"Dominic?" she said, unable to contain her astonishment.
He looked up, surprise giving way to a grin so genuinely delighted that June felt her heart turn over in her chest.
"June!" He set down the bowl and wiped his hands on a cloth that appeared to have seen better days. "You're early. I wanted to surprise you."
"Consider me thoroughly surprised." She stepped fully into the kitchen, taking in the disaster area that surrounded him. "What on earth are you doing? Where is the staff?"
"I've given them the evening off," Dominic replied, moving toward her with the easy grace that seemed inherent to him, regardless of setting. "As for what I'm doing—I'm bringing the world to you."
"I beg your pardon?"
He gestured around the kitchen, his blue eyes alight with enthusiasm. "You said you wished to see Greece, to travel. And while we shall certainly do so, I thought—why wait for summer when I could give you a taste of the world tonight?"
June stared at him, momentarily speechless. This was so far from anything she might have expected that she struggled to process it. "You're... cooking?" she managed finally.
"Don't sound so alarmed," he laughed. "I've become quite proficient during my travels. Well, perhaps not proficient, but at least competent enough not to poison us both."
June moved further into the kitchen, taking in the various dishes in preparation. On one counter sat what appeared to be a flat bread, sprinkled with herbs and drizzled with oil. A pot on the stove emitted a rich, garlicky aroma that made her mouth water despite her confusion.
"I had no idea you could cook," she said, watching as he returned to his whisking.
"One of my many hidden talents," Dominic replied, the dimple in his cheek deepening as he smiled. "Though I confess, Mrs. Braithwaite nearly had an apoplexy when I banished her from her domain."
June lifted an eyebrow. "I can imagine. I'm surprised she didn't simply refuse to leave."
"I may have employed my most ducal tone," Dominic admitted, a mischievous light in his eyes. "The one I reserve for particularly recalcitrant Parliamentary committees and overly familiar social climbers."
The image of Dominic imperiously ordering his cook from her own kitchen was so absurd that June couldn't help but laugh. "You're utterly mad."
"Perhaps. Sit down." He gestured to a wooden chair at the servants' table. "Tell me about your afternoon while I finish this sauce."
June settled into the chair, watching as he returned to his work with unexpected competence. For all the chaos around him, his movements were surprisingly confident, his hands sure as they wielded knife and whisk.
"When did you learn to cook?" she asked, genuinely curious.
"Here and there, over the years," he replied, adding something to the sauce that filled the kitchen with a new, exotic scent. "A summer in Greece, a winter in Spain, three months in Damascus."
"But why? Surely you traveled with servants."
Dominic glanced up from his work, his expression turning thoughtful. "At first, yes. But I discovered something rather quickly—one can only truly experience a destination when one lives as though one truly belongs there."
"And that required culinary skills?"
"Among other things." He moved to check another pot, stirring its contents with a wooden spoon. "I found that if I dismissed my retinue and lived as the locals did—ate what they ate, slept where they slept, worked as they worked—I gained insights no mere tourist could access."
June tried to imagine it—Dominic, with his aristocratic bearing and impeccable manners, living in some Mediterranean fishing village, sleeping in a humble cottage and hauling nets alongside weathered fishermen.
"It's difficult to picture," she admitted.
"I'm not surprised. Most of Society would find it equally incomprehensible." He sprinkled some herbs into the pot he was stirring. "They travel to say they've been somewhere, not to truly know a place or its people."
June watched him, struck by this new facet of her husband she'd never imagined existed. "And you wish to know places truly."
"I do." He looked up, meeting her gaze with an intensity that made her breath catch. "Life is too short for superficial experiences, wouldn't you agree?"
The words pierced June to the core.Life is too short. There it was again, that certainty of limited time that drove him. Yet instead of using it as an excuse for dissipation and excess, as many men might, he channeled it into a hunger for authentic experience, for depth rather than breadth.
He's wrong about dying so young. He must be. His mother doesn't believe it, and neither shall I.
