Chapter Twenty-Three
Everything in its Place
Emmie
“Okay, stop. I can’t watch this anymore.”
Crew glares at me over the cutting board, knife frozen mid-chop. “I’m cutting an onion. What’s wrong?”
“Your technique is all off. You’re going to lose a finger.”
“I’ve disarmed suspects with my bare hands. I think I can handle an onion.”
“Disarming suspects and dicing onions are two very different skill sets.” I hip-check him out of the way and take the knife. “Here. Watch. You want to keep the root end intact, see? Then slice horizontally, then vertically, then across. Perfect dice every time.”
He watches with the intensity he probably reserves for tactical briefings. “Why does the root end matter?”
“It holds everything together. Keeps the onion from falling apart while you cut.”
“That seems… unnecessarily complicated.”
“That’s cooking, babe. Controlled chaos.”
The endearment slips out before I can stop it. We both freeze.
“I mean—” I start.
“It’s fine,” he says quickly. “It’s, uh… fine.”
We stand there for a moment, the kitchen suddenly feeling very small.
“So.” I clear my throat. “You want to learn to make this or not? Because I need help if I’m going to test three recipes tonight.”
“I said I’d help.” He takes the knife back, positioning his hands the way I showed him. “What are we making again?”
“Filet mignon with a red wine reduction, truffle mashed potatoes, and a chocolate soufflé that’ll either be perfect or a complete disaster.” I tie my apron tighter. “It’s for the ‘Cooking to Impress’ chapter. Date night food.”
“That seems like a lot of food for two people.”
“It’s about the experience, not the quantity. Although—” I grin at him “—you’ll definitely be eating leftovers.”
He makes a noise that might be approval and starts chopping. His technique is still wrong, but he’s trying, and something about watching Crew Jensen—decorated FBI agent—carefully dicing an onion makes my chest feel tight.
Don’t, I tell myself. Don’t go there.
Too late. I’ve been going there for weeks.
“Okay, onions in the pot for the reduction.” I guide him through the next steps—searing the filets to get a perfect crust, building the red wine sauce, peeling and boiling the potatoes until they’re fork-tender.
He follows instructions with military precision, asking clarifying questions, taking mental notes.
“You’re actually pretty good at this,” I tell him.
“I’m good at following procedures.” He almost smiles. Almost.
While the potatoes simmer, we move on to the focaccia. Because what’s a fancy steak dinner without warm bread to soak up the sauce?
“You have to knead it,” I explain, dumping the shaggy dough onto the floured counter. “Work the gluten. Make it smooth and elastic.”
“Show me.”
I demonstrate—heel of my hand pushing forward, fold, turn, repeat. The rhythm is meditative, familiar. I’ve been making bread since I was six years old, standing on a step stool in my grandmother’s kitchen.
“Your turn.”
Crew approaches the dough like it might attack him. He presses down too hard, and it sticks to his palm.
“Gentle,” I say. “It’s not a suspect. You don’t have to subdue it.”
“This is harder than it looks.” His mouth twists with a wry look.
“Here.” I move behind him, reaching around to place my hands over his. “Like this. Feel the rhythm?”
He goes very still.
I’m pressed against his back, my arms alongside his, my hands guiding his through the motions. I can feel the tension in his shoulders, the way his breathing has gone shallow.
“Emmie.” His voice is rough.
“Just feel it,” I murmur. “Push, fold, turn. Push, fold, turn.”
We knead together, my body moving with his, and it’s—
It’s a lot.
“I think I’ve got it,” he says after a minute, and I step back quickly, my face burning.
“Right. Yeah. Good. You’ve got it.”
We don’t look at each other.
The focaccia goes into a bowl to rise. The filets are seared and resting, the mashed potatoes keeping warm on the back burner.
I start separating eggs for the soufflé, hyper-aware of Crew moving around the kitchen behind me, cleaning up, putting things away, being helpful in a way that makes my heart hurt.
“Can I ask you something?” he says.
“Sure.”
“Why cooking?”
I pause, chocolate in hand. “What do you mean?”
“Why is this your thing? The cookbooks, the recipes, all of it. Why cooking specifically?”
It’s a real question. Not small talk, not surface level. He actually wants to know.
“My grandmother,” I say, resuming my stirring. “She taught me. Every Sunday, I’d go to her house and we’d cook together—whatever she felt like making that day. Could be anything. Tamales, pot roast, homemade pasta. She said cooking was how you showed people you loved them.”
