Attraction aimed at the man holding me here is all wrong. It’s not against the rules, it’s against everything I thought I knew about myself.
“You cook like this often?” I ask, keeping my voice level, as if I’m not tracking every movement.
“When I have time,” he says. “And when I don’t trust anyone else to do it right.” A pause. “It helps clear my head.”
That catches me.
I glance over before I think better of it. His focus stays on the stove, sleeves rolled to his forearms, ink shifting with the flex of muscle beneath skin. The tattoos read differently here. Less like a warning. More like something earned through repetition rather than display.
I slide the vegetables into a bowl and set them within reach. He nods once and tips them into the pan. Sausage follows. Then spices I recognize by smell before sight. Paprika. Cayenne. Bay leaf.
The scent blooms fast, warm, and familiar, and I resent how grounding it is.
“You can stir,” he says, handing me the spoon. “Keep it moving so it doesn’t scorch.”
I take it. Our fingers brush for a fraction of a second, but neither of us reacts. My pulse does.
I stir while he steps back, giving me room without hovering, then moves to the sink to rinse rice. The rhythm settles around us. Oil sizzles. The spoon scrapes the bottom of the pan. The sounds layer over each other until the bunker fades at the edges.
“You’re not worried I’ll throw this at you?” I ask lightly.
“Obviously not,” he says, dry.
That answers more than the question. We aren’t going to small talk.
We work in silence after that. No music. No filler conversation. Just shared space and an unspoken agreementnot to trip over each other. He checks the pot, adjusts the heat, tastes once, then again.
When he nods to himself, I smile to myself at his humanness. Approval, even over something small, seems like something he gives sparingly.
He plates the food and sets one dish in front of me before taking the other. There’s no ceremony or hesitation.
He gestures toward the small hightop tucked against the wall. “After you.”
We sit across from each other, close enough to register presence without turning it into a standoff. It’s a strange middle ground, where we’re no longer just strangers, but nowhere near anything safe to define.
“Eat,” he says. “It’s better hot.”
I do. Because I’m hungry. Because the smell is impossible to ignore. Because my body is exhausted from staying braced, and the simple act of being fed lowers something in me that I wasn’t prepared to give up.
The first bite makes my shoulders loosen before I can stop it. Smoky heat. Deep, balanced spice. Andouille with just enough bite. Red beans and rice made by someone who understands restraint as well as intensity.
I don’t comment right away. He doesn’t leave space for it, and I don’t push.
The food settles slowly, steadying more than hunger. The sensation unsettles me. It feels like something being returned that I hadn’t consciously realized I’d started denying myself.
“That was…” I pause, then look up. “Perfect. It’s my favorite meal, apparently.”
He shrugs, but there’s a faint pull at the corner of his mouth. “Thought you might need something solid.”
That’s it. No follow-up. No explanation. Care, offered in a way that doesn’t ask for acknowledgment.
The comment reaches into my soul and squeezes out any resolve I thought I had left. It’s not an apology or compensation for what he’s done to me. It’s something adjacent to both, and more, somehow.
I want to ask questions. About my father. About how cooking became his outlet. About why this feels like a temporary ceasefire instead of a tactic.
But I don’t. Not yet. Too much too quickly will do the opposite of what I’m hoping to do.
I study him quietly, trying to reconcile the man in front of me with the one who dragged me into this, bound and blindfolded. Both exist. Neither cancels the other. The realization is uncomfortable in a way I don’t bother unpacking.
