Page 77 of Thrones We Steal

Adelaide can afford a cook, but she chooses to do her own. She can afford a full live-in staff for that matter, but she resents the idea that wealth means you can’t do anything for yourself anymore. I suspect she also cherishes her privacy too much.

“Cullen skink.” She tosses me an apron. “You can chop the leeks.”

I take my place at the cutting board and we work in companionable silence. She directs me to saute the leeks and onions in butter and when those are soft, she adds a bowl of diced potatoes.

“Poach the haddock in the milk and cream,” she says. “But be careful you don’t burn it.”

To date, my experience in the kitchen has been minimal. Rosalind didn’t consider cooking a necessary pillar of education for the future bride of the crown prince. And she didn’t form a backup plan in the event said match didn’t work out.

I can, however, make a mean piece of toast.

Adelaide keeps an eye on me and my pan of fish and eventually directs me to gently break the filets apart.

“You want these in with the potatoes and leeks?” I say.

She nods and holds the lid while I pour the two mixtures together. After giving it a quick stir, she says, “We can talk while this simmers.”

As Nina crows about feeling good, Adelaide and I perch on two wooden stools near the stove. The soup smells like the sea. My stomach burbles in anticipation.

I scratch at a small scuff on the counter. “How do you get over someone?” The words tumble out. Preambles are overrated anyway.

She waits a beat until the silence becomes nice and uncomfortable, then says, “Darling, I could tell you a million things to try, but the only one that actually works is time.”

“Time.” That’s as bad as self-love.

“Breakups require a grieving process, just like any other kind of loss. Nothing will speed up the process.”

“How much time are we talking?”

“Every relationship is different. The stronger it was, the longer it takes.”

“It’s been weeks. I hoped I’d feel better by now.”

“You have a hard time letting people in. When you eventually do, your attachment is strong, which in turn makes letting go that much harder.”

“There’s got to be a way to speed up the process.”

“Well, you could always consider taking a new lover.”

My laugh is abrupt. “You make it sound like shopping for a new pair of shoes.”

“It’s even more fun.” She winks. “There is an exceptionally enticing option living right under your nose. He might be just the ticket.”

It takes me a second to process this. It finally clicks into place that she means Henry. My disdain for preambles has landed me in this situation. Right now, I hold the status of giant ass. “I, um, I wasn’t—well, I wasn’t referring to Beck.” I mumble this to the countertop, as though it could somehow help me.

She takes this in, and there’s no way she isn’t shocked by it, because who in their right mind wouldn’t be, but she keeps her face an expressionless mask because that is Adelaide for you and I love her for it.

“If not Beck, then who?”

I wince at this. Who isn’t relevant to the conversation, and I hoped to avoid getting into that.

This tiny facial expression tells her all she needs to know however.

“Oh,” she says. “Oh.”

I don’t like the intonation.

“I suppose it was to be expected,” she says.

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