Chapter 143

Chapter 143
Edward POV


I'd been so focused on what I thought I needed from her—an heir, a wife who could navigate society functions, someone who wouldn't embarrass the Frost name—that I'd completely missed what she'd been trying to give me. She'd been trying to take care of me. In her own quiet way, with whatever tools she had available, she'd been trying to create moments of connection, to build something real between us despite the transactional nature of our marriage.

And I'd thrown it away. Literally and figuratively, I'd taken her offerings and treated them as inconveniences, as distractions from what I considered important.

The worst part was that I couldn't even claim ignorance. I'd known, on some level, that she was lonely in that house. I'd seen the way she'd light up when I'd come home early, the way she'd try to engage me in conversation over dinner, the small gestures she'd make that I'd dismissed as her trying too hard. I'd known, and I'd chosen not to care because caring would have required me to acknowledge that our marriage was more than a business arrangement, that she was more than a means to an end.

I'd told myself I was being practical, that emotions had no place in the kind of strategic alliance we'd entered into. I'd convinced myself that maintaining distance was the professional thing to do, that getting emotionally involved would only complicate matters when the time came to fulfill our primary objective—producing an heir.

What a fucking idiot I'd been.

I looked across the table at Anna now, at this woman who'd somehow maintained enough generosity of spirit to invite me into her home, to teach me how to shop for groceries, to stand beside me in her kitchen and patiently guide me through the basics of cooking. After everything I'd done, after all the ways I'd hurt her and dismissed her and treated her as less than human, she'd still opened her door to me. She'd still smiled when I'd correctly identified the ingredients she'd need. She'd still let me help, had trusted me enough to hand me a knife and assign me tasks, had created this moment of domestic intimacy that I'd never known I was missing until now.

The realization hit me with the force of a physical blow: I'd been chasing the wrong thing all along. I'd been so focused on securing my inheritance, on producing an heir to satisfy my father's will and my family's expectations, that I'd completely missed what was actually valuable. Anna herself. Not Anna as a vessel for my children, not Anna as a prop in my carefully constructed life, but Anna—this talented, resilient, quietly strong woman who made art and fought for the people she loved and somehow still had enough kindness left to teach a fool like me how to pick out baby bok choy.

Where Anna was—that's where I wanted to be. Not in the Frost Estate with its empty rooms and formal dinners and the constant weight of family expectations. Not in boardrooms or society functions or any of the other places I'd convinced myself were important. Just here, in this modest apartment, eating home-cooked food at a simple table, watching the way the light caught her hair and made her eyes seem impossibly blue.

This was what I'd been missing. This feeling of being cared for, of sharing space with someone who saw me as more than Edward Frost, heir and CEO. This sense of peace that came from doing something as mundane as washing vegetables together, of learning something new not because it would benefit my business but simply because it would please her to teach me.

I'd spent so many years believing that emotions were weaknesses, that attachment was a liability, that the only relationships worth maintaining were those that served a clear strategic purpose. My father had taught me that, had modeled it in his own cold marriage to my mother, had made it clear that feelings were for other people—people who didn't have empires to maintain and legacies to protect.

But sitting here now, I understood what my father had never grasped: he'd been wrong. Catastrophically, painfully wrong. The empire meant nothing if you had no one to share it with. The legacy was hollow if it was built on the systematic suppression of everything that made life worth living. Power and wealth and status were all well and good, but they couldn't keep you warm at night, couldn't make you laugh, couldn't create these moments of simple, perfect connection that made the rest of it bearable.

"Edward?"

Anna's voice pulled me back to the present, and I realized I'd been staring at my plate for who knew how long, lost in the labyrinth of my own thoughts and regrets. She was watching me with concern now, that furrow between her brows deepening, her fork frozen halfway to her mouth.

"You're not eating," she said, and there was uncertainty in her voice, a hint of the same vulnerability I'd seen in her expression that night with the noodles. "Is it... is the food not good?"

