Our first #SpotlightSaturday is this super-cute excerpt from Summer Kitchen by E.J. Russell. The first in the Saving Home series, Dev and Casey's story is a low angst rom-com with a well deserved HEA. So enjoy the excerpt, and the book is available now.
From the blurb:
The foolproof recipe for personal redemption and perfect love...
Take:
• One almost-MBA turned cooking school student
Add two heaping spoonfuls (each) of:
• responsibility
• familial obligation
• regret
And a dash of:
• misunderstanding (optional)
Stir together in:
• one small Vermont town
Season with:
• friends
• family
• foes
• and one large ginger cat
Garnish with:
• validation
• laughter
• just deserts (also desserts)
Simmer for one entire summer before serving up a delicious (well-deserved) HEA. Bon Appetit!
Excerpt:
Since Dev didn’t want to undo Kenny’s work and scare the student—the only student—again, he eased up the steps as quietly as his size fourteen boots allowed, wincing at the creak he hadn’t managed to fix in the top step.
When the voices inside didn’t stop suddenly, he crept across the porch, straining his ears to hear the conversation. Yeah, maybe eavesdroppers rarely heard anything good about themselves, but he needed more ammunition if he expected to encourage the guy to stay for the entire Summer Kitchen session.
Students had bailed before, either because they found the curriculum too grueling—Summer Kitchen was a serious training school, not a carefree way to pass the time, drinking mimosas with friends while you gossiped over the pastry. Sometimes, Sylvia had expelled them, although that had happened more often in the early days when students were still vying for one of the limited spots.
Dev angled himself so he could peer through the screen door without being too visible from inside. He couldn’t see the student from this angle, only Kenny, standing next to an angular knee-high object that must be the new nightstand.
“Really?” Kenny asked between his signature chuckles.
“I’m sorry to say that it’s true.” The other man’s voice was light and pleasant—a tenor—and held an undercurrent of amusement. “I mean, I’m not totally divorced from reality. I knew it couldn’t really be the Iron Giant.”
“I expect it was Dev in his welding gear.”
“Dev?”
“Devondre Harrison. He’s—” Kenny caught sight of Dev lurking outside the screen, his eyes widening comically behind his tortoiseshell glasses. “How about that? Here he is now.”
After that intro, Dev could scarcely refuse to come inside. He opened the screen and stepped onto the entry’s weathered oak floorboards, somehow recovering the smile he’d lost when he thought he’d scared the guy away.
“Dev, this is Casey Friel,” Kenny said. “I was just telling him that you don’t commonly keep robots or monsters in the basement to scare away the flatlanders, but I’m not sure he believed me.”
Dev tried to make a comeback to Kenny’s snark—he’d had plenty of practice over the years—but somehow he couldn’t make words. Because Casey Friel had to be the absolute embodiment of Dev’s perfect man.
His impression of somebody Kenny’s size was correct. Casey was the same height, and like Kenny, his body was wiry rather than muscled. While Casey had soft brown curls to Kenny’s shiny, board-straight black hair, they both wore it a little overlong and shaggy rather than close-cropped like Dev’s usual style.
But Dev had never felt the least stirring of lust for Kenny, maybe because they were practically brothers, growing up together as they had. Casey, though…
Dev belatedly shifted the lilacs to in front of his waist like a fucking bridal bouquet, because something about Casey’s wide, guileless hazel eyes, the spray of freckles across his nose, the quirk of his mouth that made one side of his lips tilt up higher than the other… Well, Dev definitely needed the groin camouflage.
Casey’s crooked smile faded—no!—and Dev realized he’d been holding out his hand for Dev to shake while Dev had been juggling lilacs and indulging in insta-fantasies. Casey started to drop his hand, but Dev lunged forward to catch it in his own.
“Hey. Hi. Welcome home.” Dev grimaced. “I mean to Home. Welcome to Home.”
Summer Kitchen is currently available as an audiobook, e-book and paperback.
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