in the drawer right in front of you.”
She pauses her work and grabs two glass bottles. “You know you can drink alcohol around me, right?” she asks, prying the cap off the bottle and sliding it over to where I stand stirring the sauce on the stove. “It’s been years since I’ve stopped drinking, and I told you I have had a drink since then and been fine. I’m not that fragile.”
“I know, but you still don’t choose to drink most of the time.” I grab the bottle in front of me and take a cooling sip. “Plus, I don’t mind.”
“Do you really mean that?” She turns her attention back to the bread she was slicing.
“If I wanted to drink, I’d drink. But honestly, I enjoy being sober with you.” I shoot her a wink, which seems to satisfy her as she pops a cube of cheese into her mouth.
She grabs her drink and slides closer to peer into the two pans I have on the stove. “So, what is on the menu for tonight?”
“First, antipasto.” I point at her board. “Then the primo dish of red sauce and penne. Then I have a roasted chicken in the oven for the secondo with broccolini as the contorno. And finally, we’ll end with the dolce…dessert. Although full confession, I picked that up at the store. There’s a really good bakery around the corner that makes the best cannoli. Seriously, they are better than my nonna’s, but if you ever tell her I said that, I’ll have you murdered.”
Her eyes widen as she takes a sip out of her glass bottle and heads back to her tray prepping. “Homicide seems a bit intense for a cannoli.”
“Food is life or death in my family,” I state with no hint of amusement. “Nonna actually hated one of our neighbours in Bourton because they put parsley in their minestrone.” I pin Tilly with a grave look. “That’s an unforgivable sin, in case you didn’t know.”
“I had no idea,” she replies with wide eyes. “Good thing I never make minestrone.”
This makes me genuinely laugh.
She pops a green olive into her mouth. “You can’t eat like this by yourself every night. There’s no way you can consume this much food and look the way you do.”
I side-eye her while dropping the pasta into the boiling water. “You’ve noticed how I look, Tilly?”
She rolls her eyes and grabs a grape. “I mean, you haven’t given me a proper show, but I can get a general idea just by the look of you.” Her eyes drift down my body.
“So, you have been eyeing me up,” I say, feeling smug.
“No,” she volleys back, shooting daggers at me. “Your ego is surviving perfectly fine without my attentions.”
I huff out a noise as I reach over and snag an olive off her board. “What kind of food does your family make?”
“Mmm,” she replies as she swallows a sip of her lemonade. “My mother is a very proper meat and two vegetable type of cook. She would think a curry is something exotic.”
I laugh again. “Are your parents disappointed you’re not moving back to Scotland?”
“Aye, sure, but they were pleased about my job opportunity. Plus, I think they’re going to be making a lot of visits to London once Freya and Mac have the baby.”
I watch Tilly for a long moment as she works and hesitate asking her a question I’m sure she won’t want to answer. But knowing she wouldn’t hold back from asking me, I decide to just come out with it. “Is it hard for you to be around Freya?”
“Why would it be?” She frowns over at me, looking genuinely confused.
I swallow the knot in my throat. “Because she’s pregnant, and you’ve lost a baby before.”
When her hands still, I immediately regret going so deep so fast. We were laughing and flirting and having a great time, and I completely buggered this all up. “I’m sorry, you don’t have to answer that.”
“It’s fine,” she says quietly, turning her attention back to the food in front of her. “I guess I don’t really think much about it because…well…it was connected to such a difficult time in my life that isn’t a part of me anymore. So I try to just leave it in the past.”
I nod slowly. “Doesn’t mean it isn’t still hard, right?”
She turns sad eyes to me. “I suppose so.”
I remain quiet for a moment as she appears to be processing something. “Do you want to talk about it?”
She