Oh shit. Had he seen them kiss? The deep furrow between his bushy brows said yes. For a moment, Susanne considered waiting for Anja, who was so much better at dealing with him. But that wouldn’t be fair, not to Anja and not to her uncle. She’d put off talking to him—really talking to him—for much too long already.

Her throat tightened as she reached for the brass handle and pulled the door open.

The jingling bell sounded like a harbinger of doom.

“Good morning. What are you doing here?” Maybe going on the offense would help. “Shouldn’t you be resting at home?”

Uncle Norbert scrunched up his nose like a little boy. “I’ve done nothing but rest for a week. I’m sick of it, and the doctor said I can go back to work if I feel up to it. At least when I’m at work, I’ll be distracted from the pain.” He walked around the counter, still moving a bit stiffly, but much better than he had last week. “Speaking of distraction, is that what you’re doing with Anja?”

Susanne stiffened and had to fight down a wave of defensiveness.

“Looking for a nice little distraction while you’re here? Because if that’s what you’re after, I suggest you look for it elsewhere.” His normally gentle blue eyes drilled into her like laser beams. “Anja is a person who feels things deeply, even if she doesn’t always show it. If you—”

“Stop it!” The words finally burst out of Susanne. “Why the hell would you assume I’m just playing with her? Why aren’t you out there”—she waved toward the coffee shop, where Anja waited for their coffees to go—“warning Anja not to hurt me? I’m your niece after all, not Anja.”

“You never behaved like it,” he murmured, his voice so low that Susanne almost didn’t catch it.

Susanne swallowed. Her rush of anger faded away. She’d hoped to avoid this conversation, but that was probably the same bullshit strategy that had estranged her from her uncle in the first place. She gathered her courage and stepped up to him. “Listen. I know I shouldn’t have stayed away for so long, but—”

“Then why did you?”

Susanne flinched. Straight to the jugular. Apparently, her uncle wasn’t always a dreamer who avoided conflict—and she would have known that if she hadn’t cut him out of her life. “I…I don’t know.”

He continued to look at her. “I know it had nothing to do with your mother forbidding you from visiting after the divorce; otherwise, Franzi would have stayed away too.”

“No, Mama would never do that.”

Uncle Norbert paled beneath his beard. “Then was it something I did?”

“No!” Susanne leaned against the counter and sighed. “It had nothing to do with you, okay? I just… I needed some distance.”