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streaming in the wake of her move. She landed and extended her leg in a self-conscious flourish to his applause.
    “I haven’t done that in ages,” she said when she skated back to him.
    “Then you were due,” he murmured, and reached up to claim her hand.
    Three moms with a pack of laughing, falling, shrieking kids stumbled out onto the ice. Ronan guided her into the herd now moving in a slow loop around the rink. He took advantage of the relaxed atmosphere, and said, “The second year is harder.”
    She stiffened next to him. “What?”
    “The second year of grieving. It’s harder than the first. Everyone remembers the first anniversary without a husband or the first Thanksgiving without a father. By the time the second one comes around, you’re supposed to be over it. Everyone else is, but you’re not. So it’s harder. Lonelier.”
    She’d been in his apartment, seen the folded flag in its polished mahogany box, given to him after Uncle Lance died in the South Tower on 9/11. She didn’t know he’d lost his best friend to a collapsing building three years ago, or how long it took him to emerge from that fog.
    Until right around St. Patrick’s Day, in fact.
    “It’s easier to act like I’ve moved on,” she said finally. “No one understands. I don’t meet their expectations. Half the time people say I’ve gotten this great second chance to find love all over again, like Jesse was a starter house with a cracked foundation and a badly designed kitchen.”
    He controlled his wince. “It gets worse around the holidays, especially if they were a big deal,” he said as they glided past Prometheus, gleaming even in the darkness, carrying light and flame in his hand.
    Her gaze remained forward. “We’re both from big Catholic families, so it was a huge deal. Cookies and presents and caroling, and Advent candles everywhere. We did it up right for the nieces and nephews. Jesse used to leave bells in the snow, like they fell off the reindeers’ harnesses, and get the kids to find them Christmas morning. We got engaged on Christmas,” she said, a little stiffly. “He went down on one knee and proposed in front of his whole family.”
    “Sounds romantic,” he said, then caught her sidelong glance. “It does.”
    “It’s awkward to talk to the guy I’m sleeping with about my romantic-minded husband.”
    “Not for me.”
    She considered this for one loop of the rink, then continued. “He died the Wednesday after Thanksgiving. I had to come home early to get back to work. End of year, and a big implementation just before the holidays, which always go wrong and always suck. He was driving back in a storm. A big SUV going too fast for the road conditions skidded into an overpass. His Prius got caught between the Tahoe and the concrete.”
    He’d worked enough bad car wrecks for her words to bloom into vivid images, and this time he did wince. She didn’t seem to notice. “His mother wanted to do Christmas for the grandkids, and she’s old-school Catholic, convinced he’s in a better place. She lit candles for him. I...didn’t take it well.”
    He knew too well the torrential, monumental grief under the clipped phrases. “I’m sorry,” he said.
    “I’m not...good with emotions. Hence the therapist my family insisted I see when I moved.” The fingers of her free hand drifted up to her ear. “I loved him. I loved him like I’ve never loved anyone or anything else.”
    And that kind of once-in-a-lifetime love would never come around again. That was the thought she didn’t say.
    “He sounds like a great guy,” Ronan said finally. He knew better than to get in a battle with a dead man. He’d lose. Or worse, he’d win and in the process defeat something vital in Thea. “Want to get going? We can pick up hot chocolate on the way to the subway. Your great quadruple lutz earned it.”
    “Single toe loop,” she said, amused.
    “I knew that.”
    They skated to the exit and tottered into the