‘This would help me out. A lot.’
And her too, she hoped. He might refuse to stand side by side with her in a kitchen and show her how to make fiddly little macarons, but he might be worked on to create a sensible, within the realms of possible, macaron recipe for her.
‘If you’re sure?’ he added.
So much for the demanding, overbearing kitchen tyrant. Russ had always chortled at Mac’s on-air tantrums. She was starting to see why.
‘As long as you’re prepared to eat the odd disaster for dinner if things don’t always work out.’
‘What the heck? We’ve always got fish fingers to fall back on.’
She laughed.
‘What if I give you the first recipe tomorrow?’
She nodded. And then glanced around at the lengthening shadows and shivered a little. The warmth quickly leached from the air as the afternoon closed in.
‘Speaking of dinner, I’ll need to get back and start it soon.’ The beef stew she’d planned needed to simmer for at least an hour and a half.
‘And I should get a bit more work done.’
He moved to get up and she started to offer him her hand, and then snatched it back, remembering the way he’d shaken off her touch earlier.
Mac’s gaze narrowed and he leant back on his hands, peering up at her from beneath the brim of his hat. ‘Did my lascivious gaze earlier embarrass you?’
She almost swallowed her tongue. His what? So he had been...? Was he saying...? Surely not!
‘Of course not,’ she lied.
He rose to his feet in one smooth motion. Bandit immediately leapt to his feet too. ‘I did tell you that you were a striking woman.’
She snorted and turned towards the house. ‘You’ve been stuck out here on your own for too long.’
Without warning, cool, firm fingers gripped the suddenly overheated flesh of her forearm, pulling her to a halt. ‘And you’re selling yourself short.’
No, she wasn’t. She just knew what she was. And she wasn’t the kind of woman who turned men’s heads. Mac was just trying to charm her, manipulate her.
‘I should put your mind at rest, though.’ He stroked her skin with his index finger before releasing her. ‘I want to assure you that you’re perfectly safe from unwanted attention. I have no intention of thrusting myself on you. I do mean to act like a perfect gentleman towards you, Jo.’
She wished he hadn’t used the term thrusting.
She drew herself up to her full height but he still towered over her. ‘No other scenario occurred to me, I assure you.’
‘Good.’ His eyes twinkled for a moment. ‘It doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy looking at you, though.’
Jo stumbled. Mac laughed. Bandit barked and raced off towards the house.
* * *
Mac paced back and forth outside the kitchen door.
Jo peered around the doorway. ‘You can come in and watch, you know. You could sit at the table.’
If he did that he’d bark instructions at her the moment she started. He’d make her nervous and she’d have an accident and burn herself. His stomach churned at the thought. If he sat in the kitchen he wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation to take over.
He didn’t deserve to indulge his passion when a boy lay in a hospital bed, suffering because of that passion.
‘So, all I’m doing at the moment is infusing these few ingredients for the béarnaise sauce I’m to make tonight, right?
‘That’s right.’
‘And—’
‘No questions,’ he ordered. ‘I need to know if you can follow the recipe.’
‘Okay—gotcha.’
He couldn’t have said why, but her earnest expression made him want to kiss her.
He could just imagine how she’d recoil from that. He grimaced, and tried to push the thought from his mind, but it didn’t stop the itch and burn that coursed through his body.
‘If you’re not going to watch then you best go somewhere else to pace. You’re making me nervous.’
Go where? Do what? He didn’t have a hope of settling to work at the moment. What if she didn’t understand an instruction? What if—?
‘Go toss a ball for Bandit.’
With a nod, he barrelled outside. The dog had a seemingly boundless reserve of energy.
Mac threw the ball three times. When Bandit brought it back the third time he gave the border collie an absent-minded scratch behind the ears. ‘How do you think she’s getting on in there, boy?’
He glanced back towards the house. It wasn’t as if she had to do anything difficult—just measure out a few ingredients, chop up a tablespoon of onion. Simple, right?
He sprang up the steps and moved soundlessly across to the door. He breathed in deeply but couldn’t smell anything. He straightened, ran a hand back through his hair. He should at least smell the vinegar being brought to the boil by now, surely? She should be reducing the mixture and...