How is it fair that you don't remember me, while I become sleepless thinking about you?

Ben walked next to Dana and said politely “I have never been in a kitchen, please guide me”

“If I were to guide you in the kitchen, it would be blind leading the blind. Luckily Bolognaise is child’s play.” Dana smiled brightly at Ben. It was just like the smile she gave when she told him that he acted brilliantly during their first encounter. Ben stared at her in a daze, but Dana didn’t notice as she was busy unpacking the mincemeat into the mid-size barrel.

“I prefer to wash the mince, do you have a different opinion?” Dana looked up at Ben

“Eh… um… I’ll do as you say.”

“Alright then” Dana went and bought the giant sized mesh cloth and held it over another barrel. “Would you mind pouring that over this?” She pointed at the barrel she previously washed the mince in “Or do you want to hold this”

“Not at all” He lifted the barrel and carefully poured it over the mesh.

“How are you guys going?” Lara popped over with hands covered in messy dough. She had heard Dana’s question and was walking over to tell the man off if he opted for holding the mesh and changed her question satisfied when she saw him pouring.

“Better than we normally do” Dana laughed and turned to show Lara “Look my dress is spotless”

“Whatever” Lara waved her hands in disinterest before walking away although she was pleased.

Dana laughed as she turned back to concentrate on her work.  As he emptied the barrel, Dana asked him “Can you squeeze the water of this while I hold?” Seeing Ben nod, she twisted the top of the mesh to tightly hold the meat in. Ben squatted down with her and did as she asked. They did a few rounds of washing before stopping.

“You must be tired with all the lifting and squeezing, I’ll do the rest”

“Nope, not tired at all doing it with you” Ben silently said the last part in his head.

“Alright then, let’s hurry. We might have to make a few batches.”

Ben watched as Dana got an oversized pan; lit the stove and poured oil in. She lowered the flames and dropped the chopped garlic “Here, you stir I will go and quickly chop some onions and veggies”

Ben stirred as he watched Dana chop onions, carrots and zucchini. ‘Life would be good if I could watch her for the rest of my life’, Ben’s lips curled up as this thought flashed past his mind. Dana came over, added soya sauce and pepper before going back to chopping. A few minutes later she came over to pour some mincemeat-

“Can you simmer and close the lid? I’ll get the tomato sauce for base”

She instructed as she went to get the tumbler with the tomato sauce. Ben tapped on his watch to ask how to simmer. Sarah’s laughter filled the room, while everyone looked over to see what the joke was. Sarah excused herself and walked quietly over to Ben’s side and turned the fire down, rolled her eyes at Ben before walking back.

“Puchi…” Lara burst out laughing as she understood the gist although no one verbalized anything. She had seen Frank whispering to Sarah before she burst out laughing. The only thing she couldn’t understand was, how Frank knew about Ben’s predicament without talking.

“Looks like Pasta section is the fun department today” Alfred commented as he walked towards the pasta section.

Lara quickly made an excuse of running out of ingredients and that she would go to the storeroom to fetch them and ran away, while Sarah and Frank looked puzzled ‘There is enough ingredients here, which one were they short of?’

“Where’s Lara?” Alfred came up to Sarah and rested his hands on her shoulders while his fingers danced around her neck.

Frank squinted his eyes at Alfred but before he could respond Sarah understood the ingredients Lara was missing and quickly excused herself and followed in Lara’s direction. Lara came up to Dana’s workspace looking for her; annoyed she sat on the bench waiting for Dana. Ben looked at her with annoyance in his heart due to her intrusion on his perfect life.

Lara ignored him and started munching on the chopped carrots.

“Why don’t you nibble on the whole carrot?”

“What’s it got to do with you? I’m munching on the carrots my friend cut.”

“Well it’s the carrot my ………” Ben realized what he was about to say when his watch vibrated and finished his sentence with “partner cut” He had been too immersed in his world. Thanks to Frank, he stopped just in time.

“Deserter!” Sarah yelled softly as she stopped near Lara.

Lara smiled and poked her tongue out and offered some carrots as peace offering. Sarah too sat beside Lara and started munching on the diced carrots.

“What should I do? Stay and be abused? At least I left you with your boyfriend” Lara pouted.

“Stop you two, either start dicing carrots that you finished or clear away” Ben ordered.

“Hymph” Both ladies hmphed and ignored Ben.

Dana just came out of the store rolling the tomato sauce barrel and could not help by laugh as she heard them making a ruckus. Ben turned around and saw her rolling the barrel and walked towards her and picked it up and carried it forward.

“Thank you”

“You should have said it was heavy. I thought it was in a bottle. How did you get it out here?” Ben asked in concern.

“By rolling” Dana replied casually and walked towards Lara. She looked at more than half of the carrots that had disappeared and shook her head, and asked with a smile “Who offended you?”

