1
Marin
“Welcome to Cooking Solo,” the tall, reed-thin woman at the front of the room announced in a voice that rang with so much cheer, it screamed of bullshit. “A class designed for singles, such as yourselves, who want to learn the art of cooking for one.”
And this is what my life has become, I thought glumly, being passive-aggressively judged by a stick figure with a carat-and-a-half rock on her ring finger.
There should have been some sort of disclaimer when I signed up for the class online stating the instructor was a “happily married mother of three.”
If you were going to be teaching people to cook for one because they were painfully and glaringly A-L-O-N-E, the least you could do was be single yourself.
But oh no, Chef Jodi—a title she’d undoubtedly christened herself with and insisted we call her by—couldn’t stop talking about her loving husband and precious babies.
I kind of hated Chef Jodi. Chef Jodi was an asshole.
“Now, we’re going to start off simple, because the last thing any single man or woman probably wants to do is waste time in the kitchen cooking up some complicated dish just for themselves, am I right?” She let out a condescending laugh. “I’m sure you’d rather be on one of those Tinder apps or on a blind date or whatever it is you single people do nowadays to try to meet someone.”
I was going to smack the shit out of this woman with my handy little spatula the next time she came around to my station.
“So tonight, I’m going to teach you to make one of my husband’s favorite meals—”
The vibe in the room was growing more hostile the longer she rattled on, and something told me Chef Jodi was going to be getting some pretty nasty reviews on Yelp.
“For the love of God, Jodi,” a woman who looked to be in her sixties, one station across and back from mine, declared. “We all know you and your family. Your husband spends so much time in his damn recliner doin’ a whole lotta nothing that his ass is permanently flattened. Those sweet little angels you’re goin’ on about nearly started a forest fire last summer with a bunch of illegal fireworks, and everyone in town knows you lock yourself in the bathroom with a bottle of wine and sleep in the bathtub at least once a week just to escape the chaos. So you can get the hell off your high horse, already.”
The laugh I tried to swallow down came out as a snort as the room filled with snickers from all directions.
With Jodi properly put in her place, she managed to go about teaching the rest of the lesson without any more insults, and we were able to go about making our rosemary chicken without the commentary on how much her husband loved it.
I wasn’t a very good cook, so for the past few months I’d been living off cereal, boxes of powdered mac and cheese, and soup from a can—another reason I’d stupidly thought signing up for Cooking Solo was a good idea.
By the end of the class, I’d succeeded in making a passable dish that didn’t smell like charred feet and was only slightly rubbery, so I was feeling pretty good about myself as I cleaned my station and packed up to head home. Then I turned around and lost my breath at the sight of the man at one of the stations near the back of the room.
Pierce Walton: the sexiest man in existence, successful lawyer, single father of what had to be the cutest little boy on the face of the planet, world-class prick, and the older brother of my abusive asshole of an ex-boyfriend.
Well shit.
My feet were rooted to the floor for the several seconds it took my brain to reengage after short circuiting—because that was the kind of effect the man had on pretty much everyone, men and women alike.
Before he could look up and spot me, I ducked behind a group of fellow singles and booked it for the side exit as my heart beat wildly, attempting to escape the confines of my chest.
As soon as I rounded the corner, I plastered my back to the wall, breathing like I’d just run a mile at a dead sprint. I chanced a quick peek, unable to help myself where Pierce was concerned. From the very first moment I’d met him, the man had some kind of crazy power over me. Inappropriate as hell, given that I’d been in a relationship with his little brother at the time. But it couldn’t be helped. There was just something about him, he was a freaking wizard or something.
A few people passed by, giving me strange looks, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. I tried to be as inconspicuous as possible as I leaned farther for a better look. Just another inch . . . and there he was. God, the man still took my breath away.
It really was too bad we hated each other.
In my defense, my hatred of him was solely reactionary. He’d hated me first, so I figured it was only fair I hate the stupid sexy jerk back. I’d have been fine with the guy if he hadn’t decided within the first half hour of meeting me that I was somehow seriously lacking for whatever reason.
I’d been dating Frank for six months when he’d taken me to meet his family for the very first time. I was standing in his mother’s kitchen, helping with the last-minute preparations of the very lovely dinner she’d made, when the back door suddenly opened and a Grecian god came waltzing through.
I was stunned into immobility at the mere sight of him. In his expensive-looking suit and well-polished shoes, he looked like he belonged on the glossy pages of a magazine, modeling men’s designer clothes, not stepping into a small, countrified home in a small mountain town. Then I looked down to the little toddler holding his hand, a near spitting image of the dark and dangerous man who’d just come in, and nearly swooned into a puddle of goo.
The only way I could describe how I felt in that moment was dazzled. I was completely dazzled by this gorgeous stranger while standing in the kitchen of my boyfriend’s childhood home.
He looked up at me with eyes so blue they glinted like glaciers in the middle of the sea, and for a beat, he seemed almost as flummoxed as I was. There was something in his penetrating gaze that I wasn’t able to read, but whatever it was, it had warmed me to my core. It made me fidgety and antsy. I wanted to dive in and get to know him at the very same time a tiny voice in the back of my head was telling me to run away because this man was Dangerous with a capital D.
We stood there, staring at each other in surprise for what felt like an eternity before Mrs. Walton cleared her throat and broke the spell. Then he smiled a smile that rattled me to my very core.
“Well, hello there,” he said in a velvety smooth voice that had just the right amount of delicious rasp to it. “I’m Pierce.” He extended the hand not attached to the adorable kid, and the instant his long, thick fingers engulfed my hand, goosebumps broke out across my whole body. “And who might you be?”
His mother jumped to introduce me when it became obvious the power of speech had failed me, and as soon as the words, “Frank’s girlfriend” left her mouth, a switch flipped. The man who’d nearly knocked me on my ass just a minute earlier with nothing more than a smile was suddenly giving me the deep freeze.
Every encounter after that was downright chilly. Every forced conversation felt layered with frost until I eventually just gave up all together.
Frank used to bad mouth his brother constantly, always going on about how arrogant and condescending he was, how he thought he was better because he’d gone to law school and worked in the city. The colder Pierce acted toward me, the easier it was to understand Frank’s animosity toward his big brother, and eventually, Frank’s animosity became my own.