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Lou sniffed, returning to her task. “I’ll ask Maggie.”

Theo took the name and tucked it into a corner of his mind to examine later. He could control the heat crawling up his cheeks. He was the master of his emotions. He would not allow something as trivial as a woman’s name to send him into a spiral.

He felt her mouth on him, warm and safe, leaving a lingering word—home—on his skin.

Ah, fuck.

“There is another thing,” Jake said called over his shoulder. “Since you’re all here. I’ve been looking for new spaces, as asked, and it’s rather bleak at the moment. None of the available options is much bigger than here, except for the old grocer on Ryne.”

“That place was massive,” Theo replied idly, politely shaking his head as Emmy offered him a spit-soaked bit of jerky. “Mama used to take us there for overwintered vegetables.”

“That’s a very specific memory, Ted,” Jake replied. “And yes, it’s big. Nearly three times the size of this place. But I wanted to look at it anyway, just for the nostalgia if nothing else, and there was a gentleman there also viewing it, a Mr. Isaac Engelsen. We got to talking, and he told me that his family is from Germany; he was born here but his parents came over from Munich, and they want to open a delicatessen.”

“Oh, I love delicatessens,” Lou piped up. “Anytime we go to Minneapolis I make Theo take me to one near the park. The most marvelous soups, I swear.”

“Were they looking at the space for that reason?” David asked.

“They were.” Jake set up the last clean knife to dry, turning and leaning against the counter as he faced his siblings. “He was a very charming fellow. I thought maybe we could discuss joining up and splitting the space.”

“Sharing?” Theo didn’t bother to mask his surprise. “With a delicatessen?”

“It’s just an idea,” Jake shrugged. “It would certainly be unexpected. And you heard Lou; people want something simple and good. The inn is decent but it’s just Kev and Martin running it. They can’t keep up with the demand.”

“Is it a Jewish deli?” Lou asked, looking around at her siblings, who looked back with some reprimand. “What? The one Theo takes me to is so I thought this one might be, as well.”

Jake nodded. “Isaac said that they weren’t interested in keeping it kosher, though. Too few Jewish people around to make it worthwhile.”

“A delicatessen,” Theo mused. “Could be interesting.”

“Depends on the soup selection,” Lou said, apparently the final word on the subject.

Bridgers and Tom had gone through their rough patches before, of course—Maggie knew as well as anyone that the course of true love never did run smooth—but the tension in the air was thicker than she’d come to expect from one of their spats. It followed them around like a fog, clinging to passersby and muffling her thoughts.

“You two need to stop,” she hissed to Bridgers, who had just locked the front door after hustling Mrs. Risney out (“As much brocade as you think is decent!” being the final thing she had said before the door slammed in her face).

“Stop what?” He made a show of double-checking the locks.

“You’re both jabbing constantly. It’s tiring.” And upsetting. “Just stop fighting.”

“We aren’t jabbing.” Bridgers abandoned the door and strode to the back of the room, seizing a straw broom and sweeping up discarded bits of linen and lace into a neat pile. “Don’t mind us.”

“I do mind you,” she insisted, crossing her arms, “because I live with you. And you’re being terrible.”

Bridgers stopped his sweeping and sighed. “Maggie.” His mouth set into a thin line, white appearing around his lips.

“What?” Maggie put her hands on her hips, unsure exactly what stance she was trying to take. Intimidating? No. Challenging? Maybe. “Maggie, what?” Definitely challenging.

“It isn’t easy,” he said quietly. Bridgers was not a quiet man. Scathing, ribald, and outrageous, yes. Not quiet. Alarm flickered in her chest.

“What isn’t easy?”

He hesitated, fiddling with the broom handle. “Attaching your life to someone else’s. It’s work, and sometimes it’s hard and doesn’t feel … very successful.” He was staring over her shoulder, hard, and Maggie had to remember to keep her breathing even. Discomfort squirmed in her belly; she knew they were fighting, but this talk of not succeeding was uncharted territory. “And it’s lonely,” he added. “It’s very lonely, being so secretive. I wish I could … I don’t know, take him out on the town, buy us dinner somewhere. I wish I could just love him, but I can’t. Not out there.” He nodded towards the front door. “He thinks I don’t understand that, but I do. I understand that our lives are smaller than they should be.” He let out a loud breath, straightening his shoulders. “But that isn’t your concern, dove. You just focus on the work and your hobbies. Tom and I will be fine. We’re always fine.” His smile wasn’t reassuring. “I’ll finish up here. You go on upstairs and start supper, would you? Oh,” he said, suddenly. “I forgot, I’ve a letter from Pearl.” He went over to his desk, withdrawing an envelope. “We can open it once Tom gets back.”

Pearl Monet, Bridgers’ unflappable aunt. The sister to his own departed mother, Pearl was fiercely protective of her nephew, even after he told her about his equal preferences for men and women. Her husband, Jack, was some sort of higher-up in the church, and both of them presented a united front against the sort of ugliness that had hounded Bridgers and Tom for most of their lives. Pearl had established herself, without being asked, as a replacement mother for Bridgers once his passed, and the couple looked at Bridgers and Tom as another set of children. When Maggie had been embraced by the boys, she was also adopted by Pearl—unrelenting Pearl, a force for good in a cruel world, who refused not to love someone because she was told she shouldn’t.

Maggie murmured an agreement and left, climbing the stairs to the apartment and slipping into the kitchen silently. Tom was nowhere to be seen—he had a habit of nipping out for a pint before dinner, something she knew was slowly driving Bridgers insane—so she began her task of peeling potatoes, slowly dispatching them with the paring knife she knew Tom kept razor-sharp out of fear that a dull blade would somehow end up killing her. She hummed to herself as she worked, some old folk song her mother sang, and was about to move on to the carrots when the doorbell clanged. She glanced up, startled, and further jumped in her skin when Tom appeared in the kitchen.

“Good God, you scared me to death! I didn’t know you were home!”