I grin. “Ha.”
His eyes lift. “What?”
“You like it.”
“It is adequate.”
“Oh, honey, that was not an adequate face.”
Darlene, passing behind me with a coffee pot, mutters, “That was a man seeing the Precursors in pastry form.”
Kauss glances at her. “You are Darlene.”
She stops. “I am.”
“Your smoking near the rear fuel line is unsafe.”
The bakery goes dead silent again, but for a very different reason.
Darlene’s eyes narrow into slits. “Excuse me?”
I slowly put one hand over my mouth.
Kauss continues with absolute seriousness. “The line casing is old. If pressure fluctuates, ignition risk increases.”
Darlene plants one hand on her hip. “Are you lecturing me in my own bakery?”
“It is not your bakery.”
“Oh, he’s brave,” Renn whispers from a nearby table.
I cough into my hand. “Kauss, Darlene has smoked in that exact spot since before I was born.”
“That does not make it safe.”
Darlene stares at him for another long second. Then, to my astonishment, she turns to me and says, “I hate that he’s right.”
I lose the battle and laugh, which hurts badly enough that I grab my ribs and make a sound somewhere between a wheeze and a dying kettle.
Kauss immediately stands, the stool shrieking in relief beneath him. “You are hurt.”
“I’m fine,” I gasp.
“You are not.”
“She laughed,” Darlene says. “People do that.”
“Her ribs are bruised.”
“Her sense of humor is also bruised, but we soldier on.”
Kauss remains standing, looming over the counter with concern carved into every hard line of his body. I press a palm to my ribs and breathe carefully until the pain fades.
“Sit down,” I tell him.
“You should sit.”
“I am sitting.”
