The Perfect Ingredient (Dare Valley) Read Online Free PDF Page A

lunch and dinner menus at Brasserie Dare.”
    Jill was married to the chef-owner of the best restaurant in town. Well, maybe Terrance would change that. Seeing him go head-to-head with Brian McConnell was going to be interesting. She’d already heard the temporary menu at The Grand was impressive.
    They took their coffees to their table, and Elizabeth knew she couldn’t hold it in any longer.
    “Okay, I have to spill the beans. Prepare yourself. Terrance came to my house last night.”
    Jane spewed out the sip of mocha she’d just drank, and Elizabeth angled to the right to elude the spray.
    “He what?”
    “Hold it together, Wilcox. People are staring, and as much as I love you, I don’t want your germs.”
    Her best friend dabbed at her mouth with a napkin and cleaned up the table, her eyes huge in her face. “How could you not have called me?”
    “It was close to midnight when he left. You were probably having sex.”
    Her mouth twitched. “Yep. Most assuredly.”
    It was a joke between them. Jane had lived like a nun before meeting Matt, whereas Elizabeth had been involved with lots of men. Now the tide had turned, and she was glad for her friend, who liked to flaunt it now that she had something to flaunt. She just wasn’t glad for herself. Man Fasts sucked. Especially now that a certain someone was dangling in front of her nose like Tantalus’ grapes.
    “Back to Terrance.” She leaned forward and Jane did the same, like they were sharing a secret. “He said he was mad at me, but I got all scared when I heard his car pull up late, thinking it was Ryan—”
    “Is he still bothering you? Dammit, Liz. I told you—”
    “He’s harmless,” she said, praying it was true. So far Ryan only called and texted her every once in a while. There had been an uncomfortable encounter on the street one day, but he’d backed off. “Doesn’t matter, though, he still triggers me. Anyway, I got my baseball bat before opening the door. When Terrance realized I was scared and noticed the bat by the door, he said the fight went out of him. He made Bananas Foster to make it up to me, and then we just sat in the kitchen and talked about…oh crap, just stuff , like two old friends who hadn’t seen each other in a while. It felt good.”
    “Oh crap,” Jane repeated. “Is the spark still there?”
    Elizabeth raised an eyebrow she’d plucked just this morning, realizing she wanted to be better groomed now that Terrance was around. Lord, when a woman started worrying about a thing like that, she knew she was in trouble. She was so in trouble. “Is the pope still Catholic?”
    “Meaning you wanted to jump his bones? Ewww, it seems sacrilegious to talk about that after your pope comment.”
    Now that made her laugh. “Yes, I wanted to jump his bones and dump my dessert on his rock-hard abs and lick it off.”
    “Hey! TMI.”
    Her best friend might flaunt her new love life, but she still blushed like a college freshman. Elizabeth knew from experience—they’d met in their first year at Harvard. “Like you and Matt don’t do the same thing.”
    Jane leveled her a glance. “Anyway. How did you leave things?”
    Sleep hadn’t come easy since her brain had kept cycling through their conversation. “I apologized, and he said he wanted to be friends, and I agreed.”
    “You’re kidding!”
    “Oh, and get this. He’s trying to stop swearing. He’s even charging himself a hundred dollars a word.”
    Jane set her mocha down with a thud. “Are you sure the man who came to your house was Terrance Waters and not some shape shifter?”
    The thought of Terrance changing into a wolf at night made Elizabeth laugh out loud, but it wasn’t too far off. There had always been an edge of danger around him. “I know! I was as shocked as you are.”
    “Did he tell you why he’s working for Mac?” Jane asked.
    As she filled Jane in, Elizabeth could only marvel at how much of a sucker she still was for Terrance’s sweetness.