“I hope you understand why I couldn’t be with you today. Things are bad.” Philip threw up a hand. “I mean, everywhere you look. Nate. Melissa’s disappearance. People choking to death on their own phlegm. A city that’s become a ghost town.” The raised hand curled into a fist. It knocked twice on his forehead. “I don’t know what to do anymore.”

As much as Imani wanted to ask questions, she forced herself to think like a therapist. Her husband’s identity was melded with his career. Closing his restaurant had to feel like excising a limb.

She reached for the hand engaged in the mock beating. “No one could have anticipated all that’s happened. You’ve done the best possible.”

Philip dropped his fists to his sides. He looked longingly at his scotch.

“Don’t worry,” she continued. “We’ll manage. We have my salary and our savings, and we only have the property taxes on the house. We’ll—”

“We owe on the house.”

For the second time, Imani had trouble processing the words she’d so clearly heard. They couldn’t owe on their home. Philip had inherited the place free and clear from his parents. When she’d met him, he’d been treating his childhood residence as a flophouse, letting rooms to other guys working their way up in kitchens like himself. But that hadn’t been about paying any mortgage. He’d wanted to fill the vacancies left by his folks and earn extra spending cash. Debt had never been an issue with the house.

“We can’t keep this place, you mean. You want to sell it?”

Philip drained the rest of his whiskey. He poured another as he spoke. “Remember when I revamped the restaurant and added Coffre? I took out a loan—a home equity line of credit. I thought I’d have paid it off by now, but the refresh didn’t bring in the level of new business that I’d hoped, and then the pandemic hit and Coffre had to close. Nearly every penny over the past year has gone toward the lease and staff salaries. There’s been nothing left over to pay down the debt.”

Imani placed a hand on the counter, concerned that her knees might buckle. After eighteen years of living together, surely the carriage house was as much her place as his. How could he have taken out a loan and not told her?

“How much is the mortgage?”

“Six grand a month.”