Shame the Devil (Portland Devils #3) - Rosalind James Page 0,196

happening, buddy. That’s what the Instant Pot’s for.”

“Plus,” Dyma had said from the kitchen, where she and Annabelle were doing something that involved Indian spices and a whole lot more pots and pans than Jennifer would have used—she was pretty sure it was going to involve lentils, but she was just going to overlook that—“Annabelle and I decided we should do our share. Responsibility and all that. Annabelle even cooked a chicken thing for you and Owen, since I refuse to prepare flesh. Even though this dinner has protein already. Oh—Owen’s coming over for dinner. So you know.”

“Flesh, huh,” Harlan had said, raising his eyebrows at Jennifer. “Is Owen all good with that characterization?”

“Relationships don’t require shared interests,” Dyma had answered. “They require shared values. ‘Because one believes in oneself, one doesn't try to convince others. Because one is content with oneself, one doesn't need others' approval. Because one accepts oneself, the whole world accepts her.’ Which means,” she’d finished, “that I don’t have to eat meat for Owen to love me, and he doesn’t have to be a vegetarian for me to love him.”

“Sounds good,” Harlan had said. “But also like a lot of extra cooking.”

Today, though, it was Saturday, Harlan’s one day off, because training camp really was brutal, and Jennifer had just finished the grocery shopping and needed to think about making pot roast for dinner with one small portion of the half a steer Owen had brought her from the ranch. Now, that was a present. Cut up and wrapped in butcher paper, too, the way she liked it. Pot roast wasn’t exactly vegetarian, but she wasn’t cooking two dinners. She was doing creamed spinach, too, though, because Owen was coming to dinner, and he loved it.

She needed to get started on all that, because it was already almost five o’clock, and she had to sear the meat first. She didn’t feel like searing meat, but there you were. Life was tough like that. Harlan and Owen were off playing golf, which was the last thing she’d have done after the kind of regimen they’d been through these past couple weeks, but she guessed that was why they were in the NFL and she wasn’t.

She may have been a tiny bit disappointed that Harlan had left her for hours on his one free day, but that was because there was, apparently, no pleasing her. He’d watch a movie with her tonight. He’d rub cream into her belly after her shower, he’d make love to her, and he’d do it all so well, her toes would curl. He didn’t have to spend every minute with her.

He’d been different since they’d come home from North Dakota. Something in him had eased, exactly like he had been walking around with that heavy weight on his chest. He’d always laughed easily, but now, the laughter came from a deeper place. He smiled because he wanted to, she thought, and not because he thought he had to. He’d been doing a call with each of his sisters every week, and that felt important, too. And in the days after they’d come back, he and Annabelle had gone through the photo album that had lain, dusty and untouched, on the bookshelf in that terrible house, and now, there was a framed picture of his mom on his desk. It stood next to the one of the siblings on the fence at Easter with their dog, whose name had been Ranger.

He’d even talked about getting a dog again. “Good for Bug, don’t you think?” he’d asked her. “She’s going to be lonesome after Dyma leaves for college. Good for the baby, too, if it’s gentle. Ranger would let Bug crawl all over her when she was a baby. A big dog like that would be good. When camp’s over, we could start taking a look. Have to do it quick before the season starts, though.” After that, he hadn’t said anything, because he’d fallen asleep.

So, yes. Even exhausted, he’d been thoughtful, and funny, and sweet. He’d talked about Annabelle and Dyma and the baby that they were already calling Nick. He’d talked about a dog. He’d made love to her with even more intensity, and with so much tenderness, it made her want to weep. He’d started looking at car seats and strollers online, researching their safety ratings and how easy they’d be for her to maneuver.

He just hadn’t mentioned wanting to marry her.

She started cutting beef into cubes and went over all