Borrowed Time

Chapter 105

Cooking was something that relaxed Juliette when she was doing it mostly on her own... But something about cooking for Gianna and Esme made her a little anxious, and maybe that was just because she wanted to make sure she repaid Gianna for all of her generosity in letting her stay here... If she wouldn't let her pay rent, the least she could do was help out in any way that she possibly could.

And this was one way that she was very well practiced at, one way that could be very helpful to her... Who wanted to cook after working for 18 hours? Though now that she thought about it, she wasn't sure how much work she was getting done as Francesca's personal assistant... It kind of just sounded like a loophole for her to have to accept money from her for things...

Which Juliette respected.

"When is your mom getting home from work?" Juliette asked, and Esme grimaced for a moment, clearly trying to remember what their mother had said... Juliette couldn't either, so she could hardly blame them... Esme did have the better memory out of the two of them, but still.

Memory was something that was difficult for most people, at least that was what Juliette assumed... and if anyone told her differently, she was gonna choose to simply not believe them.

"Uh... 10 minutes? Something like that... The table is set, the sides are started... She asked to do the main dish, but I've got everything set out and ready to do if she doesn't want to." Esme said, and Juliette gave them a look... Out of the two of them, she was the better cook, and if they wanted this to be a really good meal, she should cook it.

Esme was great at comfort meals, she was great at following the recipe and having things come out how they were meant to come out, and that was something that they needed to make sure that they did with this.

"You mean I'll do it." Juliette clarified, and Esme gave her a look... An adorable one, almost pleading. Their eyes were great for that, they probably had the best puppy-dog eyes on the entire planet, it made it almost impossible to say no to them and they knew it.

But Juliette was going to hold strong on this one, she had the ability to do that.

"But-." Nope. Not happening... Very cute, very hard to ignore, but it still wasn't gonna happen for them.

"I'm the better cook, baby." She slid a hand over the side of their face, making them look down at her as she shook her head, an involuntary smile spreading across her face... So damn handsome. "You're a very skilled person just... Not in the kitchen." She murmured, and Esme chuckled, raising an eyebrow as they did... So fucking pretty.

"Damn..." Esme let out a chuckle that made Juliette's heart race, one that made her mouth feel almost dry... There were several different tones that they put behind chuckles and laughs, this one was the one that nearly drove her to her knees every single fucking time. "Well... Okay." They mumbled, and Juliette squinted... They were cutting the vegetables perfectly... Everything was the same size, there were no hack marks... When had they learned how to properly do this?

"Wait..." She said, and Esme turned around, setting down their knife for a moment to give her their full attention... Which Juliette could mostly handle, even if it made her cheeks feel hot.

"What?" They asked, sounding innocent even though they were clearly fucking hiding something... She jutted her chin towards their cutting board, narrowing her eyes.

"Since when can you do prepwork?" Juliette asked, and Esme got a large grin on their face as they turned around, setting the knife down as they leaned against the counter. Something in their posture made Juliette's knees weak... God, their smile was always so hot when it got all cocky, she could hardly control herself around them... But that was normal.