“That’s where the cookbook idea comes from. Cooking for your person.”
“Yeah.” I smile, remembering. “She used to say anyone can say ‘I love you,’ but not everyone can make you a meal that tastes like home. Food is love you can hold in your hands.”
Crew is quiet for a moment. “She sounds wonderful.”
“She was. She passed a few years ago. Cancer.” I blink back the unexpected sting of tears. “Sorry. I don’t know why I’m—”
“Don’t apologize.”
“I just miss her sometimes. Especially when I’m cooking. It feels like she’s still here, you know? Like I’m carrying on something that matters.”
He moves closer. Not touching, but near. Present.
“What about you?” I ask, desperate to shift the focus. “What’s your thing? What do you love?”
The question seems to catch him off guard. “I don’t… I’m not sure I have a thing.”
“Everyone has a thing.”
“I have routines. Procedures. That’s not the same as loving something.”
“What about before? When you were a kid, what did you want to be?”
Another pause. Longer this time.
“I didn’t really get to think about that,” he finally says. “When you’re bouncing between homes, you don’t dream about the future. You just try to survive the present.”
My heart cracks a little. “Crew…”
“It’s fine. It was a long time ago.” He picks up a dish towel and folds it with unnecessary precision. “I think that’s why I like structure so much. When everything around you is chaos, you create your own order. Your own safety.”
“That makes sense.”
“It also makes me—” He stops and shakes his head.
“Makes you what?”
“Difficult. To be around. To be with.” He sets down the towel. “I know I’m not easy, Emmie. I know the way I am is… a lot. The checking, the counting, the needing everything to be just so. Most people can’t handle it.”
“You’re not that hard to be around. You’re just… particular. There’s nothing wrong with knowing what you need.”
“Most people would disagree.”
“Most people are idiots.”
That startles a laugh out of him—a real one, full and warm. I want to bottle the sound.
“Come on.” I grab two beers from the fridge—the fancy craft kind I bought last week—and hand him one. “Dinner’s got another hour. Let’s go sit.”
* * *
We end up on the couch, facing each other, the city lights twinkling through the window behind us. Murphy wedges himself between us, purring like a small motor.
“Okay,” I say, tucking my feet underneath me. “Let’s play a game.”
“What kind of game?”
“Questions. We take turns asking each other things. You have to answer honestly.”
He narrows his eyes. “This feels like an interrogation.”
“It’s not an interrogation. It’s getting to know each other. We’ve been living together for weeks, and there’s still so much I don’t know about you.”
“You know plenty.”
“I know you check the locks four times, and you like your eggs scrambled, and you have a secret soft spot for Murphy even though you pretend he annoys you. I don’t know the real stuff.”
“That is real stuff.”
“The deep stuff, Crew. Come on. I’ll go first.” I take a sip of beer, considering. “What’s your happiest memory?”
He’s quiet for a long moment. I’m about to tell him he can pass when he speaks.
“Basic training graduation.”
“Really?”
“It was the first time I ever finished something. The first time I was part of something bigger than myself. I felt so accomplished.” He picks at the label on his beer. “My drill sergeant shook my hand and said he was proud of me. No one had ever said that to me before.”
The image breaks my heart—eighteen-year-old Crew, alone in the world, desperate for someone to be proud of him, to acknowledge how hard he had worked to get there.
“Your turn,” I say softly.
“What’s your biggest fear?”
I wasn’t expecting him to go deep so fast. “Um. Being alone, I guess. Ending up by myself with no one to cook for, no one to take care of. My whole family is so connected, so close, and the idea of not having that…” I trail off, inhale a big breath in.
“Your turn. What’s something you’ve never told anyone? ”
He takes a long pull of his beer. “Sometimes I talk to Murphy when you’re not home. Full conversations. I tell him about my day.”
I press my lips together, trying not to smile. “That’s adorable.”
“It’s pathetic.”
“It’s adorable. And Murphy is an excellent listener.”
“He is. Very nonjudgmental.” Crew’s mouth twitches. “My turn. What’s something you want but you’re afraid to ask for?”
The question hits close to home. I think about it—really think.
“To be chosen,” I finally say. “Not settled for. Not convenient. Actually chosen, by someone who wants me specifically. All my chaos and mess and too muchness.” I laugh, but it comes out shakier than I intended. “That sounds pathetic too.”
