Page 8 of Help Wanted: Wife

“Question?” he asked.

“No, and dozens,” she dodged, curious, but reluctant to pry into his personal grief.It’s none of my business.But was that true? They were going to get married. Shouldn’t she have all the facts?

He chuckled, and, in his deep laugh, she heard traces of the man he must have been, the one unscathed by tragedy. Maybe, someday, he would heal and become that man again, except she wouldn’t be here to meet him. At the end of the year, she would leave. The marriage had been intended as a stopgap, a transition period.

He led her to a garage-like bustling open-air market housed on the ground level of a cloudtopper, and the aura changed immediately. The clean, light, bright space exuded excitement and optimism. Right up front, a florist showed off his wares, huge buckets of cheerful alien blooms bursting with every color of the rainbow. She recalled how she’d adorned the gazebo with chains of flowers, how the park had been awash in spring color, and a sharp pang pierced her.

Fortunately, Larth didn’t slow but dove into the interior of the market, stopping beside a shuttered booth. “This is it!”

THE BAKERY AT COZI 2 said the sign. He tapped his wrist, and the shutters rolled up with a creak.

She fingered her own wrist, catching the gist of what was happening. “Do the chips control everything?”

“Yes. Your chip grants you access to the bakery, the apartment, and public areas. It operates the vaporator. You use it to pay for purchases and charge customers.”

A man strolling by slowed and gawked. Passersby, most of them men, had been eying them with curiosity. Everyone knows I’m his mail-order bride.“Um, when will we actually be getting married?”

“I booked an appointment with an officiant for tomorrow between breakfast and lunch. Business is slower then. If we have time after the ceremony, I’ll show you the future location.”

The booth was open now. Front display cases presented a reassuringly familiar sampling of baked goods, from breads, rolls, and muffins to pastries and pies.But what do they taste like?What kind of grain does the flour come from? Maybe it’s not even flour.

She’d brought a lot of baking stuff and ingredients she probably couldn’t use. Her boss Clifford hadinsistedon helping. He’d been like a benevolent steamroller. A guest at the wedding-that-wasn’t, he tiptoed around, his expression pitying like most everyone in Bloomhaven. But at least he didn’t gossip. Not like so many others. She couldn’t count the number of times she’d approached a group of people, and conversations shut off like a faucet.

Did you hear? He dumped her on their wedding day! How could she not know he was sleeping around? Eyes wide shut!

She could imagine what the villagers were saying.

And then there were theconcernedqueries about her well-being.How are you? How are you doing?No simple, polite chatter.Tell me the juicy detailswas what they really meant.

Despite misgivings about coming to Caradonia, escaping the humiliation brought no small measure of relief.Having people gape at me because I’m human is better than them staring at me because they pity me or they’re comparing me to the skank William ran off with.

She eyed the racks laden with baked goods. “You bakedallof that yourself? In your home kitchen?”

He nodded. “It’s the only space I have until the new site opens.”

“When do you find the time?”

“Late at night, after my shift.”

“And then you get up early and come in for the breakfast rush.”

He nodded.

“When do you sleep?”

He barked a humorless laugh. “I don’t. Since I lie awake all night anyway, I figure I may as well work.” Avoiding her gaze, he entered the booth through the side and rearranged the already neat rows of baked goods on the rack.

She’d had the opposite problem—she couldn’t drag herself out of bed.

“You’ve accomplished a lot.” She was impressed by how much he’d gotten done all by himself.

“I—we—” he amended, “will be able to do much more when we have a regular storefront. But, if not for the cozi, the bakery wouldn’t exist at all.”

“What exactly is a cozi?” The translator didn’t have a word for it.

“It stands for Caradonia Opportunity Zone Incubator. It’s a low-cost space for small businesses tohelp them get established. I owe all of this to Governor-General Krogan.”

“He established the cozis?” she guessed.

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