Chapter 1564 - 1548: Receiving Payments via WeChat Is a Problem (2)

He still remembered the buckwheat his grandfather on his mother’s side planted with his own hands when he was young, bitter with a hint of sweetness, the more you ate the more fragrant it became. Later, everything sold in the markets had lost that unique aroma.

"Wow, this is my first time eating it." Ada’s eyes sparkled, feeling that in some ways she really was a country bumpkin.

Marcus Quinn curled his lips slightly and said in a low voice, "Buckwheat isn’t grown in many places. People in the north eat noodles, people in the south eat rice, not many people eat this stuff. If we get the chance later, I can grow authentic buckwheat for you, let you have a taste."

In his later years, his grandfather on his mother’s side deliberately moved back to the ancestral house in the countryside, reclaimed quite a bit of land, hired people to cultivate five or six hundred mu. From medicinal herbs to rice, buckwheat and vegetables, everything you could think of was there. He even leased a mountain and planted all kinds of melons, fruits and vegetables, never sold them, just kept them for himself.

All year round, from rice and wheat to melons, fruits and vegetables, it was harvest season, never stopping, buzzing with life. His grandfather would take him around eating the freshest, most natural food. Whatever they couldn’t finish, the harvested produce was sent in a steady stream to the Imperial City.

Sometimes before he could even ship it out, all those uncles and elders would turn up at the door asking for produce. His grandfather might keep his face stern, but inside he was overjoyed, feeling he still hadn’t lost his touch, that these people just loved eating the food he grew.

As a teenager, he spent the happiest period of his life there, only after his grandfather passed away, he never went back again.

When Ada heard that he could grow buckwheat, she was startled yet again, thinking his childhood must have been really hard if he even had to go into the fields and farm. She couldn’t help looking at this tall man with a touch of heartache.

"Come eat." Seeing the doe-like look in her eyes, so cute it almost exploded his heart, Marcus Quinn’s lips lifted again. He carried the two bowls of noodles with meat and bones to the table, called Ada over to eat, then went to warm up a glass of milk for her.

Girls on their period can’t drink soy milk, so he bought milk instead.

Ada happily sat at the table, took a sip of the rich, milky broth. The umami flavor made her eyes curve with laughter. Then she took a bite of the buckwheat noodles, green like jade, crisp and cool with a delicate fragrance. She instantly started praising them nonstop, feeling that in her more than twenty years, she had never lived as authentically as she did in this stretch of time.

Marcus Quinn watched the little girl with her small face practically buried in the bowl, eating her buckwheat noodles. A flicker of satisfaction crossed his gaze. Ada’s appetite wasn’t big; after one bowl she couldn’t eat any more, and he finished everything left in the pot.

Ada stared at the firm, smooth lines of muscle on his arm, thinking no wonder he could eat that much—so many muscles needed fuel.

Once Marcus Quinn finished cleaning up, he started simmering the thirty jin of pig’s trotters to be supplied to Qingfeng Restaurant tomorrow. He could cook over a hundred jin a day if he wanted, but he chose to limit the supply to save trouble and effort. The boss of Qingfeng was sharp too, knew that scarcity brings value, so he promised that even if he got hold of the secret recipe someday, he’d still keep the trotters as a limited-supply dish, turning them into Qingfeng’s signature.

Marcus Quinn couldn’t be bothered with Qingfeng’s business strategy. Giving them the recipe had been a last-minute decision. After all, it was a bit of a pity that his grandfather had no one to carry things on, so if some of those home-style dishes could be passed out into the world, then so be it.

After lunch, the weather grew even hotter. The mall delivered the four-piece bedding set Marcus Quinn had bought. He set the pillows in a ventilated spot and carried the quilt up to the rooftop to sun it. Then he washed the gray-blue embroidered set and took that up to the rooftop to dry as well.

As for that red four-piece set, he ended up not taking it out again and stuffed it into the wardrobe.

When Ada saw that red bedding set, her small face flushed and then turned a little pale. Bright red—the color of a wedding. Because he’d been busy making money and Marcus Quinn was the silent type, the two of them had only talked about her staying on that second day; after that it never came up again.

So, had Marcus Quinn always thought of her as his wife? He even bought a festive red bedding set only used for weddings?

Ada felt a faint sweetness in her heart, thinking that this man was someone she could rely on. Even if they didn’t have a life of wealth and luxury, he was always hardworking and diligent, never let her go hungry, and was trying his best to give her a good life.

Her life was like three broken, disconnected segments: from more than twenty years as a rich heiress, to a dark year of captivity, and then to these plain, gentle days now. Ada felt that with her father gone, nothing in the past was worth clinging to anymore. Living an ordinary life was actually pretty good.