“I’m working.”
“You’re spiraling. I can feel it.”
“I don’t spiral.”
“You’re spiraling right now. About…” She concentrated on the bond, trying to parse the tangle of emotions. “Money? Something about money draining away?”
His expression went flat. Closed.
“Stay out of my head.”
“I’m not in your head. You’re projecting.” She turned back to her dough, kneading harder than necessary. “If you’re going to have feelings, have them quieter.”
“I’ll take that under advisement.”
The sarcasm was sharp enough to draw blood.
They worked in hostile silence for the next hour.
Marina tried to lose herself in the work. Croissants: butter folded into dough, again and again, until the layers were paper-thin. Baguettes: shaping the loaves with practiced hands, feeling the gluten stretch and resist. Her grandmother’s honey lavender scones: the recipe she knew by heart, the one that still didn’t taste quite right no matter how carefully she followed the steps.
But every few minutes, the bond would flare with another wave of Alessandro’s stress. Financial projections that made hisstomach clench. Emails that made him grip his pen too hard. A phone call he sent to voicemail that left him radiating frustration so intense Marina nearly burned her fingers on a hot pan.
“This is impossible,” she muttered.
“What is?”
“Baking while you’re having a feelings emergency every three minutes.”
“I’m not having a feelings emergency.”
“You’re having multiple feelings emergencies. I can feel them. They’re very disruptive to my croissant lamination.”
He stared at her. “Your croissant lamination.”
“It requires focus. And you are the opposite of focus.” She waved a floury hand at him. “You’re like… emotional static. Interfering with my signal.”
Something unexpected surfaced from his side of the connection. Amusement. Quickly suppressed, but genuine.
“I apologize for interfering with your signal.”
“You should.”
“I’ll try to have my existential crises more quietly.”
“That’s all I ask.”
The corner of his mouth twitched, the closest thing to a smile she’d seen from him.
Then he stood up, muttered something about finding a glass, and walked directly into her open oven door.
The pain was immediate and shared.
Marina gasped as heat lanced across her palm. Phantom pain, but vivid enough to make her drop the tray she was holding. Croissants scattered across the tile. Alessandro clutched his hand, smoke actually curling from his nostrils, and for one horrible moment she thought he might set her kitchen on fire.
“Don’t you dare,” she said.
“I wasn’t—” He breathed through his nose. The smoke dissipated. “That wasn’t intentional.”
