Recipe for Romance. Olivia Miles

he had stayed away. It just was what it was.

      * * *

      “I just don’t know what came over me,” Emily repeated, closing her eyes to the memory of her outburst that afternoon.

      “Well, I do!” Julia declared. “The man had it coming, Emily.”

      “But, Julia, I work there. That’s my boss’s brother!”

      Julia waved her hand through the air. “Please. Lucy knows you and Scott have a history. Besides, she was the one who commissioned him for the contest.”

      Emily considered her sister’s reasoning. “Maybe you’re right,” she said quietly.

      “Maybe? Emily, Scott Collins is a jerk,” Julia said firmly. “I’m so sick of hearing everyone in town go on and on about his return. If it were up to me, he’d never have come back. Seriously, I mean who does he think he is, huh? He might have been Mr. Popularity back in high school, but he’s thirty years old now and he needs to get over himself. But one day he’ll see that he can’t just tromp around on his high horse, zipping through town in his fancy car, flashing that smile and expecting every woman in the street to just swoon. Oh, what I wouldn’t like to do to him...just kick that butt right to the curb, right out of Maple Woods, back to wherever the heck it is he’s been hiding all this time...”

      Emily heaved a sigh and glanced at her sister, whose eyes had narrowed to green slits, her pink lips pinched in fury as she detailed the revenge she’d like to take on Scott Collins, and burst out laughing. It was the first good laugh Emily had enjoyed all day, and she needed it more than she’d realized. “Are you finished?” she asked, when she’d settled down.

      “It’s not funny!” Julia exclaimed, shaking her head in disgust. She leaned over and took a long sip of wine from her glass and then set it back down on the coffee table with a scowl. She reached for her knitting needles and motioned to Emily to flick on the television. The sisters had just finished eating dinner and were getting ready to catch up on the soap opera that they recorded each afternoon and watched together each night. It was a cozy ritual, and one that Emily cherished, even if she sometimes did worry that she and Julia were destined to become two spinsters, living in a four-room apartment above the town diner for the rest of their lives.