“Sleeze bag”

“Huh? Was he in your group today?” Dana asked in confusion.

“She invited him” Lara threw the pot at Sarah

Now that Dana was around, Ben started listening to the conversation and frowned as he looked at Frank.

“Me?” Sarah looked confused.

“Your siren laughter” Lara retorted

Dana smiled and urged them “I am sure her boyfriend can take care, hurry up otherwise the kids will be hungry, there’s only half hour more”

“Do you think she’ll run if her boyfriend could take care?” Lara pouted with raised eyebrows. Sarah felt guilty but before she could correct them, someone burst out laughing

“Hur…hur…”

“Stop … stop … will you” Dana frantically urged Ben as she saw Alfred walking towards them. Lara and Sarah looked in Dana’s direction of gaze and decided it was time to get some more ingredients and gave the slip.

Ben noted their direction of gaze when he saw Dana panicking but continued to make a ruckus. ‘He had to take care of this today or his woman might have to panic every Saturday. What if?’ Ben didn’t even realize that he had classed her as ‘his woman’ Seeing Alfred was nearing, Dana wanted to leave as well. She quickly told Ben to put the veggies in the first portion in 2 minutes and was about to head towards the store when Ben caught her wrist and pulled her back.

“Where to?”

Dana looked at him in confusion.

“Dana dear, share the joke… we’re more like family, aren’t we?” Alfred smiled blatantly as he reached out to hug her shoulders to show familiarity. Dana flinched as she closed her eyes and shrank, but Alfred’s chubby hands didn’t fall. When she opened her eyes, she saw Alfred smiling clasping his hands “Carry on…carry on… we must hurry, the dining room doors are about to open. I will see if the kids need me” The smile vanished into a sinister glint the minute he turned his back to them ‘Heh! Threatening me, I will show you who’s’ Boss’.

Dana didn’t know that while she closed her eyes, Ben had stepped forward and whispered “You should know where your hands can and cannot rest or you won’t know how the gates of Somersby closed”.

They cooked the next two batches of sauce without events except for Ben and Daniel exchanging swords with their eyes while Dana was refilling the buckets Daniel bought back with sauce.

“Do you remember me?” Ben couldn’t hold it in any longer.

“You mean we’ve met before?” Dana looked at Ben in surprise. Ben nodded with a smile although he felt pain that she didn’t remember him.

“Is it at a convention?” Dana asked doubtfully.

Ben shook his head.

Before either of them could say anything, Dana spotted Mrs Appleton walking towards her awkwardly.

“Auntie Bess” Dana called as she neared them.

“Have you finished the sauces for the evening?” Auntie Bess asked in a fluster.

“What is it? What happened?” Dana asked calmly holding her hand.

“Oh dear… oh dear… oh my girl… it’s a disaster” Auntie Bess whispered on the verge of tears.

“What is it? Tell me, it might not be that bad. The sauces are all ready, they just need to be refilled when the buckets come back.” Dana tried to calm her.

“It hopeless dear girl. Joe tried to turn the dishwasher and it’s not working. We don’t have enough plates and cutlery”

“Is that all?” Dana smiled reassuringly. Don’t you worry, keep serving and get Joe to bring the used plates to the kitchen washing up room.”

“That space is only one person wide where the sink is… no … no I can’t get you to do it”

“That’s alright… I’ll get Lara. We’ll wash and wipe them and send them out quickly”

“No need. We’ll do it together” Ben spoke for the first time since Auntie Bess came.

“Are you sure?” She looked at Ben with an unconvinced gaze.

“Let them get on with the pasta, we’ll take care of this” Ben reassured.  My friend can help with the clearing and redistributing of plates and cutlery” Ben signaled Shadow over.

“Thank you my dear girl” Auntie Bess hugged Dana almost breaking off in tears.

Dana and Ben followed Auntie Bess into the washing area. She showed were the detergent, gloves and plugs were. Dana put the plugs in one sink, added detergent and opened the tap to fill it with water. She handed a dry towel to Ben “You dry them and place them on this trolley and push it out for Joe”

“Miss” Joe called from the outside. Ben opened the door and pulled the trolley with used plates towards the sink.

“Joe come over to the other door, we’ll push the washed plates and cutlery to you.” Dana instructed Joe as she started busying her herself with washing. Ben wiped them and placed them on the trolley and once it was full he pushed it out the other door.

As they were washing the final set, Ben bought up the topic that was on the top of mind again.

“Dana, do you really not remember me?”

Dana scrunched her eyebrows still concentrating on washing and started talking out loud “You said it was not a convention, are you a doctor?”

“No”

“Then do you work at Holy Cross?”

“No”

“Did I conduct a training event for your company?”

“No”

“Have you visited Dorsen public hospital’s counselling clinic?”

