Page 179 of Modern Romance June 2025 1-4

‘You don’t think I would be handy in the kitchen,belleza?’ A mocking smile curled Emilio’s lips. The way he sauntered over to stand before her made Jasmine think of the man from the club: predatory and fun; laid-back. Over the last two days she hadn’t been able to see that man at all, but tonight he was peeking through again.

‘I don’t.’

He narrowed his eyes and everything below her waist coiled. ‘Care to bet on it?’

‘You’ve never washed a dish in your life.’ It would take nothing at all to close the small space between them and kiss him. And she wanted to. Just as she had wanted to in the club and as she had wanted to outside SOP.

‘I don’t need to,’ Emilio replied. ‘I don’t know if you heard, there are machines for that these days.’

‘So you’re telling me you can cook.’ Disbelief was clear in her voice, a smile tugging at her lips. She always tried to be so in control, but around Emilio everything was heightened. She smiled more, laughed more, grew impossibly angry or annoyed. He didn’t let her feel anything in small measures. Not even pleasure.

‘I can cook you anything you’d like.’

‘Yeah, right.’

‘Who do you think feeds me?’

‘I thought you just grew satiated on wine and the suffering of the little man.’

‘I’m going to make you eat those words.’

‘Or maybe one of you could lay the table so we all could eat?’ Her mother reappeared in the kitchen, holding a Dutch oven. Jasmine had completely forgotten she was even there. She was taken back to that night at the club when she’d forgotten about the dancing bodies and loud music. It had all faded into nothing around Emilio.

‘Let me take that,’ Emilio said hurriedly. He took the Dutch oven over to the table while Jasmine quickly set down plates and cutlery. Behind his back, her mother gave her a nod of approval.

‘It’s nothing fancy,’ Angela warned Emilio when they all sat around the table. He had moved his place setting from the end of the table to beside Jasmine.

‘It’s perfectly fine, Mom.’ This simple dish—sausage, spiced rice and a mish-mash of vegetables—was part of who Jasmine was. She wasn’t going to hide that from Emilio, and she wanted to know now, at the start, if he would have a problem with it. Growing up, her mother had magically turned inexpensive ingredients into delicious dishes that Jasmine would ask for again and again. It hadn’t mattered how cheap the food was when it had made her mother smile to hear her daughter ask for it.

‘You don’t have to eat that way any more, Jasmine, and I certainly don’t want to. Let’s take your mother to a nice restaurant instead.’

Jasmine didn’t want another Richard. She had been so blind to so many of his flaws during their relationship. Hidden parts of herself to make him comfortable. She didn’t want a repeat.

She watched Emilio serve her mother first, then her and lastly himself. When he finally ate a morsel, he didn’t complain.

‘This is delicious, Angela,’ he said. A warmth spread in Jasmine’s chest at his words.

‘You think so?’ Angela beamed. Jasmine knew that it hurt her mother that, no matter how hard she’d tried, Richard had never liked the food she prepared. In just a few minutes, Emilio had put a smile on her mother’s face in a way her ex-fiancé never had.

‘Yes.’ Jasmine could have sworn that Emilio looked almost wistful for moment before he turned his attention to her and placed a warm hand on her back. ‘Are you okay?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then why aren’t you eating?’

Because she was comparing him to Richard and feeling guilty about doing so when he was nothing like him.

‘I could make you something else if you’re feeling unwell,’ Emilio offered. Jasmine felt her heart skip a beat. In that moment she had no doubt she could ask for whatever she needed and Emilio would see that she had it. She caught a warm look in her mother’s eye that told her Angela thought the same.

‘I’m fine,’ she said hastily and put a forkful into her mouth.

Her mother’s smile didn’t fade. ‘Do you like to cook, Emilio?’

‘I do. It makes me feel closer to my mother.’ That wistfulness Jasmine had seen before was back, but this time he didn’t attempt to hide it.

‘Is that something you do together?’ Angela asked. Jasmine was surprised by how happy it made her to watch them interact, see the tender way Emilio conversed with her mother. How comfortable her mother seemed. Dinners with Richard had never been this easy, this light.

Maybe this was a test, but so far Emilio was passing with flying colours.

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