"Hey, you're back."
Ava looked up from the stove with a grin when she heard the door.
"Something smells incredible," Cole said, dropping his bag and heading straight for the kitchen. "What are we working with tonight?"
He walked in like he lived there — which he did, technically, though the old version of him would have hovered at the doorway and found an excuse to disappear into his room. That Cole was gone. This one pulled up to the counter and looked at what she had going like he belonged there.
Ava blinked at him.
Last night he'd been different. Tonight he was doing it again — walking into her space, easy and unbothered, like the shy guy who used to practically sprint past her in the hallway had been replaced by someone else entirely.
"You always just walk into people's kitchens?" she asked.
"Only when it smells like that." He nodded at the stove. "Did you eat already or are we doing this together?"
Ava pointed at the bags on the counter — tomatoes, beef, broccoli, a few other things she'd picked up that afternoon.
"I bought more than I needed. If you want in, you're in."
Cole looked at the bags, then looked at her apron.
"You bought, I'll cook."
Ava stared at him. "You cook?"
"You seem surprised."
"I've lived with you for months and you've never once touched that stove."
"Fair." He reached toward her with both hands to untie the apron strings at her back.
Ava stepped back fast. "What are you doing?"
"I need the apron."
She looked at him. He looked back, completely straight-faced.
She untied it herself and held it out at arm's length.
Cole took it with a grin and tied it around his own waist. The distance between them had been maybe ten centimeters at the closest point. Ava was aware of every one of them.
"Go sit down," he said. "I'll call you when it's ready."
Ava retreated to the living room with more speed than she'd intended and dropped onto the sofa. She pressed the back of her hand against one cheek, which was warmer than it should have been.
She thought: are guys his age all like this now? Because this is genuinely difficult to deal with.
Through the kitchen doorway she could see Cole moving — washing the ingredients, setting things out in order, handling everything with the kind of quiet competence that meant he'd actually done this before. Not fumbling around like someone figuring it out as they went. Actually cooking.
She'd heard people say there was something specific about watching a man who knew his way around a kitchen. She'd always thought that was a bit much.
She was revising that opinion.
Cole had learned to cook after marrying Vanessa, in his previous life. She couldn't stand the smell of oil and heat, so the kitchen had become his. He'd even spent time learning from the chef when he ran the restaurant, trying to make better meals for her and the boy. He'd thought of it as love back then. Looking at it now, from the other side of everything that had happened, it was hard to find the right word for it. Foolish came close. Ten years of cooking for another man's family and feeling grateful for the chance.
He pushed the thought away and focused on the pan.
Thirty minutes later he carried everything out — stir-fried beef with peppers, tomatoes and eggs, a cold cucumber salad, and a bowl of clam soup — and set it all on the table.
"Dinner."
Ava came over, looked at the spread, and picked up her fork without a word. She tried the beef first.
Her eyes went wide.
"Okay. This is genuinely better than mine."
"It's not that serious."
"It absolutely is." She pointed her fork at him. "Where did you learn this? Culinary school?"
Cole kept a straight face. "I went to the same place as everyone who really knows what they're doing."
"Where's that?"
"Necessity."
Ava laughed — a real one, surprised out of her — and they fell into the easy rhythm of two people eating a good meal together without needing to fill every second with conversation. By the end, the table was clean.
Ava set her fork down, let out a small involuntary burp, and immediately covered her mouth with both hands, mortified.
Cole said nothing. Just picked up his bowl and kept his face completely neutral.
"I'll do the dishes," Ava said, standing up quickly.
"Knock yourself out. I've got work to do."
He headed to his room. Ava watched him go with the corner of her mouth pulling up without permission.
She thought: he really is kind of great, actually.
---
Cole sat down at his desk and opened the laptop.
He had posted ten thousand words the night before and needed to keep the momentum going. The novel was the long game — not the fastest money, but steady, and it kept him sharp and occupied during the hours when he wasn't moving other pieces.
He thought about the stocks briefly. The real estate. The way every plan he was building right now had a ceiling on it — how much he could buy, how much he could invest, how visible he could afford to be. Moving too fast or too big in any one direction would draw attention he didn't want yet. Big data didn't exist the way it would in ten years, but people with sharp eyes and the right connections could still notice patterns. The early stage had to be quiet.
Diversified. Patient. Invisible.
He opened the novel platform, logged in, and started typing. The story was already fully formed in his head — he'd read this particular fantasy series so many times in his previous life that the plot points were practically muscle memory. His fingers found the rhythm quickly and he settled in, the outside world going quiet around him.
---
Across the city, Rosewood was packed.
It was the weekend, which always pushed the dinner rush higher than usual, and the kitchen was running at full capacity. Serena Park was in there with them — she always was during peak hours. It was a habit she had kept since the beginning. During service she was the one watching for problems, coordinating between stations, tasting everything that went out. No dish left that kitchen without her sign-off.
Everyone was moving fast and focused, the controlled chaos of a busy service in full swing.
Then a tongue of fire shot out from the far end of the line, sparks scattering across the floor wherever it touched.
"Fire! Get the extinguisher!" The chef's voice cut through everything, sharp with panic. "It's spreading — move!"