She almost missed it.
They were on the drive back — the city going past the windows in its Saturday afternoon version, busy and bright, the lake visible between the buildings as they moved north. She was looking at the city and thinking about the morning — about the blue door and the pancakes and the way he’d said I loved that about him with the specific past tense that still had weight in it.
He said it quietly. Not to her exactly — more to the road, to the afternoon, to the space that sometimes held things more safely than a direct address.
“I want to build something with you,” he said. “Not just the consultancy. Not just the building.” A pause. “Everything. Permanently. With your name on it.”
She turned to look at him.
He was watching the road. His jaw was set with the specific qua