“It doesn’t.”
“What’s the most impulsive thing you’ve ever done?” I ask, steering our conversation away from the heaviness in my heart.
“Adding the girlfriend clause while you sat in my living room.” He actually laughs at that.
“That was impulsive? It was seventeen pages with color-coded tabs!”
“Adding the clause itself was impulsive. The rest of the document was ready.”
I’m laughing now, really laughing, and he’s smiling—that rare, soft smile that transforms his whole face—and I think this is what it could be like. This is what we could have.
If it were real.
We trade questions for another hour. Silly ones—favorite movie (he settles on Die Hard, which tracks), worst date ever (mine involved a guy who brought his mother), most embarrassing moment (his involves accidentally tackling the wrong person during a training exercise).
Serious ones—biggest regret, what we’d change about ourselves, what we want our lives to look like in ten years.
By the time the oven timer goes off, I feel like I know him. Really know him. The man underneath all the walls and routines and defensive mechanisms.
And I like him. God help me, I really like him.
* * *
Dinner is perfect.
The steaks are fall-apart tender, the focaccia golden and pillowy, the chocolate soufflé warm and rich.
Crew eats like a man who’s never had a home-cooked meal in his life—which, I realize with a pang, he probably hasn’t.
Not like this. Not made with love and attention and someone who wanted to feed him.
Wanted to make sure he felt nurtured and cared for.
“This is incredible,” he says around a mouthful of focaccia.
“Yeah?”
“This is the best thing I’ve ever eaten.”
“You’re just saying that because you helped make it.”
“I’m saying it because it’s true.” He looks at me across the table, and something in his expression makes my breath catch. “Thank you, Emmie.”
“For what?”
“For this. For—” He gestures vaguely. “All of it.”
I don’t know what to say, so I just smile and steal a bite of his mashed potatoes.
Later, after the dishes are done and the leftovers are stored in Crew’s precisely labeled containers, we end up on the couch. Some movie neither of us is really watching plays on the TV. Murphy is sprawled across both our laps like a furry bridge.
I don’t remember falling asleep.
One minute I’m watching the credits roll, and the next I’m blinking awake in the dim glow of the TV’s screensaver, my head on Crew’s shoulder, his arm draped loosely around me. We’re tangled together in a way that should feel awkward but doesn’t.
I should move. Go to my own bed. Put some distance between us before this starts to feel like something it isn’t.
I close my eyes instead.
The sound wakes me—a low, guttural moan that makes my blood run cold.
“Crew?” I sit up, disoriented, heart pounding. The apartment is dark now, the TV having shut itself off. “Crew, what’s—”
He’s rigid beside me, every muscle locked tight. His breathing is ragged, shallow. And then he makes that sound again—not a moan, I realize. A whimper. Raw and animal and terrified.
“Crew, wake up.” I grab his shoulders, shaking him. “You’re dreaming. It’s just a dream.”
His hands are fisted at his sides, his jaw clenched so hard I can hear his teeth grinding. He’s somewhere else—somewhere terrible, somewhere I can’t reach.
“Crew!” I grab his shoulders, shaking. “Wake up. Please, wake up. You’re safe. You’re home. You’re—”
His eyes fly open. His breathing is ragged, his skin damp with sweat, his pupils blown wide.
“Hey.” I cup his face in my hands, forcing him to focus. “It’s me. It’s Emmie. You’re okay. You’re in your apartment. You’re safe.”
“Emmie?” His voice is wrecked.
“I’m here. I’m right here.”
He stares at me for a long moment, chest heaving. Then something in him crumbles, and he drops his forehead to my shoulder, his whole body shaking.
“I’m sorry,” he manages. “I’m sorry, I—”
“Don’t apologize. Don’t you dare apologize.” I wrap my arms around him, holding tight. “It’s okay. I’ve got you. You’re okay.”
We stay like that for a long time. Me holding him. Him letting me.
Eventually, the shaking subsides. His breathing evens out. But he doesn’t pull away, and I don’t let go.
“Do you want to talk about it?” I ask quietly.
“No.”
“Okay.”
“It was—” He stops. Swallows. “Thanks for waking me up.”
“Of course.” I touch his jaw, stroke his cheek. “You okay?”
He nods once. “A few more minutes of cuddling?”
I smile. “Of course.”