A taste of something new

CHAPTER 29: A TASTE OF SOMETHING NEW.

RACHEL'S POV

I sit on the couch, waiting for Noah to return. The house is unusually quiet, and I find myself glancing at the clock every few minutes. My fingers trace the rim of my phone absentmindedly when it suddenly vibrates, making me jump from the sound.

I exhale softly in relief when I notice that it is just a phone.  An unknown number flashes on the screen. My instinct tells me to ignore it, but curiosity gets the best of me. I hesitate for a moment before swiping to answer.

        "Hello?" My voice comes out wary.

A sluggish, slurry voice responds on the other end, almost incoherent. It takes me a second to recognize it, but when I do, my heart clenches.

    "Rachel… Rachel, I—" There’s a pause, followed by a heavy sigh. "I'm so sorry… I shouldn't have said those words to you… I still—still love you. I promise that (burps) I promise to do better. We can both do it. I promise to release you from the shackles of that manipulator."

Liam.

My grip tightens around the phone. He sounds drunk. I feel a mixture of emotions—worry, confusion, and unease. Liam has never called me like this before. Ever since we started dating until I broke up with him, I have never seen him get drunk before. His words are slurred, but his emotions are painfully clear.

   "Liam… you should go home," I say softly, trying to keep my voice steady. "You don't sound good."

He exhales heavily, mumbling something I can’t quite make out. I shake my head, reminding myself that whatever this is, it isn’t my responsibility and I shouldn't make it mine even though I am as worried about him as anything else.

   "Please, just get some rest, okay? Go home so you don't stumble," I add, but before he can reply, I hear the deep rumble of an engine outside. 

Noah.

Panic flickers through me as I quickly end the call, shoving my phone aside as I rise to my feet. It is almost as if I am trying to hide an illicit affair from my husband - something of that dramatic type. A few seconds later, the door opens, and Noah steps in. His presence fills the room effortlessly, his cold, unreadable eyes scanning the space before landing on me.

I smile, pushing aside the lingering unease from my earlier conversation. "Welcome,"

He doesn’t resist as I approach him, his expression neutral as I take his coat and guide him toward the dining table. There’s an unfamiliar softness in his gaze, though he doesn’t say much.

   "Hmm," that's his response.

   "I made dinner for us," I chirp, unable to contain my excitement. "I had to tell Marco to leave early because I wanted to try something new," I add and quickly sit him down before I turn around the table.

But then I pause and look at him.

   "You haven't had dinner yet, have you?" I ask him and he shakes his head. That's a relief.

I quickly get down to dishing our meals as I speak softly to him, "Beatrice gave me the recipes, and I even went to the local market myself to get the ingredients. They were quite hard for me to get at the supermarket so I had no choice but to divert my journey to the local market instead." 

I serve him, watching eagerly as he takes his first bite. He chews slowly, his expression giving nothing away. My stomach knots in anticipation.

     "Well?" I ask, my voice filled with expectation. "Do you like it? How is the taste?"

Noah looks up, meeting my eyes. "It’s… quite good for the tongue."

His answer is so underwhelming that I almost laugh out. He could’ve just said it was decent, but this was Noah’s way of being slightly kinder than usual. Still, knowing him, the fact that he even acknowledged it meant more than he let on.

I smile to myself, a small warmth blooming in my chest. It might not have been a grand compliment, but it was something.

NOAH'S POV

I watch Rachel as she eagerly leads me to the table, her fingers delicately brushing against my wrist. She’s buzzing with energy, her voice animated as she tells me about her adventure at the local market.

There’s something almost amusing about the way she talks as if this meal is a masterpiece she’s been dying for me to taste. She serves the food with a proud smile, sitting across from me with anticipation clear in her eyes. I take a bite, and immediately, I know—

It’s good.

I don’t say it, though. Instead, I give her a neutral response, one that doesn’t reveal just how much I actually like it. "It’s… quite good for the tongue."

Rachel’s eyes flicker with relief, and for some reason, that makes my chest tighten. She’s so easily affected by my words, so eager to please. The way she watches me, the way she smiles—it does something to me, something I don’t entirely understand.

She keeps talking as I eat, explaining how difficult it was to find the right ingredients, how Beatrice insisted she try something different. I listen in silence, my gaze lingering on the way her lips move, the way her eyes light up.

Once I’m done eating, I push my chair back and stand. "Thank you for the meal."

Rachel’s face brightens. "You’re welcome!"

    "You don’t have to clean up," I say as I turn toward the hallway. "Marco can have the maids handle it in the morning."

   "I don’t mind cleaning up," she replies quickly. "It’s not that much as leaving it unattended to would be wrong of me."

I hesitate for a moment before nodding. Let her do whatever she wants to. Without another word, I leave the dining area and head upstairs.

Inside my room, I let out a slow breath. The shower is quick and refreshing, but even as I settle onto my bed, my mind refuses to rest. My hand reaches for my journal, the leather-bound pages familiar beneath my fingers.

I open it, letting my thoughts spill onto the paper.

Her smile.

Her voice.

The way her lips curled in satisfaction when she spoke.

Is it possible?

I flashback to my conversation with Liam a few hours after I left the company.

   "Look," he started as he placed his hand on my shoulder and shifted closer to me.

  "I am not going to tell you what to do or what not to do regarding your woman. However, as for your mindset, you need to totally change it so you can follow what your heart says."

    "What if she is like others?"

Liam frowned, "What do you mean by others? You haven't been in a real relationship except for the traumatic teenage one you had, but you can't compare your younger self to now, nor can you compare Rachel to HER. They are different people. Even though I have only met Rachel once, I can vouch for her when I say this - that girl is too simple and pure-hearted to be involved in whatever mess that you think she might do. Do you know why?"

I shook my head, "It is not her discipline and she doesn't have any valid reason to even want to do such in the first place. Listen, even if you don't want to fall in love with her, try to cooperate with her and stop treating her like your enemy — start as friends. Cooperating with her and becoming friends with her will even set your plans in motion quickly because she is going to understand your situation very much when the time comes."

Back to the present, I pause, my pen hovering over the page. My thoughts drift back to earlier—the way she looked at me when I walked through the door, the warmth in her expression, the excitement in her tone.

I exhale and write the final words of the night:

For some reason, I am always feeling the need to want to come back home because I want to see her face and hear her speak. And it feels different knowing that someone is waiting for me at home.

With that already written, I close my journal and cover myself with my bedspread.