Page 13 of Talk Turkey To Me
“What?”
“Just… for the record, there wouldn’t have been much for her to tell.” He gave a little lopsided shrug. “I dated a little when I was on the rig but once I was laid up at home there weren’t many women interested in visiting my sad little apartment and keeping a grumpy invalid company.”
“I really don’t care.” She huffed.
“Once I started cooking and got the job here, I poured all my free time into proving myself to Dave and to your dad.” He continued and she rolled her eyes skeptically.
“Are you honestly saying you haven’t dated anyone seriously in the past seven years, Myles?”
He shrugged, though the nonchalant gesture didn’t match his next words, “I never figured there was much point getting serious with someone when I knew she wasn’t the one.”
Lily’s jaw tensed at the way he looked at her, “Don’t.”
“What?”
“Don’t act like I’m the one that got away. You have no right, not when you practically pushed me out the door.” She saw his lips twitch and when he opened his mouth, no doubt to argue with her about more of their ancient history she cut him off with a sneer. “Besides, I told you. I don’t care. It’s not likeI’ve been a nun since we parted ways.”
He scowled at her, “I never said you…”
“I had boyfriends in college.” She continued before he could. “I spent several months with an Italian man on the Riviera while I was traveling. And for the record, I have someone waiting for me back in New Orleans.”
“You have a boyfriend?” His brows knit together and his eyes darted over her face, as if looking for the lie behind her words.
She held herself absolutely still, “We’ve been inseparable for nearly a year. He lives with me actually and he wasn’t happy about me packing up and leaving for the weekend.”
Myles looked physically ill but she stared him down until he finally gave a curt nod and turned away. She breathed out a sigh of relief as quietly as she could. She knew he thought he could read her like a book because he always had but she’d become a better liar than the girl he remembered had been. And besides, she reminded herself as she listened to him bang around with the oven and pans, it wasn’t actually a lie.
Therewassomeone who lived with her and he’d been very unhappy to see her go. If she’d misled Myles into believing it was a boyfriend then that was his problem. She’d never actually said the words and he didn’t need to know that she’d been talking about her giant orange rescue cat named Mango.
Her friend from across the hall was keeping him until Lily returned and the truth was, she missed the big lug already but she had no intentions of telling Myles the truth. She hadn’t been in a serious relationship since their breakup. It was his fault, after all, for making her distrust men, and her own instincts. She had dated of course but she understood what he’d been saying better than she wanted to admit.
Because how could she commit to someone else when she still felt as if this man right here owned part of her heart?
A wave of loneliness crashed into her and she bit her lip to stifle the rush of need that followed it. In that moment she wanted more than anything to tell him the truth. She wanted totell him that he had screwed her up, irrevocably, and even still no other man could take his place. She wanted to throw herself into his arms and lose herself in him the way she’d been able to when they were kids with no idea what the future truly held for them.
But it had been seven years and they weren’t those teenagers with stars in their eyes and the whole world at their feet anymore. So she turned her back to him and got back to work because she hadn’t come here tonight to spend time alone with Myles and rekindle old flames. She was here to cook and to prove to her father that she could work with her ex-boyfriend if that was what he needed her to do. Nothing more and nothing less.
They worked in silence this time for so long that Lily finished peeling and cutting and mashing all of the potatoes. She’d also spent the majority of that time feeling bad about letting Myles believe her lie about having a boyfriend. There had been a time in their lives that he would have been able to see straight through her to the truth, when he’d known her better than she even knew herself.
The kitchen was hot from stoves and ovens going at full blast but it felt thick too. The air clogged with a tension that she knew was her fault. She’d been taking her anger at this situation out on Myles from the moment she’d run into him and it wasn’t fair. All he’d done was find something he loved doing and a way to make a living at it. It wasn’t as if he’d taken up cooking just to spite her. She knew that. And if they were going to work together she knew she’d have to bury the hatchet once and for all.
He muttered under his breath as he banged around behind her and she gave in and turned around to face him, prepared to play nice and even apologize for being such a pain. But her mouth opened and no words came out when she caught sight ofhim. Her breath caught and she snapped her jaw shut so hard she nearly broke a tooth.
The bastard. He’d taken his shirt off while she wasn’t paying attention. As if she could be swayed with rippling muscles and… good grief was that a tattoo peeking out of the waistband of his pants and curling around his hip?
She shook away the bolt of lust and curiosity and clung to her anger like a lifeline, “What the hell do you think you're doing?”
Myles glanced up from where he’d been scooping filling onto a pie crust, “Uh… what’s it look like? I’m making pies.”
“And since when does making pies require you to go shirtless?” She snapped but he only shrugged,
“I didn’t want to get pie filling all over my button down.”
“That’s why they make aprons.”
“In case you’ve forgotten, mine's covered in lemon tart, Lil.”
“Which is my point, it’s already dirty so it wouldn’t have mattered if pie filling got on it.”
