He came at eight exactly.
I opened the door before he knocked — the mate bond's navigation, which I had stopped apologizing for — and he was standing in the corridor in his coat with the specific quality he had when he'd been managing something all day and had set it down to be here.
He looked at my face.
"You're okay," he said. Not a question. Assessment.
"I'm okay," I said. "Come in."
He came in.
He did not immediately bring up Yvaine. He did not ask me to process it further. He went to the kitchen, found the food Sable had sent — a container of something that smelled like the east side's version of comfort, warm and complex — and he plated it without being asked and put it on the table.
We ate.
At some point I said: "I read it four times."
"I know," he said. "I read it twice. T
