Rising (Anderson Special Ops #2) - Melody Anne Page 0,101
was.
“An Oreo milkshake sounds like heaven,” she admitted.
“Especially when you dip French fries into it,” he assured her.
“I’ve never done that,” she told him. He stopped what he was doing and looked at her.
“How in the world can you work in a place like this and never dip your fries in a milkshake?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” she said with a shrug. He turned back to the blender, added ingredients, blended them, poured two heaping cups, and stuck a straw and spoon in each one. Then he grabbed the whip cream and made a mountain on the top of each glass.
“Here you are, my darling,” he said, handing her a shake before he moved back to his seat and sat.
“Oh, I should’ve done this hours ago,” Erin said as she spooned ice cream into her mouth. “It’s exactly what the doctor ordered.” Her nausea was disappearing. Maybe the baby needed ice cream. She wasn’t broken-hearted over that.
“Yep, my mom taught me when I was young that the cure to everything is ice cream. Surgery? Ice cream. Someone calls you a name? Ice cream. Upset stomach? Ice cream.” He seemed quite proud of himself.
“What if you have the flu? Isn’t it bad to eat?” she pointed out.
“Nope, ice cream doesn’t count as food since it’s made from cream and simply coats the stomach. It freezes the germs away, and makes us all warm and cozy,” he insisted. “Especially if it’s homemade. There’s nothing like homemade ice cream.”
“I’ve never tried homemade,” she said. “I’d love to.”
“I’ll get you an ice cream maker. We used to have to churn it ourselves, but now they have machines that do all of the work,” he said, sounding just a bit jealous. She imagined he’d spun a manual maker for a lot of years.
“Order up,” Tom called. Erin started to get up.
“Stay where you are,” Steve scolded. She sort of liked this protective mode he was in.
“Really, Tom?” Steve asked with a laugh. There was a double cheeseburger stacked so high Steve was going to have a hard time getting his mouth around it, and a long breakfast plate next to it loaded down with fries, onion rings, and mozzarella sticks.
“I’ve seen the way you eat. I think you’ll finish this and then ask for more,” Tom insisted.
Steve laughed. “You might be right,” he said. He took his plates and set them on the counter, then reached into the fridge and grabbed catsup and ranch.
“I just don’t get how you keep that flat stomach,” Tom told him with a belly laugh as he patted his own bulging belly.
“I run . . . a lot,” Steve said. “If I don’t burn energy, I get cranky.”
“I knew I’d have to do something I hated if I wanted a nice body. I’ll just keep the teddy bear stuffing,” Tom told him.
Steve moved back to his seat. He picked up a fry and dipped it in his shake then stuffed it in his mouth, sighing after he was done.
Erin decided to give it a try, thinking the fries looked pretty amazing. She dipped and took a bite. It was ridiculously good — like pure heaven good. She turned and called out to Tom. “We’re going to need more fries,” she said. Tom laughed from the back.
She grabbed an onion ring and dipped it in the ice cream and Steve looked at her with horror before he gripped his burger and took a bite, a sigh of satisfaction overtaking his disgust at her dipping her onion ring.
“You told me to dip things,” she said, loving the onion ring dipped as much as the fry.
“Just fries,” he said.
“Don’t knock it till you try it,” she insisted.
“I’ll pass,” he said before chomping off half of his burger.
The two of them sat and chatted as they polished off his plate of goodies. Just as one plate was empty, Tom set a second heaping plate between them, this one loaded with fries, onion rings, cheese sticks, and jalapeno poppers.
“You’re my favorite person ever,” she told the cook.
“A lot of people say that to me,” he said. “Everyone loves the cook.”
Shockingly, they finished the second plate. Finally Erin started to feel full and really good for the first time in a while. Steve leaned back in his chair and rubbed his flat belly. “I feel good,” he said. “I could probably eat a little more, but I’ll wait a few minutes and have a big slice of pie and some more ice cream.”