won some international culinary awards, but who cared?

No, he needed to reintroduce the town to Donovan Foster. The boy who left to follow his dream and came back a man wanting to share his skill and love for food with his hometown. “Do you have an extra notepad I could borrow?”

“Sure.” She reached behind her and grabbed one with a pen, setting both down in front of him.

He clicked the pen and began jotting down every idea that came to mind to promote his appearance. “Oh, this is good,” he said, continuing to write furiously. He needed to build a buzz before he sliced one tomato, turned on one burner, or flipped one sandwich. That’s how he was going to get people to give his new venture with Zoe a try.

“What are you doing, Toots?”

“Working.”

“I thought you start your new job today.”

His smile widened. “I just did.”

11

“Tails,” Zoe said out loud to her empty frozen yogurt shop and flipped the penny in the air, watching it land on heads.

“O and ten. I guess I won’t be going to Vegas anytime soon,” she mumbled to herself, placing her finger on the old penny and sliding it across the marble counter. It’d been three days since the infamous coin toss that decided her fate.

Donovan was her business partner for the next two weeks.

At least, she thought he was. She straightened her apron and walked around the Ice Heaven’s counter, crossed the shop, and paused at the door. The street was relatively quiet for a Thursday afternoon. Her gaze fell on Donovan’s shiny black Audi.

Some business partner. He’d shown up the last three days, greeted her with a cup of coffee from the Star Lite, and offered small chitchat on the cold weather. Then he ghosted her until it was time to close the shop.

The first day, he’d come back in the late afternoon all smiles with one large soup pot full of cooking utensils. Yesterday was the same, another pot that this time included the mystery soup ladle they’d found in the antique purse.

Today, he breezed in with her coffee, said a quick hello, and away he went. Didn’t even bother to exchange polite small talk. She heaved a sigh. Maybe her business partner had lost his spark for good because cooking appeared to be the last thing on his mind.

“Where are you?” She stared across the empty street, her gaze landing on a heavy snowbank.

What was with them and snowstorms? Was she going to be tossed into Donovan’s life every time one hit?

When the coin landed on heads that night at Rachel’s, Zoe’s emotions had gone into overdrive. Their working together wasn’t a good idea. She could deny it all she wanted, but her attraction to him was only growing. Running a business side by side was not going to help her curb these emotions. Feelings she was all but sure were one-sided.

And even if they weren’t, what if he suddenly remembered why she’d been so familiar to him the night of the blizzard? Would he be disgusted and storm out of her kitchen like he’d done at the Rocky Top?

She shouldn’t have caved. Let him open a business somewhere else. That’s what she should have insisted, but when he’d opened up to her that night and confessed with such honesty that he’d lost his ambition, her heart had broken.

Here was a guy with an amazing amount of talent feeling useless. Yeah, in Denver she’d known his reputation as the arrogant playboy, but with each recent encounter, she was starting to see something different. Less pompous, more lost.

She’d been so worried about him recognizing her that she’d never stopped to question why he gave up his successful business in Denver and moved back home without a plan in the first place. He’d said the night they took refuge in the Sugar Spoon he’d needed a culinary comeback. She’d completely dismissed what he was really revealing as some catchphrase.

His frustration made her heart ache. She knew how brilliant he was, and it was a damn shame that people were no longer enjoying his talent. He needed a kitchen like all people needed air. It was his oxygen.

He should be buzzing around a prep counter, cutting, slicing, and whipping up mouthwatering dishes. In the moment, she’d gotten caught up in wanting to help him find his way back. It was the only reason she’d cast her own feelings and insecurities aside and agreed to the coin toss.

She rested both hands on the glass door handle, staring out the window. Maybe if they spent time together, he would see that she was talented and worthy of cooking next to him.

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