Assuming as sunny and light an expression as she could, Gemma said, “I’ve moved about a lot, worked different jobs, lived in different parts of London.”
“Married a doctor,” Brogan added, dryly and with a twinkle in his eyes.
That brought Vera’s wide-eyed look of shock to her husband. “Married awhat?”
Brogan looked at Gemma. “Do you want to explain, or are you wanting me to?”
Gemma figuredsheought to. If she told her own history, she could decide how it was painted. “I left South London to get married.”
“You didn’t tell me you was getting married.”
Gemma rubbed the back of her neck. “We didn’t invite no one. Father didn’t approve. Making him boiling weren’t the best foot to start off on.”
Vera nodded heavily. “We were all terrified of your father.”
Gemma sighed. “I’ve heard whispers he’s dead. Likely makes me a terrible person, but I’d rather he were under the ground than on it.”
“If that makes you a terrible person, then I’m one too.”
Brogan took Vera’s hand, holding it gently but firmly.
Gemma pushed away the surge of longing she felt. Baz sometimes held her hand; he had the night before. She wanted that to mean something, but she weren’t sure it ever would.
“So you and this doctor traveled a great deal?” Vera asked.
“Just me,” Gemma said. “He ain’t a wanderer.”
“And you’ve come back to see him again?”
“For a spell.”
“All this beating around the bush is driving me batty,” Brogan said to Gemma. “She knows him. Might as well tell her flat-out who he is.”
Again, Vera looked shocked and confused and curious.
Gemma didn’t know why she was avoiding saying his name. She’d married someone who didn’t love her. That wouldn’t surprise anyone who’d ever known her. “He’s Dr. Barnabus Milligan.”
Vera looked as if she might fall over. “Doc?”
“The one and only,” Brogan said with a slight chuckle. “Our bachelor doctor, who you and m’sister have been scheming to find a wife, had one all along. And, we discovered only now, you already know her.”
Brogan might’ve found it entertaining, but Gemma didn’t. Not at all.
“It is a small world at that, i’n’it?” Gemma hoped that would end the conversation, and she jumped quickly to a new one. “Would either of you object to me making breakfast for everyone? I suspect you ain’t eaten yet, and gabbing with me is keeping you from doing so.”
Though he narrowed his eyes on her for a moment, Brogan didn’t push the matter. “That’d be kind of you.”
Gemma slipped from the room and found the small kitchen. It was little more than a worktable, some shelves, and a fire. It was enough.
She pulled from the larder a few things and began piecing together a simple meal. Under other circumstances, she’d’ve been overjoyed to cross paths with Vera Sorokina again. Losing touch with her one friend had been a sorrowful thing.
But she’d have to make this reunion brief. She wouldn’t impose on this household longer than she had to, and she’d leave them better than she’d found them. It was a life approach she’dembraced only after leaving her father’s home. He certainly hadn’t believed in that philosophy.
She had nearly finished preparing a humble soup while wandering through her own thoughts when Móirín stepped into the room.
“I’ve just had m’brother and m’sister-in-law spill a great many things into my ears,” she said. “You’re in need of a job, you know Vera from your years in South London, and you strong-armed m’brother into letting you make breakfast.”
“Oi. That’s the front and back of it.” Gemma stirred the pot hanging over the fire.