Chapter 191: She Wasn’t Hiring Herself a Boss

Iris sat across from Dove at the outdoor counter while Thorne brought water. Edrik stayed inside arranging recovered goods, close enough to hear if she wanted him but not pretending every conversation required his shoulders in it.

"The morning time is convenient for my kitchens," Iris admitted. "That doesn’t mean it’s the only time food can arrive."

"Two visits a week," Dove said. "Ask what I’ve got before you plan dinner around it. If I’m out looking for more, you wait until I’m back."

Sprout opened her stock list privately, including every container she owned.

"Not the ones for our food," she told it. "Those stay mine."

"Excluding household stock."

Iris studied the shelves. Dove waited without filling the silence with a better offer. She used to do that at work, apologize until other people’s problems became hers. Apparently dying had improved one habit.

"You’d turn down the larger order?" Iris asked.

"The machine can sell while I eat. It can’t pack your delivery and drive it over. I’m not waking up wondering who gets to be angry if I want a day off."

Iris looked toward the street, where a kitchen runner waited beside the car. "Fair. I should have asked before letting my schedule become the obvious one."

Iris crossed out the morning times and wrote down the two visits Dove could manage. She would ask what Dove had before sending a runner, and Dove would tell her if a batch wasn’t available. The kitchen could plan its meals without planning Dove’s whole damn life.

Iris chose recovered containers and clean cloths for her first order. Dove kept her favorite pieces back without apologizing, then watched Iris’s runner load the rest. The counter had brought her a regular buyer, and she still owned her mornings. She wanted to hug it again, but Edrik was already looking jealous.

After Iris left, Thorne came around the counter and rested his hands lightly at Dove’s waist. "You look pleased."

"I told somebody I like no and she still likes me. I’m considering doing it more often."

Edrik leaned in the doorway. "Please do. It’s one of your best habits."

"You like it when I do it to other people."

"I like it when you mean it."

That answer made her quiet long enough for Thorne to kiss her hair. She had expected a joke. Edrik’s expression said he knew, and that he had meant to answer anyway.

Sprout closed the day’s record at fourteen hundred and twenty-five normal coins and one hundred and thirty-five Favor. Nineteen new Favor included the day’s genuine reactions and the single mate extra. No screen kits remained for a retention fee. Dove checked the total, then shut the menu before it could suggest a purchase to celebrate managing her time.

The awning pulled sideways when the wind changed. Dove wanted to understand the fix before their next trip, so she asked Thorne to show her instead of doing it while she fetched dinner.

He touched the old metal fitting and used his power to open its bent curve. Edrik reinforced the sound frame beneath his palm while she loosened the fastener. Thorne shaped the replacement around the support, leaving the hole clear for her bolt. Dove turned it the wrong way once, swore at herself, then got it seated.

They released their powers before testing the finished work. It held. Thorne tried a slower adjustment on the discarded clip afterward, while Edrik practiced sustaining reinforcement without clenching his whole arm. Dove could see the difference between effort and panic now, even if she couldn’t feel the magic herself.

"Look at that," she said when the shade sat properly. "Three adults and nobody needed to be decorative."

Edrik looked her over. "You managed both."

She tried to glare at him and failed when Thorne started laughing. Her tail brushed his leg as she went past, and his hand caught hers just long enough for a kiss before he let her return to the shop.

Dove kept the tool and checked the fitting herself. The old clip had bent under the sideways pull; the new one sat square. Now she knew what to look for before it failed, instead of waiting for a husband to point it out.

"Could one of your books help with this?" she asked Sprout.

"The development books build on their existing powers. They don’t replace practice."

"Neither do compliments, but watch this." She caught Thorne’s hand. "That was good. Show me the slow part again later?"

His ears lifted before he answered. Edrik watched him with a grin, then held out his own dusty hand.

"Oh, you’re unbearable," she told him, kissing his knuckles anyway.

She washed her hands before handling food, then caught Edrik reaching for the bread and sent him to wash his too. His slow smile suggested he enjoyed being ordered around when dinner and a kiss might follow. Dove told him not to encourage her unless he meant it, and he said nothing that sounded like a warning.

Dinner was ample and ordinary, food they’d bought or recovered and used while it was good. Dove chose a sweet drink from their personal supplies and refused to share the first sip. Edrik waited until she finished enjoying it before stealing the second, which she considered rude enough to justify stealing a piece of his dinner.

Later, Dove opened her training manual to the movement she kept rushing. She wanted to see where her first step should land before trying it again. She asked Edrik where her feet had gone wrong that morning. He explained using the clear space beside the bed, moving slowly while Thorne watched from his chair.

Dove tried the step without a grip first. Then she asked for the controlled practice hold. On the third attempt she made space cleanly enough that she grinned before she could stop herself.

"That’s the one," Edrik said.

She caught his shirt and kissed him before he could start the next correction. Edrik’s hand settled at her back, careful and warm, and the lesson slipped from her mind for a moment. She liked being the one who distracted him.

When they put the book away, Thorne reminded her the rent period ended after tomorrow night. Day Ninety-Nine would be their last paid day unless they renewed. Dove had not forgotten, but hearing it inside the comfortable room made the choice feel different.

They had rejected one vehicle, accepted a smaller trade schedule, and found a way to make the shop work better. Leaving now would be a choice, not an order.

Dove looked at the postcard above the bed, then at her husbands. "I want to stay long enough to leave properly," she said.

She had once packed her whole life because someone else decided she couldn’t stay. Tomorrow she would ask for fourteen nights and a place to come back to. Then there was the other choice she kept putting off: whether she was ready to face the man who should have stopped that from happening.