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“You’re going to burn them,” Kakashi said.
The oven beeped three times before Rin rolled her eyes at her husband’s unnecessary criticism. She opened the oven door and reached for the hot baking tray with a silicone-gloved hand.
As she carried the tray of steaming, puffed golden cookies, she casted Kakashi a smile. “Well? Do they look burnt?”
There was no taunt to her voice, only an admonishment as sweet as the sugary vanilla smells filling the kitchen. The cookies weren’t burnt. They weren’t going to burn as long as they followed the Nohara clan recipe that had made the best cookies for generations of holidays. Kakashi might’ve been a great cook, but he couldn’t school Rin when it came to this cookie recipe.
Kakashi narrowed his eyes at her so that Rin knew there was a scowl hidden behind his mask. “Maybe not this batch.”
“Why don’t you,” Rin said as she slid the cookie tray onto the stone counter, “make yourself useful and start decorating?”
She gave a nod to the previous batch already cooled and ready for the next step. Hiding a laugh behind clamped lips, she watched the expression change on Kakashi’s face. He didn’t want to decorate cookies. Honestly, she didn’t think he wanted to celebrate the holiday with her clan, but he wouldn’t just refuse her, either.
“Or,” Kakashi drawled, coming up behind Rin as soon as she parted from the metal tray, “we can take a break.”
When his arms wrapped snugly around her waist, Rin huffed a laugh. “And do what?”
She knew exactly what he was suggesting, but they had timing to consider here. After all, he was the one who’d just suggested they might mess this up. Kakashi had to know better. Still, he planted a wet kiss on her cheek, let the heat of it linger just like the heat soaking through Rin’s oven mitt, and gradually trailed his lips down Rin’s jaw. It was one of the rare occasions he’d slipped off his mask when they weren’t in the bedroom.
Rin’s breath hitched as she pulled her shaking hand from the oven mitt to grasp his hands linked at her waist. “Kakashi. We have to finish this.”
“I’d rather finish you off.”
Rin reached for the nearest icing tube with a snap of movement before wagging it over her shoulder at Kakashi. “Start decorating.”
Her cheeks burned as she set up the cooled cookie tray with new mounds of dough for the next batch. Fortunately, she was able to cover it with the heat wave from the open oven as she placed the cookies inside. At her back, Kakashi violently squeezed the icing tube in the air, a display of his displeasure. Rin giggled. He wasn’t used to losing. But maybe, if he reframed this entire scenario in his mind, he’d realize he was winning by doing things Rin’s way.
“Kakashi,” Rin said, pressing against his side to spread the cookies in an array which could be easily decorated, “if we don’t finish these today, who do you think will give Kushina and Minato-sensei their gift first?”
“Who–” Kakashi snapped his lips shut before side-eyeing her.
Rin smiled up at him. “Hmm?”
“Well…” Kakashi said with a lazy shrug, “I suppose we can finish this.”
“Thank you,” Rin said victoriously as she spread a thin line of white icing across the first cookie. “Then we’ll take Minato-sensei and Kushina their share–”
“They’re going to feed them all to Naruto.”
“Kushina likes my holiday cookies. And Minato-sensei always has at least one.”
“He’s too nice not to.”
“And then we can come back here,” Rin said with a coy smile, running her hand up and down the warm fabric wrapped around Kakashi’s muscular arm, “and do whatever you want.”
Kakashi tilted his chin and raised a brow at her. “All before Obito gives our sensei his gift.”
“Yes, Kakashi,” Rin groaned with a fond roll of her eyes. Then she slapped his ass. “If you move fast enough. Get piping!”
As she giggled and turned to the oven beeping once again, Kakashi grumbled about Rin getting so bossy the longer they were married. There was far less heat to his words than Rin found in the open oven.
It didn’t even compare to the warmth in her heart she found whenever she shared this clan tradition for the holidays with her husband.