“No”

“I mean as a bystander with anyone?”

“No”

“Are you member of St Anthony’s church”

“No”

Dana ran through all the list of places where could have made acquaintances. She really couldn’t think of anything else.

Ben lips curled up as he read the message from the soft vibrations from his watch telling him that Shadow was on guard outside the door and everyone else had left the kitchen area.

“I really can’t think of anywhere else? Why don’t you give me a clue or tell me your name?” Dana suggested as she pursed her lips tightly trying to remember if their paths had crossed.

“So, you really don’t remember me?” Ben asked as he walked a step closer to Dana.

Dana looked at him as she looked the pulled the plug in the sink and shook her head and then paused shaking her head as she thought of Lara’s previous comment. “Do you work with Lara? Has she offended you?” She carefully asked as she turned to face Ben.

“Who’s Lara?” Ben asked as he stepped closer.

Dana had no choice but to move backwards “Look you’re scaring me. I really don’t remember you. I can apologize if I have offended you”

Dana’s back hit the wall, she couldn’t more any further.

“I’ll give you a clue” Ben lowered his head to her ears and asked in a gentle tone, blowing hot air on her ear lobes “How is it fair that you don’t remember me, while I become sleepless thinking about you?”

Dana’s eyes were wide open, she could hear her heart beating loudly. She raised her hands to push this unreasonable person in front of her away. Ben caught her hands and pinned them above her head. He held her between him and the wall.

“Let me remind you”

He lowered his head again and grabbed her lips and kissed her passionately. Sensing her resistance, he tyrannically kissed her no matter how she tried to dodge, he would catch her lips. Kissing her madly, lips entwined, bit by bit taking over all her senses, he gradually broke her mental defenses and pried open her teeth, tangling his tongue with hers, deepening the kiss, sinking into her sweetness. Her entire body became soft. He could feel her breath becoming shallow and pulled back in hesitation. He looked at her satiated daze and swollen lips, his lips curled up; he held her hands with one hand. He raised her chin with the other hand to meet his eyes, caressed her swollen lips with his thumb and asked in a deep husky voice “Remember me?”

Dana was still staring at him in a daze ‘This kiss… this taste… a voice rang in her memory “Benjamin Adalase”. Her eyes widened as the memory of that night hit her.

“Mr… Mr. Adalase” She mumbled.

“It’s Ben for you” Ben touched his forehead with hers, breathing heavily. His voice was still raspy from their brief combat.

Dana snapped out of the daze and started to struggle. He pinned her back, he hadn’t had enough of her sweetness, her taste which he was pinning for over the last 4 weeks.

“You…”

Before she could say another word, the man seized her lips again. This time his actions were extremely punitive and potent. He dove directly into her mouth, like the hurricane, awakening all her sensual desires and quenching his thirst. How long they kissed for, he didn’t know. He could feel his woman becoming limp and she was running out of air. ‘Damit! She didn’t even know how to breathe while kissing.’ He cursed as he reluctantly left her lips and looked at her, satisfied with dazed look; he caressed her swollen lips, bit her earlobes in a tantalizing manner and whispered into her ears in a sexy, hoarse voice-

 “This is to never forget me again”.

Ben let go of her as he knew his lower half was responding; if this continued, he would be embarrassed or he would do something he regretted. He was more worried of the latter. Dana stared at him in resentment breathing heavily.

“You owe me a dinner, remember?” Ben had a roguish smile

“Got to hell, you bastard” Dana pushed him furiously

He pulled her into his embrace holding her by her waist “Yes, he’s your personal Bastard!” he whispered into her ears with a chuckle.

She kept struggling, cursing herself for being lured into the lion’s den.

“Keep moving and kissing won’t be the only thing we do here” Ben warned through gritted teeth; He was struggling to rein in the demons of desire she was unleashing with her unintentional actions.

Shocked, Dana stopped moving and raised her head to look at him in fear.

“Tell me, when are we having dinner? Or shall we continue?”

“No… no … dinner. I promise”

“Monday evening at 6?”

“Yes… yes”

“I will pick you up from work” Ben continued as he looked at her with narrowed eyes “and if you give me the runner, we will celebrate Monday night in your bed… agreed?”

“No… no … dinner… I will treat you” Dana gasped nervously.

Ben took her phone from her jumpsuit pocket and punched his number in… rang his phone before releasing her.

“See you on Monday”

He walked out of the room with a beat in his step and his lips curled up.

Dana stood there leaning against the wall trying to calm herself. She couldn’t believe how a perfect gentleman could turn into a beast in the next second. What confused her even more was her own response. She didn’t hate his touch; she wasn’t repulsed even when he had his tongue stuck inside her mouth but rather enjoyed it.’

“Urgh!” She shook her head in annoyance and sat on the floor.