Then she closes it halfway, keeping her hand on the edge of the door.
“I can’t really cook,” she says, and the sheepishness in her voice is so out of character from the woman who can stare down a boardroom without missing a beat that it almost hits me like a small punch.
“I mean… I can, technically. Like, if the other choice was starving to death. But it’s not good.”
I lean back against the couch, keeping it casual.
“Why not?”
Her shoulders lift in a small shrug that’s trying to make it nothing. “We traveled a lot when I was growing up. Restaurants, hotels, room service. It was just… always easier.”
I nod once like it makes perfect sense, because it does. And because I can hear what she isn’t saying out loud—how being raised always in motion makes certain things optional.
“I can cook something,” I say.
Her head turns, fast, surprise breaking through her nerves for the first time since I walked in with those bags.
“You can cook?”
I smile at her surprise. “Yes.”
She studies me like she’s waiting for the punchline.
I give it to her. “My mother insisted we learned so we wouldn’t be a burden on some poor woman one day.”
Amusement flickers in her eyes.
“That sounds like quite a task,” she says.
“Lord knows we made it harder than it had to be,” I tell her. “But she was a determined woman.”
She huffs a small laugh, and it eases something in the room, just a fraction. Then she looks back into the fridge like the reality is still sitting there, unimpressed.
“I would love to see that,” she says, and the words are almost sincere, almost warm. Then her mouth tightens again. “But I don’t really have anythingtocook either. I was out of town for a while and…”
I can see the embarrassment in the way she shifts her weight and taps her fingers against the fridge door, so I decide not to mention that she’s been back in town for at least two weeks.
I keep my tone easy. No judgment. No big deal.
“Then we order something.”
She closes the fridge and turns to face me fully, suspicion coming back. “Is that… all right? Safety-wise.”
“It’s fine,” I say. “I’ll make sure it is.”
Her eyes narrow slightly, but there’s relief in them.
She walks to a drawer beside the island, pulls it open and lifts out a thick stack of takeout menus instead.
She carries them over and drops them on the coffee table with a small thud, then shrugs like she’s daring me to judge her.
“I’m just a really bad cook,” she says, sheepish again.
I look at themenus, then back at her.
“You’re not a bad cook,” I say, flipping the top menu open like I’m evaluating it with the seriousness of a contract. “You’re an untrained cook.”
Her brows lift. “Is there a difference?”
