Things Impossible (The Pagano Brothers Book 5) by Susan Fanetti

Author:Susan Fanetti [Fanetti, Susan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-07-03T18:30:00+00:00

~ 13 ~

Alex pulled the marinade dish from the fridge and set it on the counter beside the range. The rich tang of garlic, oregano, and red pepper in white wine vinegar lofted up, and he took a nice, deep breath. When his mother taught him how to cook, one of her most-repeated pearls of wisdom was to ‘be messy’—in the kitchen and in the food. Don’t stress about the cleanup until after, and don’t be shy about playing around with ingredients until you make something truly your taste and style. Even if it turns out to taste awful, you’ll have learned something.

He wasn’t quite as messy a cook as she was—she always managed to wear a bit of everything she was cooking with—but he loved to experiment. He’d made some horrific disasters and some great successes. Some of the successes had become family favorites, like his grilled chicken marinade.

He and his mom had never had much money, but they’d always eaten well.

As he began laying marinated chicken breasts on the heated grill in the middle of the range top, his mother came up alongside him to watch.

She sniffed deeply. “Oh, that’s nice. D’you do somethin’ different?”

He shrugged as he said, “Not really. Just sort of dumped stuff in until it looked and smelled right, like usual.”

“I thought maybe you’d get fancy for your girl.”

“Fancy food isn’t the way to her heart.”

“Huh. I’d think a Pagano princess would have champagne and caviar tastes.”

With a furtive glance toward the doorway—Lia was in the bathroom down the hall—Alex said, “Lia isn’t a princess. She has pretty simple tastes. Also, Ma, be nice.”

She did have simple tastes, in food, at least—especially with her watching her weight so obsessively. In fact, when, at his mother’s request, he’d invited Lia to have dinner at his house, he’d worried what kind of meal would be nice enough without making pressure on her to eat more than she wanted or making it obvious that she wasn’t eating. Grilled chicken seemed safe—it was something he’d seen her eat several times and was on just about every accepted diet in the history of the world, and his marinade didn’t add too much to it, calorie-wise. Roasted green beans seemed safe, too. He hadn’t made a dessert, but there were cookies in a pinch.

But then there was the question of starches. His mom was an old-fashioned Italian cook, who believed that a meal without bread was no meal at all. Dinner needed at least two starches—a pasta, potato, or rice and a bread.

He and Lia had been back in the Cove and dating for just more than a month. Before that, he’d been her guard for weeks. He knew pretty well what she would actually put in her mouth and what she wouldn’t. She’d lightened up a tiny bit in the past few weeks, too, enough that he’d stopped worrying she’d pass out again, but not enough yet to soften up her hips or collarbones.

Chicken and green beans, he was confident she’d eat.

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