Page 52 of Trigger

God,he looked so… Lost? Sad?

“Look,”I said with a sigh. “How about I make us dinner before I leave? It will take awhile for my clothes to wash, so I’m stuck here anyway. I could cook ussomething nice. What do you say?”

Helooked at me suspiciously. “Cook? Are you saying that you can cook?”

Isnorted. “Like Gordon Ramsay.”

“Idon’t believe you.”

“Well,there’s only one way to find out, isn’t it?”

Hedidn’t say no, so I headed to the kitchen before he could change his mind. Iopened the window to let the fresh air in, put on some music and quicklydecided on the menu, determined to impress him with my cooking skills.

I wasup to my elbow in veggies when he joined me in the kitchen, looking smug.

“Whatdid the chief say?” I asked him, although his expression already gave me ananswer.

“Wecan come to work tomorrow,” he said triumphantly. “What smells so amazing inhere?”

“Me?”I joked, raising the lid off the pot. “Or this?”

“Wow,”he murmured. “It looks great. What is it?”

“Courgettesau four en sauce tomate crémeuse.”

Hefrowned in confusion. “What?”

“Oh,sorry. My French pops up when I’m excited. It’s a creamy tomato sauce withbasil and zucchini.”

“Whyare you excited?”

“‘CauseI’m cooking for you, dummy.”

Herolled his eyes as I dipped the spoon into the sauce and blew on it beforebringing it to his mouth. When he tasted the sauce, his eyes widened insurprise.

“Youweren’t joking when you said you could cook,” he murmured, licking his lips ina way that had to be forbidden by law.Had to be.“Who taught you?”

Iraised my hand and wiped away the leftover sauce from his lip with my thumb.

“Maman.We would cook together every day after school. Well… until she got sick. Thenwe stopped cooking together, and I started cooking for her.”

“Whathappened?”

“Cancer.”

He puthis hand on my shoulder only to quickly pull it away as if it crossed aboundary of some kind.

“I’msorry.”

“It’sokay.”

Yearshad passed, but I still missed her. Her long, red hair. Her beautiful smile.The silky robes she wore, which smelled like her. An apple pie she used to makefor me when I was a kid. Objectively, she was a poor baker, but I would doanything to taste that burned apple pie one more time.

“Anyway,”I continued, draining the pasta. “After she had passed, I came to Norway tolive with my dad.”

“Is hestill alive?”

“Yeah.We keep in touch, but we’re not as close asmamanand I were. He’s adecent man. Just not a family man.”

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