Free I Still Do by Christie Ridgway Page A

his kiss, she was feeling pretty darn lucky herself.
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    It was not that Will couldn’t trust his brothers with his ladder. It was not that Will couldn’t trust his brothers with his wife—they didn’t even know he was married. It was not that Will couldn’t trust his brothers to eat their share of a home-cooked meal by a woman who looked like Emily and then follow it up with some proper appreciation.
    It was all three together: the ladder, his wife, the spaghetti and meatballs that smelled sinfully good.
    â€œYou didn’t know I was cooking spaghetti and meatballs,” Emily pointed out when he tried to explain why he’d broken away from his important appointment with his couch and televised football to come over and help with the project. “You don’t even know whether I can cook or not.”
    â€œBut my instincts were right, weren’t they? It smells great.”
    â€œOnions and garlic always smell great.” Emily stirred her sauce again. “Nobody can screw up sautéing onions and garlic.”
    â€œI don’t know about that,” Will answered. “Because I’ve never sautéed in my life.”
    â€œYes, you did. KP at camp. Sautéing is when we had to stir cut-up vegetables in hot oil.”
    â€œWell, I’m certainly out of practice. After that last summer at camp, my veggie prep consisted of ripping open a warehouse store-sized bag of raw baby carrots and tossing it onto the middle of the dining room table. I told the kids we couldn’t afford eyeglasses so they better eat up.” He had to smile a little, remembering their dutiful crunching.
    Emily stood with the wooden spoon in her hand, studying him. “It sounds as if you were a very conscientious provider.”
    He felt his smile die. “I did what I had to do.” It had been a hell of a weight at times, and he thought whole months had gone by when he didn’t sleep. “But that’s all over now.”
    Will was getting his easy, breezy bachelorhood back.
    Except here he was, in a kitchen that looked and smelled as cozy and domestic as all get out, with his wife.
    Hell. Without another word, he strode out of the kitchen and then across the hall to the dining room where Max and Tom were putting the finishing touches on the patch job on Emily’s ceiling. The new light fixture was already up—a bright, homey chandelier that lit up the small room with its walls painted a soft golden color.
    He watched with a little spurt of pride and approval as Tom steadied the ladder as Max climbed down. He’d taught them to be cautious like that, just as their father had taught him. They’d done a good repair, too, and cleaned up as they went along, another maxim that Dan Dailey had passed along to his oldest son. Clearing his throat, Will shoved his hands in his pockets. “Looks good. If you’re through with the ladder, I’ll take it back to my truck.”
    Maybe, he thought, maybe he should load the ladder, then load himself and head on home. The delicious smells in the kitchen, the camaraderie he’d felt working with his brothers, not to mention the woman in the kitchen—he didn’t want to get used to any of them, right? A carefree guy like himself could head out to a local watering hole for a beer or two on a Sunday night if he wanted. It wasn’t like the old days when he’d be shoving laundry in the gaping maws of the jumbo washing machine and dryer all night, sweating to get the siblings’ clothes clean in preparation for another school week.
    â€œSince you guys have taken care of this so quickly, I really don’t need to stick around, do I?” he said. And he didn’t want to stick around, did he?
    Max shot him a grin. “Not on my account. And it wouldn’t make me cry if you took Tom with you.”
    â€œTom isn’t getting out of your way, Max, without getting some spaghetti and meatballs