It had taken several days of convincing, but Alex had finally managed to persuade Emily that she needed a cooking lesson. (Emily had tried to warn her – about the toaster fire incident, about the wrong stove burner incident, about the melted cutting board incident...and so on – but all of that had failed to scare her off.)

She was pretty sure Alex was starting to regret her decision, though, when she had to say for the fifteenth time, "Emily, stop eating the raw cookie dough! I swear, you're worse than Ethan..."

Emily shrugged as if the matter simply couldn't be helped and continued spooning the raw dough into her mouth in spite of Alex's repeated warnings about raw flour.

"You're such a child," Alex muttered, shaking her head, even if she wore a fond smile as she did so.

"Guilty," Emily agreed around her mouthful of dough. With a mischievous little smile, she approached behind Alex where she was stirring chocolate chips into the batter, to rest her hands on her hips, press kisses along the back of her neck.

She could almost hear the pointed expression on Alex's face as she asked, "What do you think you're doing?"

Rather than answer, she let her hands slide up underneath her shirt, palms travelling along her stomach, moving ever higher in search of her target.

"You do remember our last romantic misadventure in the kitchen, don't you?" Alex asked, referring, of course, to Derek's well-timed interruption.

Any smart-mouthed reply she might've had was cut off by her phone ringing in her pocket. Huffing in annoyance at the interruption, she backed away from Alex as she pulled out her phone, frowning even deeper upon seeing the name flashing across the screen. "What, Clyde?" she said by way of answering.

"Is that any way to speak to your boss?" he replied, his usual brand of cocksure smugness.

"It is when I'm on sabbatical and you're technically not my boss," she said.

He chuckled, the sound grating on Emily even more. "Yes, well, when will this little vacation of your be over? I need you back here yesterday – you're, unfortunately, the only competent employee I have."

"It's not a vacation," Emily snapped, "I'm dealing with my father's affairs. And this is time I'm entitled to since, I apparently need to remind you, that I haven't taken a vacation in years."

"Fine, fine," he said dismissively. "You'll have to forgive my mistake, based on the Facebook photos I've been seeing."

Emily frowned. "Facebook?" she repeated, "I haven't been on my Facebook account in over a year..."

"Well, it seems that your father's ranch has one and you certainly seem to be having fun in the pictures the account has been posting."

Her patience wearing thin, Emily snapped, "Is this why you called? To check up on me like some kind of babysitter? I'm a grown woman, Clyde, and I really don't need you to mother hen me."

He scoffed. "I'm simply keeping tabs on my best employee and making sure she doesn't have plans to fall in love with some brunette woman and ruin all my hard work by deciding to stay State-side."

Emily swallowed thickly at that. "Ex-excuse me?" she stammered.

"Two weeks, Emily. I expect you back in two weeks." And with that, he hung up.

For a few moments, Emily stared at her phone, sputtering in indignation and wishing she could have gotten in even one good verbal parry before he ended the call.

"Who was that?" Alex asked, startling Emily who seemed to have forgotten she was there.

She glanced up from the phone screen which she seemed to be trying to melt with the powers of her mind. "Oh, umm," she stuttered, "That was my boss – apparently he's been keeping tabs on me." She gave a small humourless laugh. "I didn't realize the ranch has a Facebook page..." she added.

Alex nodded. "Derek and I try to keep it updated – but half the time it ends up being Ethan who does the actual posting." A beat. "Why is he keeping such close tabs on you? That would seem to me to be the behaviour of a jealous boyfriend rather than a boss..."

Emily rolled her eyes – more over Clyde than anything else – and remarked, "Well, Clyde sort of checks both boxes..."

"What?" Alex asked, brows leaping up her forehead.

Seeming to realize how that sounded, Emily quickly backpedalled. "Well, not a boyfriend, per se...we sort of went on a few dates, but nothing ever came of it. He's really just a smug asshole who likes to stick his nose in my business to irritate me." She shrugged helplessly and hoped like hell that Alex wouldn't take this the wrong way.

"Oh..." Another beat, this one almost painfully long.

"Are you upset?" Emily asked, voice small and meek.

She shook her head. "Why would I be? I could hardly expect you not to have a dating history, you're a grown woman and you're free to do as you wish."

"I was going to tell you," Emily insisted, "But I thought we were still just doing the friends with benefits thing, so I didn't think it mattered yet...but..."

Alex cut her off, insisting, "We are. Or we were. I don't know anymore."

"Are you...calling this off?" Emily asked, incredulous, "Because I went on three bad dates with my boss a decade ago and never even slept with him? That hardly seems..."

Cutting her off once again, Alex said, "I don't know. I need to think. I need... I need to go." And, with that, she threw the tray of cookies in the oven, slammed the oven door, and practically ran from the kitchen, still wearing her apron.

"Alex?" she called after her. "Alex, wait! How long do I bake these cookies for? I'm really not capable of doing this on my own... Alex?"

Her questions were left hanging, though, as no response came floating back down the hall as Alex disappeared on her once again...