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“They’re already screaming outside.”

The sound reaches us in muffled bursts whenever someone catches sight of me through the glass. Mostly women and teenage girls, phones raised, bouncing on their toes behind the stanchions security set up before we arrived. A good piece of Chicago appears to have decided to reorganize its day.

“They can scream outside,” I tell her. “Outside doesn’t contain thirty rescue cats with varying trauma histories.”

“Thirty-four.” Maisie jerks her chin toward the back. “Four cleared this morning. I moved them into transition rooms.”

Of course she did. Every event I’ve ever done here ends in an adoption rush. People come because an idiot with tattoos makes pastries on the internet and leave after falling in love with a three-legged tabby named Pickles.

Security has the rules posted outside in enormous lettering: indoor voices, no flash photography, no tapping on glass, no picking up a cat without staff approval, sanitize before and after handling, and if a cat walks away, let it walk away.

The last line is newer than the rest. Big, bold, purple.

DO NOT TOUCH THE PASTRY CHEF.

I stop. Beside me, Jubilee studies the floor with sudden intense interest. “You did this?”

She beams. “I added it while you were unloading the cats.”

Something warm pulls tight behind my ribs. I hook an arm around her waist and kiss her temple. “Thank you, Princess.”

She bumps her hip into mine. “Oh, don’t be too impressed. I have to protect my own self-interest.”

“I fully support your endeavors.”

I lift my phone before she can turn back toward the crowd. The livestream has already climbed into six figures, hearts and stars bursting up the side of the screen too fast to read. “Ready?”

She glances through the glass. A dozen girls notice her at once, pointing with excited shouts. One woman grabs both of her friend’s arms and starts jumping. Phones snap toward the window.

Jubilee’s whole face lights. Not polite or guarded. It’s incandescent. She waves. The sidewalk loses its collective mind.

The sound punches through the glass even with the door shut, and Jubilee laughs so hard she ducks her head, her bow bobbing. The red plaid of her skirt catches the afternoon light, and judging by the livestream, the autumn leaves on her stockings have become an international emergency.

OMG she’s so PRETTY!

That skirt????!

I need those stockings.

She’s bringing BOWS back

CONFIRMED CONFIRMED CONFIRMED

The GIRL is REAL

I angle the phone toward her. “There appear to be opinions.”

She leans in to read, touching my forearm. “They like my stockings.”

“That’s what you’ve taken from this?”

“They’re excellent stockings.”

“They lower my productivity levels.”

“Very effective stockings.”

Chuffing a laugh, I guide her to the reserved corner table, close enough to the front windows for people outside to see us, but staff can still work without navigating a live-action romance reveal.