The question hit me like a punch to the gut. After everything, after all my criticism and dismissiveness and casual cruelty, she was still worried about whether she'd pleased me. Still seeking approval from the man who'd done nothing to earn the right to judge her cooking or anything else about her.

"No," I said, and my voice came out rougher than I'd intended, thick with emotions I didn't know how to name. "No, it's not that. It's too good, actually. So good that I'm sitting here wondering what the hell I've been eating for the past twenty-eight years of my life."

She blinked at me, clearly not sure how to interpret that, and I saw a small smile start to form at the corners of her mouth. "Are you saying my cooking is good enough to put Michelin-starred chefs out of business?"

The teasing note in her voice was deliberate, I could tell—a way of deflecting from the intensity of whatever she'd seen in my expression, of lightening the mood before things got too heavy. And I appreciated it, appreciated her instinct to give us both an escape route from emotions that felt too big for this small apartment.

"I think they should at least be concerned," I said, playing along, forcing my own voice to match her lighter tone. "Lucky for them you're an artist, not a chef."

"Lucky for them," she agreed, and now she was fully smiling, that genuine expression that transformed her entire face and made something in my chest feel like it was expanding beyond the capacity of my ribcage to contain it. "If you like it, you should eat more. I bought too much food anyway. There's no way I can finish all this by myself."

The casual statement hit harder than she probably intended. There's no way I can finish all this by myself. An acknowledgment of her solitude, of the fact that she was used to eating alone in this apartment, that this abundance of food was unusual for her because she typically cooked for one.

I picked up my fork again, taking another piece of spare rib, letting the flavors wash over me with renewed appreciation now that I wasn't drowning in my own guilt. "Anna," I said, and then paused, trying to figure out how to phrase what I wanted to ask without sounding desperate or presumptuous or any of the other things I definitely felt but didn't want her to see.

She looked up at me, waiting, those blue eyes patient and open in a way that made me feel simultaneously grateful and unworthy.

"Can I—" I stopped, started again. "Would it be okay if I... if we did this again? Not just tonight, but... regularly?"

The words came out more hesitantly than I'd intended, and I could hear the vulnerability in my own voice, could feel my heart rate accelerating as I waited for her response. This was important, I realized. This wasn't just about the food or even about spending time with her, though both of those things mattered. This was about asking permission to be part of her daily life, to occupy space in her routine, to be someone she thought about when she was planning meals or shopping for groceries.

This was about asking if I could belong here, with her, in this small apartment that somehow felt more like home than anywhere I'd ever lived.

Anna's expression shifted, something guarded sliding into place behind her eyes, and I saw her retreat slightly even though she didn't physically move. "Are you asking me to be your personal chef?"

The formality was deliberate, I knew—a way of creating distance, of reminding both of us that there were boundaries and complications and a thousand reasons why what I was asking wasn't simple. And she was right to be cautious, right to protect herself, because I'd given her every reason to expect that I'd hurt her again if given the chance.

But I couldn't let it go. Not this time.

"No," I said firmly, leaning forward slightly, trying to convey my sincerity through posture and eye contact since my words seemed inadequate. "No, that's not what I'm asking. I want to learn to cook with you. Not have you cook for me—cook with you. Like we did today."

I saw her processing that, saw the way she was trying to decide whether to believe me, and I pushed forward before I could lose my nerve.

"The truth is, all that takeout and restaurant food—it's full of additives and preservatives and God knows what else. It's not healthy." I paused, then added with deliberate vulnerability, "And you know I've always had stomach issues. I don't want them getting worse."

It was a weak excuse and we both knew it, but it gave her an out, a practical reason to say yes that didn't require her to acknowledge the emotional undercurrents of what I was really asking. I held her gaze, trying to convey everything I couldn't say out loud—that I wanted this, wanted her, wanted the opportunity to be part of her life in whatever capacity she'd allow.