She hesitated, and he held his breath.
Her gaze darted in all directions, while her teeth trapped her bottom lip.
He was afraid to push, afraid not to.
Finally, he tossed caution to the wind, reaching out, snagging a handful of his shirt, drawing her to him and wrapping her deep in his arms. “I can’t let you go yet.”
Maybe tomorrow. Maybe never.
“It was the best pie I have ever tasted,” Lindsay said to Kaitlin, her voice bubbling through the Gilby kitchen while Ginny scooped flour into a big steel bowl.
“My grandmother taught me that recipe,” said Ginny, wiping her hands on a voluminous white apron that covered her red-and-white polka-dot dress. She had red-heeled pumps to match, and a spray of lace and plastic cherries was pinned into her hair as a small hat.
Kaitlin was fairly certain Ginny thought it was 1952.
“It’s the chill on the lard, you know,” Ginny continued her instructions, seeming to be in her element with the two younger women as baking students. “You need the temperature, the cutting, the mixing. Half in first. Like this.”
“Do you refrigerate it?” asked Kaitlin, glancing from the stained recipe card to the bowl, watching Ginny’s hands closely as they mixed the ingredients. She and Lindsay had been given the task of cutting and peeling apples and floating them in a bowl of cold water.
Ginny giggled. “That’s the secret, girls.” She lowered her voice, glancing around as if to make sure they were alone in the big Gilby kitchen. “We keep it in the wine cellar.”
Lindsay grinned at Kaitlin, and Kaitlin grinned right back, thoroughly enjoying herself. Nobody had ever taught her to bake before. She’d watched a few cooking shows, and sometimes made cupcakes from a mix, but mostly she bought Sugar Bob’s and she sure never had a sweet old lady walk her through a traditional family recipe.
“Best way to trap a man,” said Ginny. “Feed him a good pie.”
“Were you ever married?” asked Kaitlin. Ginny used the Gilby last name, but that might not mean anything. And she certainly seemed obsessed with getting men.
“Me?” Ginny scoffed. “No. Never.”
“But you make such a great pie,” Lindsay joked. “I would think you’d have to fight them off with a stick.”
“Keep peeling,” Ginny admonished her. “There’s also the sex, you know.”
Lindsay looked confused. “But yesterday you said we weren’t supposed to—”
Ginny’s sharp glare cut her off. “You didn’t have sex with him, did you?”
“No, ma’am.”
Kaitlin shot Lindsay an expression of disbelief.
Lindsay returned a warning squint.
“Good girl,” said Ginny, smiling all over again. “That was my problem. Always slept with them, never married them.”
“You had lovers?” The question jumped out of Kaitlin before she could censor it. When Ginny was young, lovers must have been something scandalous.
“Dustin Cartwell,” said Ginny on a sigh, getting a faraway look in her eyes as she dreamily cut the lard and shortening into the flour mixture inside the bowl. “And Michael O’Conner. Phillip Magneson. Oh, and that Anderson boy, Charlie.”
“Go, Ginny,” sang Lindsay.
“Never met one I wanted to keep,” said Ginny with a shake of her white-haired head. “They fart, you know. Drop their underwear on the floor. And the snoring? Don’t get me started on the snoring.” She added another scoop of lard. “Now, we’ll be making this half into chunks the size of peas. Keeps it flaky.”
Kaitlin met Lindsay’s gaze again, her body shaking with suppressed laughter. Ginny was an absolute blast.
Her attention abruptly off men and sex, and back onto the baking, she let each of them cut in some of the lard, then she showed them how to sprinkle on the water, keeping everything chilled. They rolled out the dough, cut it into pie pans, mixed the apples with cinnamon, sugar and corn starch, then made a latticework top.
In the end, both Kaitlin and Lindsay slid decent-looking pies into the oven.
“You don’t want to be sharing that with Zachary,” Ginny warned Kaitlin. Then she paused, a flash of confusion crossing her face. “Oh, my. You married him, didn’t you?”
“I did,” Kaitlin admitted. And after last night, the marriage was feeling frighteningly real.
Ginny patted her on the arm. “Wish you’d come and talked with me first.”
“Is there something wrong with Zach?” Kaitlin couldn’t help but ask. Ginny had been alluding to Zach’s lack of desirability since they arrived.
“Those Harper boys are heartbreakers,” said Ginny with a disapproving click of her tongue. “Always have been, always will be.”