It’s intimate. Domestic. Dangerous.
I part my lips and suck the chocolate off.
His eyes darken instantly.
“Good?” he asks, voice low.
“Burnt,” I laugh. “But sweet.”
He laughs too, and for a moment—between the chaos and the doomed ingredients—we are actually having fun.
“Careful, Sloane. Don’t burn down the kitchen. Again.”
The voice comes from my left.
Slick. Familiar.
I turn.
Joe.
Cohen goes still beside me. His back becomes a slab of granite.
“Worry about your own dish, Joe,” I say coolly.
But he leans on his station, ignoring Sarah, who is battling a boiling pot.
“Just saying… remember that time you tried to cook me a birthday dinner? That lemon chicken?”
He laughs loudly for the cameras, but his eyes are cold, aimed right at me.
“It was so dry I had to drink three liters of water. And you almost set the curtains on fire. Let’s face it—you were never good at taking care of a home. Or a man.”
My hands tremble.
The memory slices through me.
I’d spent the whole afternoon cooking. Wanted it perfect. He arrived two hours late, reeking of some woman’s perfume, and mocked me for the food and the mess.
He made me feel small.
Inadequate.
Not “woman enough.”
CRACK.
Cohen snaps an asparagus spear clean in half.
He turns to Joe.
Rage vibrates off him—pure, primal, animal fury.
“I think the real problem,” Cohen says, voice flat and deadly calm, “is men who think being taken care of is a right, not a partnership. Ever heard of gender equality?”
Joe’s smile flickers.
Then he pastes on another.
