Chapter 12
He leaned toward her.
“I promise you, next time, if it comes down to you or Samantha, I’ll choose you first. All right?”
Katherine didn’t answer. She only looked at him.
The stillness in her eyes was too clear, too knowing. It was the look of someone who had already seen through a promise before it was spoken.
Nicholas felt that strange panic again.
He wanted to say more, to patch over the moment somehow.
But Katherine had already closed her eyes, as if even looking at him was exhausting.
He sat there for a moment, then softened his tone.
“There is something I need your help with.”
Her lashes trembled, but she did not open her eyes.
“Samantha hasn’t had any appetite these past few days. Today she suddenly said she wanted Southern-style crab meat meatballs and tea-smoked shrimp. The chefs tried, but they can’t get the taste right. You’ve always been best at making that kind of food.”
He paused.
“Can you get up and make it for her? Maybe it’ll help her eat.”
Katherine opened her eyes slowly.
“Do you know why I’m good at Southern food?” she asked.
Nicholas frowned, clearly never having thought about it.
A faint, bitter smile touched her lips.
Because in the first years of their marriage, Nicholas had been so depressed after Samantha’s wedding that he could barely eat. Katherine had tried everything, and he rejected it all. Then one night, half-drunk, he murmured that he wanted Southern food. Something light.
Katherine had treated that one drunken sentence like treasure.
She had paid a fortune to bring in cooks from Charleston and Savannah. She burned her hands, cut her fingers, practiced for weeks until she finally mastered dish after dish. The first time Nicholas took several extra bites, she had nearly cried with joy.
Only later did she accidentally learn that Samantha’s mother had been from Savannah.
Samantha’s favorite food was Southern food.